How to start a merchandise business in 2025: The Print on Demand way

Easy to start

A business model that’s welcoming to everyone. No need for extensive entrepreneurial or marketing experience.

Low investment

You pay for the product only after you make a sale, making it less expensive to start than a traditional business.

Unlimited personalization

Anyone can personalize the products they sell, easily reaching the hearts and minds of their audience.

Zero fulfillment efforts

The print-on-demand company does all the heavy lifting – printing, packaging, and shipping the final product directly to your customer’s doorstep.

No inventory management

Everything you sell moves directly from the supplier to the end customer, so there’s no need to track inventory or set up a brick-and-mortar store.

Step 1: Choose a niche

As simple as it sounds, choosing a niche can make or break a retail business. With the right niche, entrepreneurs can sell more and enjoy less competition.

A niche product strongly appeals to a specific audience, allowing a business to stand out.

Typically, the scope of a niche should be as narrow as possible yet large enough to offer profit potential. However, for a merchandising business, the niche can be broader. As long as designs are related, a wider scope can do wonders, too.

For example, most of Hot Topic’s products are pop-culture related. They offer music, books, cartoons, and movie merchandise.

When choosing a niche market, follow your passion. If there’s a demand, you can build a successful business around it.

Step 2: Create a business plan

A business plan is a written description of a company, outlining the objectives and strategies for achieving them.

Typically, this document should include:

• Executive summary. A brief summary of the business plan. It explains what the company does, its target audience, and how it’ll achieve its objectives.
• Description of the company. An overview of the company, describing its business structure, model, and objectives.
• Market analysis. An overview of the industry, current trends, market size estimates, and an analysis of the competition.
• Management and organization. Explanation of how the business is run and handled, who the team is, and their responsibilities.
• Products. A section highlighting key characteristics of the products. Thoroughly describe them, compare them with similar products, and outline the pricing strategy and marketing plans.
• Customer segmentation. An overview of your potential customers. They can be segmented in various ways, such as demographically, behaviorally, or geographically.
• Marketing plan. A section that describes the ways and means of attracting customers. In short, it’s a road map explaining how a business organizes, executes, and tracks its marketing efforts.
• Logistics and operational plan. If a business uses the print-on-demand model, this section is short because the print-on-demand company takes care of it all – sourcing, printing, packaging, and shipping products. 
  Financial plan. This is all about your business funding. Most plans include an income statement, a balance sheet, and a cash-flow statement.

Step 3: Deal with taxes

In most of the United States, businesses must pay sales tax and other applicable taxes. Our article about sales tax provides in-depth information to better understand this topic.

Alternatively, here’s a video explaining how it all works:

When you start a merchandising business with Printify, we provide answers to all frequently asked questions about taxes in our Help Center.

Step 4: Obtain copyright licenses

If a business plans to use copyrighted material on its products for commercial purposes, it must get a merchandise license. Without one, a business can end up in significant legal trouble.

Typically, these are the steps an entrepreneur should take to get a license:

• Find the copyright owner of the intellectual property. Visit the U.S. Copyright Office and search their records.

Many works have a copyright notice, which helps to identify the owner. For example, check the copyright page of a book or the legal notice on a website.

• Contact the copyright owner. Explain how your business will use its intellectual property and what products it will create and sell.
• Negotiate a licensing agreement. Agree on guaranteed payments, advances, royalties on sales, agreement length, renewal options, territorial restrictions, and termination conditions.

Negotiations will differ from copyright owner to copyright owner, so it’s vital that both parties understand their rights and obligations.

Step 5: Brand your business

A brand helps people to recognize a business and the quality of products it offers.  It’s easier to attract new customers, retain existing ones, and get more sales with a strong brand identity.

Things to consider when branding a business:

Business name

A good business name reflects the heart and soul of a company. It should be:

• Simple, clear, direct, and clearly conveying what it does
• Original, catchy, easy to spell, pronounce, and remember
• Visually appealing, stands out in print and on-screen

Helpful tip

Shopify’s business name generator is a helpful tool anyone can use to create a unique business or store name.

Step 6: Pick products

When picking products for a merchandise business, entrepreneurs should always keep their niche, target audience, and market trends in mind.

If done properly, they can create successful products that stand out, appeal to their customers, and evolve with changing trends.

The Printify Catalog offers more than 850 high-quality products – from apparel to home décor to accessories – at the best prices on the market.

There are several factors to consider:

• Print Provider. Cut delivery costs by choosing a local print provider. We have more than 80 carefully-vetted print providers located worldwide.
• Brands. Create products your customers will love by picking the most popular brands like Champion, Bella+Canvas, and Gildan.
• Product descriptions. Find the most suitable products for your online store by exploring their key features.

Step 7: Find or create designs for your online store

When it comes to launching a successful merchandise business, design is what sets you apart from other companies.

You have several options:

• Obtain a merchandise license. While time-consuming, contacting the copyright owner and negotiating an agreement to use their work is a great way to get best-selling designs.
• Create original designs. Use graphic design tools like Adobe Photoshop, Canva, or Pixlr to create your designs.
• Hire a freelancer. Hire a professional graphic designer or agency to save time and effort.
• Use print-ready designs. Explore sites like Creative Fabrica and Designious that offer high-quality designs for online businesses.

Step 8: Select a sales channel, and set up a storefront

Selecting the right sales channel is vital for any eCommerce business’s success.

Whether you choose an eCommerce platform or marketplace, both offer an easy way to create a storefront and sell to online shoppers worldwide.

Here’s a summary and a breakdown of their advantages and disadvantages.

Step 9: Market your business

When starting a merchandise business, neglecting lessons about marketing is a bad idea. Marketing is the engine that drives sales.

Here are a few ways to market a business: 

• Social media marketing. An easy way to find, connect, and engage with an audience. 

Build a strong presence on various platforms. Try to create content that encourages customers to make a purchase: run engaging challenges, post great product photos, or offer giveaways.

• Email marketing. It has stood the test of time as one of the oldest marketing strategies. It’s a cost-effective and efficient way to reach customers.

Use tools like MailerLite, Mailchimp, or Omnisend to automate the process.

• Content marketing. A marketing strategy that helps to attract and engage with an audience by creating and posting relevant content.

While it can be time-consuming, consistently delivering helpful content creatively is effective for building trust and authority.

• Ad platforms. Use Google, Facebook, or Instagram ads to reach your target audience quickly and effectively.
• Search engine marketing. Promoting an eCommerce store by increasing its visibility in search engine results. There are two approaches: search engine optimization (SEO) and advertising (Google Ads).

Learn more from our SEO Masterclass for Driving Sales. The webinar explains how to do keyword research, find the most relevant keywords, and analyze the competition.