How Much Does It Cost to Embroider a Shirt? What Drives the Price

How Quantity Shapes Your Per-Piece Cost

Per-piece cost drops as quantity rises — a small crew run costs more per shirt than a full team order. The one-time digitizing fee spreads across more pieces too, so it barely registers on a larger order. The four drivers below set your number. Send your roster and garment and we'll quote it for your exact run.

1. Stitch Count — the Real Cost Driver

Embroidery on a shirt is priced by the stitch, not by size — more stitches, more cost. Once your logo is digitized, machine time and thread track its stitch count. Knowing your stitch count lets you read any quote you get and understand exactly what you're paying for.

• →Simple bold logo (text + clean outline): 3,000–5,000 stitches — the most economical to stitch
• →Standard left-chest logo: 5,000–8,000 stitches — the everyday workhorse hit
• →Detailed logo with fills/gradients: 10,000–15,000 stitches — more stitches, more cost
• →Full back logo: 25,000–40,000 stitches — the priciest placement to stitch

Two logos at the same physical size can have very different stitch counts depending on fill density and detail. If you want to bring per-piece cost down, the fastest lever is simplifying your logo for embroidery. See logo digitizing 101 for how that works.

2. The Shirt Itself

The blank you pick is the other half of your number. Garments climb in cost from basic tees up to FR-rated workwear:

• →Basic work t-shirt (Gildan, Hanes): an economical workhorse blank — the value pick
• →Work polo (Port Authority K500, Red Kap): the everyday crew standard, a step up from a tee
• →Performance polo (Carhartt Force, Nike Dri-FIT): moisture-wicking and tougher — a premium blank
• →FR-rated work shirt (Bulwark, Carhartt FR): flame-resistant and the most expensive blank by a wide margin

For trade-specific recommendations — which shirt fits which crew — see electrical contractors, plumbing & HVAC, and general contractors.

3. Digitizing Fee — One-Time, Then Free Forever

Digitizing converts your logo artwork into a stitch file (.DST, .PES, or similar) the embroidery machine reads. It's a one-time charge per logo — more complex logos take more work to digitize — and you never pay it again. Every reorder uses the same file.

A well-digitized file is the single biggest factor in how good your embroidery looks. Cheap digitizing produces pulled stitches, poor registration, and blurry logos. Bighorn Threads keeps every customer's stitch file on record indefinitely so reorders are always clean and always free of re-digitizing charges.

4. Multiple Placements

A single left-chest logo is the base case. Each extra placement — right chest name, sleeve hit, back yoke — means re-hooping the shirt and a separate machine pass, so each one adds to your per-shirt cost. Common add-ons:

• →Right-chest name: a small per-shirt add-on (it's usually just text)
• →Sleeve hit: a small per-shirt add-on for one more pass
• →Back yoke logo: the biggest add-on — a larger hit means more stitches

5. Quantity Discounts

Volume discounts on embroidery are real but smaller than most buyers expect — usually 10–25% cheaper per piece going from 24 to 100 pieces. Quantity also sets the floor: most shops won't run embroidery below a 12–24 piece minimum without a small-order surcharge. Unlike screen printing (where setup dominates and volume drives huge savings), embroidery cost is mostly machine time per piece, which scales nearly linearly. The savings come from better blank pricing at volume, not from eliminated setup cost.

How Long Does Embroidery Take?

Commercial embroidery machines run 600–1,000 stitches per minute. A standard 6,000-stitch left-chest logo takes 6–10 minutes of machine time per shirt. A 6-head commercial machine turns out roughly 30–45 finished shirts per hour at that stitch count.

Timing depends on quantity, whether your logo is already digitized, and the garment. Rush options exist — send your deadline and we'll quote a real timeline.

Embroidery vs Screen Printing — Which Is Cheaper?

For small runs (under 24 pieces), embroidery and screen printing are comparable in total cost. At high volumes (100+ pieces), screen printing is cheaper per piece because most of its cost is upfront setup — once screens are made, each shirt is cheap. For polos, structured work shirts, and hats, embroidery is almost always the right call regardless of cost because screen printing adhesion on pique fabrics is poor and the look doesn't hold up to washing.

Full breakdown: Screen printing vs. embroidery for construction crews.

Where to Get Custom Embroidered Shirts in Las Vegas

Bighorn Threads is a Las Vegas custom embroidery shop serving contractors, HVAC techs, electricians, plumbers, hospitality crews, and service businesses across the metro area. We'll get you a quick quote, keep stitch files on record for easy reorders, and offer rush options.

Three things to send for an accurate quote:

1. Your logo (PDF, AI, PNG — any format works to start)
2. Quantity and shirt type (or tell us your crew's use case)
3. Placements needed (left chest only, or additional positions)