PRICING
What conference merch printing costs
Every show floor is different, so we quote flat and all-in — no surprise line items after the invoice. Here is how the number gets built, with the real anchors we quote from.
The numbers we quote from
from $5,000
A staffed live-printing station at a Southern California conference: crew, presses, art prep, and a healthy run of blanks. Multi-day shows and multi-press stations scale from here.
$250/hr
Covers the whole crew on site — setup, live expo hours, session-break surges, and strike. An eight-hour expo day typically bills ten to eleven crew hours door to door.
$900 flat
Applies outside Los Angeles, Orange County, and San Diego — including Las Vegas conventions. Covers transport of gear and crew; no per-mile math, no fuel surcharges.
What moves the quote up or down
- Expo hours vs. reception hours. A three-hour evening reception costs less crew time than a two-day expo with 14 open-floor hours.
- Garment mix. Bella+Canvas tees, hoodies, and Richardson caps all carry different blank costs. Hoodie-heavy runs raise the budget; hat-and-patch formats often lower it.
- Piece count. We size blank orders to your registration count and design mix, so you pay for what the floor will actually consume — not a warehouse pallet of leftovers.
- Design count. Three to six designs is the sweet spot. More art means more staged transfers and slightly more prep cost.
- Venue rules. Convention centers with drayage and mandated power orders add pass-through costs we flag in the quote, never after it.
Example: 800-person conference, Anaheim
| Station + crew, one expo day | $5,000–$6,500 |
| 400 pressed tees (Bella+Canvas 3001) | included in station run |
| Hat + patch upgrade, 150 caps | +$1,800–$2,400 |
| Travel (Anaheim = local) | $0 |
Illustrative ranges — your quote is flat and itemized before you sign anything.
How organizers make the station pay for itself
Most conference organizers we work with do not eat this cost — they sell it. A named “official merch station” sponsorship, priced between the cost of a lanyard sponsorship and a lunch sponsorship, usually covers the full station. The sponsor gets their logo on every printed piece and a crowd photographed in their colors; you get a headline activation at net-zero. We supply mockups and a piece-count recap your sponsorship team can put in the prospectus.
Get your flat number
Give us the show, the city, the dates, and a rough headcount. You will get a format recommendation and a flat, itemized quote — typically within one business day.
Faster by phone: (562) 614-4800