Cricut & Cutting Machines

Fonts, welding, vinyl, and what breaks on the mat.

Most cutting-machine problems are diagnosable from what the material actually did. A faint scored line is not the same failure as a ragged edge, and a monogram that fell apart is not the same as one that never cut through.

So these start with the evidence in front of you — the edge the blade left, where the vinyl lifted, what the weeding took with it — and work back to the cause, because the usual first move of turning the pressure up makes several of them worse.

There is also the part nobody enjoys: whether the licence on that font lets you sell what you make.

• How to Price Stickers When the Sticker Is the Cheapest Part

  Price stickers from the sheet divided by the stickers that survive, then add your time and the per-order packing and fees, which cost the same whether an order holds one sticker or eight. In the worked example one sticker sold alone needs about $2.42, while the same sticker in a sheet of eight works out at about $1.15.

• How to Price Vinyl Decals Without Pricing by the Square Foot

  Price vinyl decals by the time the design takes, not by the square foot, because vinyl is the cheapest part and weeding time does not scale with size. In the worked example a 4 × 4 inch decal carries $0.43 of materials against $3.60 of labour and needs about $6.90 for a 30% margin after 8% fees.

• How Much to Charge for Cricut Shirts: Price From Your Own Costs

  Price a vinyl shirt from the blank up: materials, a failure rate that costs the whole shirt, your time for every colour layer and overhead, then divide by what is left after fees and margin. In the worked example a shirt costing $11.03 needs about $17.79 to keep a 30% margin after 8% fees.

• Font Words, Plainly — Weld, Swash, Ligature, Counter, Kerning, Monoline

  Six words that decide whether a font cuts. Each one defined by what goes wrong on the mat when you ignore it, not by what it means to a typographer.

• What a Craft Business Actually Costs to Run

  A craft business costs the one-off machine plus monthly fixed costs that arrive whether or not you sell, which usually come to between £40 and £120 a month before a single item is made. Divide that monthly total by the items you actually sold last month to get the overhead each item must carry.

• Why Vinyl Will Not Stick, by Surface

  Wood, glass, plastic and painted surfaces each fail for a different reason, and the fix for one makes another worse.

• Transfer Tape — Which Tack, and Why It Fights You

  Transfer tape has to grip harder than the mat and less than the surface. Every failure is that balance going wrong in one of two directions.

• Why Iron-On Vinyl Peels Off, and Which Variable to Change

  Four variables make an HTV bond, and only one of them is heat. Most failed transfers are a pressure problem being treated as a temperature problem.

• How to Price What You Make

  Add materials, your labour at a rate you would accept and overhead, multiply by two for a first price, then check what that price leaves after fees, postage and discounts. In the worked example the ×2 price leaves about 22% of what the customer paid, not 50%.

• Why Your Cricut Isn't Cutting All the Way Through

  Six causes, in the order worth checking, and how to tell which one you have from the edge the blade left.

• Cricut Mats — Which One, and How to Get the Tack Back

  Four grips, and using the wrong one is why your cardstock shifts or your vinyl tears. Plus what actually restores a mat, and what quietly ruins it.

• Cardstock Weight, and Why "lb" Tells You Almost Nothing

  The pound number on the packet is ambiguous by design. Gsm is not, and four bands cover almost every decision you will make.

• Why a Welded Monogram Falls Apart on the Mat

  Three failures, none of them the machine's fault. How to tell which one you have from what the vinyl did.

• Four Questions to Ask About a Font Licence Before You Sell Anything

  "Free for personal use" and "commercial licence included" are not the two ends of a spectrum. Here is what actually determines whether you can sell the mug.

• What Makes a Script Font Weld Cleanly on a Cricut

  Three properties decide whether a monogram welds into one shape or falls apart on the mat. You can check all three before you buy.