How to Price Embroidery: Stitch Count, Setup, Calculator

The common way to price embroidery is by stitch count: a rate per 1,000 stitches, with a minimum per piece, plus a one-time digitizing fee for each new design. It's simple to quote, but whether it pays depends on your machine. On a single-head machine the operator is tied up while the design runs, so the machine's minutes are the biggest cost; on a multi-head machine those minutes are shared. In the example below, an 8,000-stitch left-chest logo takes about 13 minutes a piece. At $1 per 1,000 stitches it sells for $8; on a single head it costs $5.49 to sew and leaves $2.51, and on a four-head machine it costs $2.02 and leaves $5.98. Below is the stitch-count method, what a piece really costs, setup and digitizing, quantity breaks, and a free calculator.

The short version

• The usual quote: stitch count ÷ 1,000 × your rate, with a minimum per piece, plus digitizing once per design.
• Machine minutes = stitches ÷ stitches a minute, plus trims and color changes.
• On one head, the operator waits out the run, so labor follows the machine's minutes.
• Thread and backing are pennies; the minutes are the cost.
• Spread each order's setup over its pieces; small orders cost more a piece.
• Charge digitizing separately; it's per design, not per piece.
• TaroStack keeps blanks and thread counted and orders against stock. More below.

The stitch-count method

Bayside Embroidery Co., a made-up embroidery shop in Mobile, Alabama, I use in these examples, quotes $1 per 1,000 stitches with a $6 minimum a piece. An 8,000-stitch left-chest logo is $8 a piece; a 20,000-stitch back design is $20. Digitizing, turning the customer's logo into a stitch file, costs $40 once per design, and is charged separately so a reorder doesn't pay it again.

What a piece really costs

The machine sews about 700 stitches a minute, so 8,000 stitches take 11.4 minutes, plus about 2 minutes of trims and color changes. Hooping, unhooping and trimming threads take the operator about 3 minutes a piece.

On one head, the operator can't hoop the next piece fast enough to keep busy while a 13-minute design runs, so the whole run is labor. On four heads, four pieces sew at once and the same minutes are split four ways. That's why a per-1,000 rate that works for a shop with a multi-head machine can leave a single-head shop short. How to put your own time into a price is in how to price handmade items.

Setup, digitizing and quantity breaks

Setup is the same 20 minutes for six pieces or a hundred, so small orders cost more a piece. A shop on a single head can raise its rate, raise the minimum, add a setup charge for small orders, or price from cost. Big designs pay better under the stitch-count method: a 20,000-stitch back design costs $12.23 to sew on one head and sells for $20. How cost-plus pricing works is in cost plus pricing example.

Garments

Customers often bring their own shirts; the prices above are for embroidering them. When the shop supplies the blanks, the garment is bought at its cost, marked up for the handling and the risk of a ruined piece, and added to the embroidery price. A misplaced logo on a customer's own jacket is a cost the shop pays, so a spare or two in a big order of supplied blanks is worth pricing in. How to price for shops that resell your work is in how to price handmade items for wholesale.

Get the calculator

Download the embroidery pricing calculator. Type the stitch count, machine speed and heads, extra minutes for trims, operator minutes and rate, machine cost an hour, thread and backing, setup minutes, order size, digitizing fee, your rate per 1,000 stitches and minimum, and the margin you want. It works out the machine and operator minutes, the cost a piece, the stitch-count price and what it leaves, a cost-based price and the order total. It's an ordinary Excel file with no macros, and it works in Google Sheets, LibreOffice and Numbers.

Where this stops working

A shop that supplies blanks keeps polos, hats and hoodies in a dozen sizes and colors, thread in fifty colors, and backing by the roll, and takes orders from teams, companies and walk-ins. A sheet can't say whether there are 24 navy mediums for Friday's order, which thread colors are running low, or what the last order really earned.

How TaroStack does it

TaroStack keeps blanks and thread counted and orders against stock.

Blanks and thread in stock. Each blank, by style, size and color, is an item, counted on a phone and kept at what you paid, and units convert: thread bought by the cone, backing by the roll.

Orders against stock. Customer orders are sales orders that show whether the blanks to fill them are on the shelf while you're still typing, so a 24-polo order doesn't find eleven mediums. Each embroidered product is a recipe of its blank, backing and thread, so a finished order takes them off stock.

And what each order earns. The reorder list works in days of cover against each supplier's lead time, and margins are reported by product and by customer, so the team order that took all week and paid little shows up.

Recipes, sales orders, counting and margins by product and customer are on every plan, from $49 a month. The first 30 days are free, with no credit card. If you'd like a hand setting up, ask, and we'll do it with you.

Questions people also ask

How much should I charge per 1,000 stitches?

Set it from what a piece costs you on your machine, with a minimum per piece. In the example, $1 per 1,000 leaves $2.51 on an 8,000-stitch logo sewn on a single head and $5.98 on a four-head machine.

How do you price embroidery by stitch count?

Divide the stitch count by 1,000 and multiply by your rate, with a minimum per piece. An 8,000-stitch design at $1 per 1,000 is $8.

Should I charge a digitizing fee?

Yes, once per design: it's the work of turning a logo into a stitch file, and a reorder of the same design shouldn't pay it again. The example charges $40.

Why do small embroidery orders cost more per piece?

Setup, threading the colors and a test sew, takes the same time for 6 pieces as for 100. In the example, it adds $1.11 a piece to an order of 6 and 7 cents to an order of 100.