Hi,
My name is Maria Garrido but everyone calls me Meg. I used to live in NYC for 10 and bought several different brands of kids personalized labels. Those that you put on your kids pencils, backpacks, clothing, etc, etc so hopefully they wouldn't loose them. Now I live in Lima, Peru and have realized nobody sells those here. Ideally, I would like to sell the stickers that you can color print and used them on everything: same sticker material can be used on fabrics, plastics and metals (I would have different designs and sizes to offer but same material).

I have someone here that can do the material cutting into sheets (they come in rolls) and the for at cutting (1"round, rectangular, slim, etc).

In a trip to the US, I bought some samples from companies there and had an appointment with 3M here in Lima. They have been able to tell me what material is the one I need but they claim that I would need a $30,000 printer to do the job.

I really don't think that these type of home business require a printer that costs $30,000 when you sell 200 labels for $50 or something like that.....can anyone help me here? I know it's a great business for Lima because nobody really makes them and moms are stuck with the old hand-sewn labels for clothing but if I can't find a better (and cheaper) way to print the labels, the time it will take to recover my money would be too long.

Hope someone can help me.

Best,
Meg

Hi Meg,
I wish I could help you with your specific question, but I am not experienced with printers or with the business you are planning. If you don't get help here, perhaps you should find a community of techies or go to ask.com. Another option would be to contact customer support at several printer companies, like HP. Hope this helps!
Pat

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Pat Cobe and Ellen Parlapiano are co-authors of Mompreneurs: A Mother's Practical Step-by-Step Guide to Work-at-Home Success (Perigee, 2002) and Mompreneurs Online: Using the Internet to Build Work@Home Success (Perigee, 2001).