When you are thinking of purchasing Embroidery Design Software, it is a large investment that you make for your embroidery business. You want to be assured that you are getting the most embroidery software for the least amount of money! There are 3 primary scenarios that will cause you to be searching for new embroidery software.
- New to embroidery and this is your first business!
- You already have a business, such as a screen printing business and you are adding embroidery to your product offerings!
- You been in the embroidery business for a period of time and you upgrading your current software?
When you are new to embroidery, thinking about adding embroidery to your current business or upgrading your services you have to make a big decision as to which embroidery software you are going to purchase. The main questions on your mind are how can I get the most software and tools with the least amount of money and how do I know that I have the right software?
Do Not Choose The Most Inexpensive Embroidery Software
Many new embroiderers make the mistake of looking for the most inexpensive embroidery software on the market, thinking that embroidery software is embroidery software. They all work the same! This is what I thought and with such a tight budget, I did make the wrong decision and as a result, I spent a lot more money than I would have if I had done some more research on my own.
Many embroidery software companies will tell you that their software is the best and that you can create any type of design with it, but when you take a closer look at it, you may be in for a real surprise! Most embroidery software suppliers offer several levels within their software. If you purchase their highest level, it may do everything that you want, but you may not need their highest level to accomplish what you want to do.
You Do Not Need The Highest Level Of Embroidery Digitizing Software
After several years of editing designs I decided that purchasing embroidery design software was the right move to take so that I could digitize my own designs. When I was shopping for digitizing software I was told by salespeople from 2 of the top embroidery software suppliers that I needed to have the highest level of their embroidery software, which was their most expensive software level. If I had any plans for digitizing for other people I would not have enough tools in the lower levels to do everything that my customers would be asking for. I believed them thinking that they definitely knew a lot more about it than I did.
At that time, I was not sure if I was going to be digitizing for anyone else or not, but I thought that I should be prepared to do so. That was a big mistake!
Before you start shopping for your embroidery software, there are several questions that you need to ask yourself and have firmly thought out and written down in your business plan. Each brand of software will offer different tools in their various levels.
- Do you plan to offer digitizing to your customers?
- Will you be sending designs to a digitizer?
- Do you plan to do your own digitizing?
- Are you going to offer stock designs from the stock design companies?
- Will you be editing stock designs?
- What is your budget for the software?
If you are just starting out with embroidery and are planning on learning how to digitize right away, you will need that capability within your software, however, you do not need to purchase the highest level in order to be able to digitize. In many of the embroidery software packages they have most of the basic tools that you need to learn how to digitize. You need to learn the basics and thoroughly understand them before you start working with the more advanced tools.
Too many people want to jump right into the advanced steps of digitizing before they have learned the basics and when it comes to solving a problem with a design, they have no idea as to how to approach that problem.
Upgrade Your Embroidery Software When You Are Ready For The Next Level
You can upgrade as you progress through your learning curve and are ready for the next level in your education. Some of the embroidery machine suppliers offer a discounted price for the embroidery design software when you purchase a machine and software at the same time. At this point it makes sense to purchase a little more or a higher level than you will be using at the beginning.
If you plan to send all of your designs out to a digitizer you will only need an embroidery package software that will allow you to set up lettering and add stock designs to it. You want to make sure though that you have good editing capabilities within that software. This is extremely important. This is something that is not always covered when you are talking to salespeople about which software you need to purchase. I just want you to be fully aware of that fact.
Look For Design Editing Capabilities
Some of the embroidery lettering packages will not allow you to edit the lettering; you can only create your basic lettering. If you want to do any editing, then you have to purchase additional software. I have found that some embroidery design lettering packages do not even offer editing software. You then have to purchase another brand in order to do any editing and they are not always compatible. This is a very inefficient way to create your designs and a huge time waster.
You are better off purchasing embroidery design software at a lower level of one of the higher end software packages that will allow you to upgrade as you grow your business and increase in your editing skills. You want to stay within the same brand of software for each one of your levels. This will give you a better end result for your designs.
It is great to have all of the bells and whistles in your embroidery software but if you are not going to be using them, it is a waste of your money. I found though years of experience, that I did not use the advanced tools until I had been digitizing for many years. I only used them as a source to speed up my digitizing, but they did not increase any of my skill level. Without that basic knowledge and skill level along with the thorough understanding of the embroidery process, all of the extra bells and whistles were totally useless to me.
Before you think of purchasing embroidery design software, thoroughly analyze your situation and do a lot of research. Ask other embroiderers and digitizers their opinions. Do not just take the word of the software salespeople. If you have an embroidery coach or mentor, get their opinion. They can usually help you to make a decision that will save you time and money based on their relationship with you and their knowledge of your situation.
It is easy to get caught up in all of the hype from each of the software companies but when it comes down to making that final decision it can a tough one. You always want to get the most software tools for the least amount of money, but in the end, that wrong decision can be very costly in both time and money!