Sublimation Pricing Calculator Spreadsheet | Blank Cost, Printhead Life & Reject Rate, Quote Builder | Mug Tumbler Shirt | Excel Sheets
A GHOSTED TRANSFER DOES NOT WASTE PAPER. IT WASTES THE BLANK.
Most sublimation pricing calculators add up the blank, a guess at ink, and twenty
minutes of your time. That misses the two costs that decide whether the shop makes
money: the blanks you destroy, and the printhead you are slowly killing.
A REJECT DESTROYS THE BLANK. The blank is usually the largest single line on the sheet.
Ghosting on a $1.20 mug wastes $1.20. Ghosting on a $9 handled tumbler wastes $9, and the
items that came out clean have to carry it. Divide by your good-item rate and the price
fixes itself.
THE PRINTHEAD IS A CONSUMABLE. A replacement head often costs close to what the printer
did, which is why a clog usually ends a printer instead of getting fixed. A head that sits
idle between orders dies sooner than one that runs every week. Every print owes it money.
INK IS BOUGHT BY THE SET AND CONSUMED BY THE SQUARE INCH. A full-bleed photo tumbler
uses several times the ink of a small monogram at the same sale price. Priced per item
instead of per square inch, your busiest designs are your worst ones.
PRESS CYCLES WEAR THE PRESS OUT. Platen coatings, heating elements and controllers all
have a cycle life, and a mug press wrap fails faster than a flat platen does.
BLANKS ARRIVE DAMAGED. Chipped handles, dented tumblers and mislabelled shirts come out
of a case you paid for in full. That is a yield loss before you have printed anything.
MARKETPLACE FEES. You cannot add your margin and then subtract fees. That arithmetic
does not leave you with your margin. The price has to be solved backwards.
On the worked example included, a shop targeting 35% using the standard method actually
earns 13.24%. That one row leaves $2.77 on the table, and the workbook shows that gap
on every row you enter.
WHAT YOU GET
- Job Calculator: 25 rows, full breakdown per item, correct list price calculated, plus a
column showing exactly what the shortcut would have cost you
- Setup: printer, printhead life, ink per square inch, press cycles, power, labor,
overhead, reject rate, blank yield
- Blank Library: mugs, skinny and handled tumblers, poly and blend tees, photo panels,
coasters, slate, totes and mouse pads pre-loaded, costed per USABLE blank
- Fee Profiles. Etsy, Etsy with Offsite Ads, eBay, Shopify, Amazon Handmade and direct. All editable
- Break-even & What-if: your lowest acceptable price, a volume table showing what
changes when you press 50 instead of 5, and a grid showing what a wrong reject rate
costs you
- Sales Log: what you actually sold, against what the model predicted
- Dashboard: four live charts (cost breakdown, correct vs naive vs break-even, cost
and price as the run gets longer, and price against failure rate) that follow whichever
job row you select
- Start Here: a plain-English guide, color-coded so you know which cells to touch
Works with any sublimation setup. Sawgrass, a converted EcoTank, flat press, mug press,
tumbler press or convection oven. The equipment doesn't matter. The cost structure does.
Eight tabs. Works in Microsoft Excel and Google Sheets, both tested. Instant digital
download. No macros, no add-ons, nothing to install. Every formula is visible and editable,
and so is the data behind every chart, so you can check the math yourself.
WHO THIS IS FOR
Etsy sellers running mug, tumbler and apparel lines, print shops adding personalisation,
craft fair vendors pricing a table, and anyone whose reject pile is bigger than their
profit. If you already amortize your printhead and cost blanks by the case, you don't
need this.
DISCLOSURE
Portions of this workbook, including its layout and formulas, were produced with the
assistance of AI tools, then reviewed and tested by a human before publication.
NOT ACCOUNTING ADVICE
This is a costing tool, not tax or accounting software. Results depend entirely on the
figures you enter. Check them against your own records.