Dye Sublimation Business - Pricing for Phone Cases
Basic cell phone covers however are just so simple, there is no need to spend hours researching what others are doing because few are doing anything online and all the individual dealers are within a few dollars of each other.
The answer?
$20 to $25. That’s the magic number for a basic cell phone cover with a photo or monogram on it. It comes mostly from the prices charged in the malls. There are countless kiosks in every mall selling all kinds of cell phone covers and they do quite well. Most covers hover around $20. Sure, there is the occasional $9.95 job or even the $24.95 model with seventeen tons of sequins on it but most hover around $20. And remember, these are not personalized, just decorated in some fashion.
Our phone covers are special. At $20, we are giving the customer a quality phone cover with added value – personalization. So, if you are charging something in the range of 20 bucks for your phone covers, you’re in the ballpark.
Now, let’s consider how to sweeten the deal:
We are already adding value with personalization (personalized products have, for years, been the No. 1 selling product in the USA) but let’s take a lesson from the infomercial and make the offer even more irresistible.
Two for the price of one?
No, we don’t have to do that, nor should we but…we can offer a second cover for a reduced price. With covers costing us between $4 and $5 each, offering two covers for $35, doesn’t hurt us a bit. In fact, it adds about $15+ profit to the mix that we probably wouldn’t get otherwise. Note the TV infomercials always make a third offer of some kind so we can too. How about three covers for just $45?
Of course, you can set your own prices for these but idea is simple – by offering reduced prices, you can get the customer thinking about what they can do with additional covers: Extra covers for themselves for a million reasons, a gift for a friend or relative or one for their spouse.
One of the very few companies that has a mall location and does sublimation is Cafe-Press in Louisville, Kentucky. They offer a variety of covers and have actually joined with one of the manufacturers of phone covers and done some real world experimentation with phone covers.
Conde has also done some research of their own and although these aren’t scientific in any way, they do show a couple things we need to know.
1. Although people like buying and having multiple phone covers, they seem to prefer having totally separate covers, not a cover with multiple inserts.
Why? Don’t know.
2. Although most dealers think people want photographs on their personalized phone covers, about 50% actually prefer a design with their monogram instead.
Surprised? I was.
3. The most difficult phone cover to compete with is the so-called indestructible Otter-Box. This cover claims to protect the phones so they can be dropped with “no worries”. Conde offers several covers made from rubber. Although these may not compare to the Otter-Box in actual testing, they do offer some protection without the bulkiness of the Otter-Box which people usually hate.
4. NFC is a term you need to know! It applies to any iPhone released after the 6, 6+, and the Galaxy
5. NFC is “Near Field Communications” or you may know it as iPay. This allows the user to wave their phone over a device at retailers and automatically transfer money from their bank account or credit card account to pay for goods. It has been around for several years didn’t take off until the iPhone 6 was introduced.
Still, there are problems but they will be resolved and NFC will quickly become an everyday thing.
Here is what you need to know: NFC will not work if a phone cover has a metal back.
Thus, you can tout that your phone covers (purchased from Conde) will have no problem with NFC. Conde’s backs for these newest smartphones use a special plastic insert.
Starting out doing phone covers can be a daunting task. Not because they are difficult, they aren’t. In fact, there isn’t anything easier to make than an insert for a phone cover. The problem is there are so many of them. Conde offers at least 70 different phone covers. Trying to offer all of these right off the bat can make your head swim! Add to that the fact that many of them come with a choice of gold, silver or white inserts and inventory suddenly gets out of control.
Here’s my suggestion: Look at the Conde website page for phone cases.
Immediately, you can eliminate the Malaga since those are cloth fold-over cases and although you will probably want to offer those, they can be held on the back burner for now. To get a better handle on the remaining covers, break them down by phone. You will need covers for the newest phones. These are different size phones so there require different covers. You will also want to stock a supply of covers for the previous iPhone since there are still a ton of those being used.
Here is an overview of cases currently available from Conde: There are two basic manufacturers: UNISUB and Conde. Both are good covers but different. Perhaps you will want to carry both or specialize in only the Conde cases since there is a wider selection. Some covers are made with rubber while others are hard plastic. A few come in colors other than black and white and at least one comes in two pieces that snap together allowing interchangeable inserts.
Finally, you will need to download background designs and the monogram font for those desiring monograms. There are a ton of these so be careful – the larger the selection you offer your customer, the longer it takes for them to make a decision and when too many choices are offered, customers can become frustrated and will just walk away rather than making a decision at all. You don’t have to print actual samples of all these designs. A printed sample in a 3-Ring binder is adequate but always have at least two binders since you don’t want to make a customer wait for someone else who is looking through your sample book.