Embroidery do's and dont's
How do you get the best embroidery results on your garments? Here are tips and frequently asked questions to help
1. What sort of Artwork do I need?
It all starts with your logo artwork file. Make sure you provide a vector file or a quality high definition PDF or JPEG file (The small logo from your website is NOT suitable).
2.Why do I get charged for set up when I already have a logo?
Your logo or design is recreated for embroidery in a highly specialized process called digitizing, where qualified embroidery personnel re-design your logo to allow embroidery machines to understand the required needle paths. The files created can only be read by an embroidery machine.
3. What size do I ask for or get?
This is really subject to the position of the embroidery and size of the garment. The minimum height for quality embroidered lettering is 4-5mm.
The letters or words in your logo may need to be increased in size to accommodate the minimum height requirement.
Each product has an average or maximum height requirement because of the product’s physical size limitations or simply for aesthetic reasons. Different embroidery files are created for each product type. The designs vary in size, stitch density, and embroidery sequence. Your one graphic logo can have multiple embroidery design files.
4. Can I get accurate colours that match my logo?
Graphic design often uses Pantone or CMYK colours, this is a process of mixing various tints together in different percentages to achieve multiple shades. Unfortunately, this is not possible in solid thread colours and many times an embroiderer can only get close to a colour match but not an exact match.
Shading is also not always possible in embroidery, shading using 2 distinct thread colours (eg blue and green) often results in a solid line at the point of colour change rather than a blend.
5. What stitch should I have?
There are many different stitch types and stitch effects, speak to your embroiderer who will have experience on what works and doesn't.
6. How is embroidery charged?
Charging is calculated by stitch count. The stitch count is the number of stitches used to embroider a logo or design. Large logos can be over 60,000 stitches and can take more than an hour to complete. On average a standard left chest embroidery would be between 3,000 and 5,000 stitches and take around 20 minutes to complete. Set up of your logo will indicate number of stitches.
7. Logo position options.
Traditionally, logos are embroidered on the left chest. You can also choose the right chest, below the rear collar, or larger back embroidery. If budget allows, consider embroidering more than one position, such as the logo on the left chest and the anniversary date on the sleeve. Mix it up! Each position required will attract another embroidery fee.
8. How quickly can embroidery be done?
Provide a clear deadline and always consider scheduling or delivery requirements. Give us time to digitize an excellent, quality-tested embroidered design. Remember, it is not the same or as quick as printing.
