Service area · Chicago, Illinois

DTF transfers for Chicago, printed thirty miles away

Most of the transfers on Chicago’s cutting tables were printed in Texas, Florida or Guangdong and spent a week in transit. Ours are printed in Schaumburg, roughly thirty miles northwest of the Loop, and reach the city by ground the next business day.

What that actually changes

It changes what you can say yes to. A boutique in Wicker Park that gets a corporate order on Monday can have pressed shirts on Thursday. A label doing a Friday drop can reprint the design that sold out on Tuesday instead of writing off the week. A screen-print shop with a forty-piece order too small to burn screens for can push it to DTF and still hit the customer’s date.

None of that is possible on a five-to-eight day economy ship, which is what the cheapest national suppliers put on their free shipping. They print same day and then hand it to the slowest truck available. The print speed is real and the delivery is not.

Who we print for in the city

• Small apparel labels. Pilsen, Logan Square, Avondale, Bridgeport: people running twenty to two hundred pieces a drop who need this batch to match the last one. Our profiles are locked, so a design reordered in March prints the same in September.
• Screen printers, for the jobs below their minimum. Nobody wants to burn four screens for thirty shirts. DTF takes the short runs, the full-colour ones and the samples, and leaves the long runs where they belong.
• Boutiques and gift shops putting their own neighbourhood on a sweatshirt. Our Chicago and Great Lakes collection exists for exactly this and it is the collection we expect to reorder most.
• Event and hospitality merch. Breweries, venues, restaurants with a staff tee and a rack by the register. Usually small, usually late, usually needed by the weekend.

Delivery into the city

Orders with clean artwork placed on a business day print that day and go out the same afternoon. Ground from Schaumburg to a Chicago address is the shortest leg we run — the North Side, the South Side, the West Side and the Loop are all a single zone as far as the carrier is concerned.

Sheets up to 24 inches ship flat between boards; longer sheets are rolled face-in and boxed. Nothing is folded. If your building has a doorman, a loading dock or a hand-off problem, put it in the order notes and we will put it on the label.

There is no counter, and we would rather say so

We do not have a storefront in the city and there is no pickup. We are a print floor in the northwest suburbs. Realistically, a transfer reaches Humboldt Park faster in a truck than you would reach us on the Kennedy at four in the afternoon, and the truck does not need parking.

What that costs you is the walk-in. What it saves you is everything a downtown address costs, which is the reason our per-inch price is what it is.

Start here

If you have a layout already, upload the sheet. If you have loose designs and no patience for arranging them, use the builder or email them to us and we will pack the sheet at no charge. If you want to see the film before you commit a whole run to it, order one transfer by size and press it on the blank you actually use. That last one costs a couple of dollars and settles more arguments than any amount of copy.

Postal codes this reaches

Ground out of Schaumburg covers the city end to end: 60601, 60605, 60607, 60610, 60611, 60614, 60618, 60622, 60625, 60630, 60640, 60647 and 60657, along with the rest of the city’s codes. North Side, South Side, West Side, the Loop, River North, Pilsen, Logan Square, Bridgeport, Hyde Park — the truck does not care which, and neither does the price. Chicago takes more of our film than anywhere else on the route.

Questions we get

What does a DTF transfer actually cost?

The roll is 22 inches wide and you pay $0.40 for every linear inch it unrolls, so a 22 × 12 inch sheet is $4.80 and a 22 × 120 inch sheet is $48.00. The price is inches, not designs: thirty different designs on one sheet cost the same as thirty copies of one. the full size and price table has every length.

Can I get transfers the same day in Chicago?

Printed the same day, yes — orders with clean artwork placed on a business day go on a truck that afternoon. Delivered the same day, no. Ground from Schaumburg into a city address is a short leg, and the shipping page gives the current transit bands by postal code.

Can I pick up in the city?

No. There is no counter anywhere, including the North Side addresses you will find for other DTF shops. We are a print floor outside the city and every order ships. We would rather say that plainly than have you drive to an industrial park.

Is there a minimum order?

None. One 22 × 12 inch sheet is a real order and gets the same film, the same colour check and the same packaging as a hundred. A single design before a run is cheaper ordered by size.