Die-Cut Stickers for West Manor, New York

A parent volunteer standing in a cafeteria with a mascot drawing, a budget the committee already approved, and a spirit run to fill is usually the person placing this kind of order. The job is not complicated, but it is specific: a sticker small enough to hand out by the hundred, cut to the shape of the artwork instead of squared off, and priced so the treasurer can sign off without calling another meeting. Most of the work sits in the arithmetic and in the artwork file, not in the printing. This page is for the people in West Manor who have been handed that job.

What a school group order usually looks like

Almost every fundraiser order starts the same way. Somebody has a drawing: a mascot, a class year, a team name wrapped around a shape. Somebody else has a headcount, which is the real driver, because headcount sets the quantity and quantity sets the rate. The design is then sized to whatever it is going onto, and that size sets the square inches. Die-cut means the sticker is cut to the outline of the art, so a circle stays a circle and a pennant keeps its point. The square inch figure used for pricing is the bounding box of that shape rather than the outline itself, which is worth knowing before anyone gets attached to a long thin banner design.

A direction that catches people out

Most of Suffolk County sits east of us, so the reflex when an order comes in is to think east. West Manor does not work that way. It lies west of the shop at a straight line distance of 2.3 miles. That is not a route and it is not a drive, but it is a useful way to understand that the artwork is not going somewhere distant. Everything is printed and cut at 205 East Main Street in Huntington.

What nine square inches actually costs

Die-cut stickers are priced per square inch, and the rate per square inch falls as the quantity goes up. It runs 35 cents at 1 to 24 pieces, 30 cents at 25 to 49, 28 cents at 50 to 99, 26 cents at 100 to 249, 24 cents at 250 to 499, and 22 cents at 500.

Take the size a school group most often lands on. A 3 by 3 inch sticker is 9 square inches. Order 50 of them and the rate is 28 cents, which makes each one $2.52 and the fifty $126.00. Order 100 and the rate drops to 26 cents, so the same 3 by 3 inch sticker is $2.34 each and the hundred is $234.00. Doubling the count did not double the bill. That gap is the single most useful thing to show a treasurer who is deciding between covering one grade and covering the whole school.

There is also an order minimum, which is not a price floor. An order qualifies at 10 or more pieces or at $10 of merchandise, whichever comes first. Nobody is pushed up to a quantity they do not want.

Getting the artwork to behave at sticker size

The commonest snag in a fundraiser order is not the price, it is the file. A mascot drawn for a banner has fine lines and small lettering that were never meant to be reduced to three inches square. Thin strokes close up and a slogan set in a delicate script turns into a grey smear. The fix is usually simple: thicken the lines, enlarge the type, and give the shape a clear outer edge for the cut to follow. Send the largest version of the art you have rather than a copy pulled off a website, and say which part of it is the cut line if that is not obvious. If two people hold different versions of the mascot, settle that before ordering rather than after.

Four people who tend to place this order

The PTA treasurer wants one number to bring back to the committee. Give us the finished size and the count and you get the per piece figure and the total, and you can hold two quantity bands side by side before anything is committed.

The teacher running a class project is working from a drawing a student made. That is fine. What matters is that the lines are heavy enough to read small and that there is an outer edge the cutter can follow.

The coach ordering for a team has a roster rather than a headcount and usually needs spares for siblings and volunteers. Rounding up into the next quantity band is often cheaper per piece than expected, so check before fixing a number.

The parent doing this without a committee wants the smallest sensible run. The minimum is built for exactly that, and a short first run before a larger one is a normal way to work.

Pickup, shipping, and how the order gets written

Local pickup is free, and for an address in the 11949 ZIP code it is usually the straightforward choice. We cover the places immediately around you as well, which matters when the person collecting the box is not the person who ordered: Lloyd Harbor at 1.4 miles, Huntington at 1.8, Cold Spring Harbor at 2.4, Centerport at 3.4, and Huntington Station at 3.6. If a shipment suits you better, we ship within the United States, and checkout works as a guest.

Questions worth asking before you order

Our PTA is choosing between 50 and 100 of the 3 by 3 inch mascot sticker for the West Manor spirit run. What is the difference on the invoice?

Fifty come to $126.00 at 28 cents per square inch, working out at $2.52 each. A hundred come to $234.00 at 26 cents, which is $2.34 each. The count doubles and the total does not.

Why is West Manor described as west of the shop when most of the county is east?

Because it genuinely is. Suffolk County runs a long way east of us, so the great majority of the places we cover sit in that direction, and this one does not. It is 2.3 miles out in the other direction, which surprises people who assume every order from the county is heading the same way.

We want a few test pieces before committing the West Manor fundraiser order. Is

10 enough to place an order?

Yes. An order qualifies at 10 or more pieces or at $10 of merchandise, whichever comes first. Ten pieces falls in the 35 cent band, the highest per square inch rate, but it is a small enough outlay to see the art in your hand before the full run is committed.

The West Manor spirit run has two mascots. Can both designs go on one order?

They can, but the quantity bands apply to each design separately, because each one is set up and cut on its own. Two runs of 50 are priced at 28 cents each rather than being combined into a single hundred at 26 cents. If the budget is tight, one design in a higher quantity is the cheaper shape of order.

Our school address in West Manor uses ZIP 11949. Is that all you need to get the order to the right place?

That plus a street address and the name of the person who will actually take the box. For fundraisers we would rather have the volunteer's name than the school office, since the office and the committee are frequently not the same people.