Fundraiser shirts: price them right so your group actually profits

Churches, booster clubs, and nonprofit groups across Little Falls, Montclair, and South Orange all ask the same question before a fundraiser: how many shirts do we need to sell, and at what price, before this actually raises money. The math is simpler than it looks once you separate the cost of the shirt from the cost of the decoration.

What a fundraiser shirt actually costs

Your per-shirt cost comes from three things: the blank garment, the print setup, and the quantity you order. Screen print has a 12-piece minimum, and setup runs $25 per color per print location, waived once you reach 100 pieces. That setup fee gets divided across every shirt in the order, so a 24-piece run with a two-color design carries a very different cost per shirt than a 150-piece run with the same art.

If your group is reordering a design from a previous year with no changes, you pay a $10-per-screen reset instead of the full setup, also waived from 100 pieces. That matters for annual fundraisers that reuse the same logo every season.

Picking a sell price that leaves room for profit

Once you know your landed cost per shirt, add a margin that's worth the group's time to sell. A shirt that costs you under eight dollars and sells for fifteen or twenty leaves real money for the team or the program. A shirt that costs you twelve and sells for fourteen barely covers the folding table. The quantity tier you choose has more effect on this than almost anything else, which is why it's worth running the numbers at a few different order sizes before you commit to one.

Presale or stock on hand

A presale means you collect orders and sizes first, then place one order sized to exact demand. It removes guesswork on sizing and lets you aim for a cost-saving quantity tier without guessing. Stock on hand means you order ahead and sell from a table at a game or a Sunday service, which works well for smaller groups or walk-up events in Glen Ridge or Verona but carries more risk if sizes run short or long. Either way, turnaround is 7 to 10 business days from art approval and receipt of deposit and garments, so build your sale window around that.

Why fewer colors beats more

Every extra print color adds another setup charge per location, and that charge repeats at every quantity tier below 100 pieces. A clean one-color logo on a tee almost always outperforms a three-color design on a per-shirt cost basis, and it still looks sharp on a crewneck or a hoodie. Fewer colors also means a faster proof and fewer chances for a color to look off against a different garment weight. We get free mockups done before you commit to anything, so you can see the one-color version next to the full-color version and compare.

What belongs on your order form

A good fundraiser order form asks for name, size including youth and up to 3XL and beyond, quantity, and payment status, plus a line for garment type if you're offering both a tee and a hoodie. Size upcharges are worth noting on the form itself so there are no surprises at pickup: 2XL adds $2.50, 3XL and up adds $4.50, and youth sizes run $1.00 less. Our tees are 100% cotton in the 5 to 5.4 ounce range and our hoodies are 7.8 to 8.5 ounce fleece, described by weight rather than brand since we buy whichever is in stock, so sizing can shift slightly between runs.

Start with the Volume Drop

The Volume Drop is built for exactly this situation: a group that needs a sensible price at a size that actually makes sense for a fundraiser, without guessing at a quote from scratch. It's the starting point we point most churches, PTOs, and booster clubs toward before anything else. You can see how it fits alongside full pricing on our price list, and our fundraiser shirts page walks through the presale process in more detail for North Jersey groups.

Screen print isn't the only path either. DTF transfers carry no minimum at all, which can make sense for a small group order, and embroidery is available with a $75 order minimum for anyone adding a polo or a jacket to the mix. Rush service is available too, and it only applies to decoration and setup, never to the cost of the blank garment itself. One more thing worth knowing: there's no New Jersey sales tax on printed clothing we supply, which helps the final number land a little better for your treasurer.

If you're ready to see what your group's design would actually cost at a few different quantities, get a quote at kstmyze.com/pages/quote and we'll build it out with real numbers, not guesses.