Brad Fletcher

CEO Tees started in 2010, as its founders saw a need in the retail industry for quality, reliable screen printing services. Early on, CEO contracted with a local retail brand to provide screen printed and embroidered goods. Through word of mouth, CEO has expanded, and now the eight-employee Tarzana, California shop spends the vast majority of its time providing goods to small boutiques

CEO began its printing on manual presses, but a year and a half ago the shop upgraded to an Anatol Volt to help keep pace with its increasing demand.

“The orders were just getting far too big for us to fill on a manual press,” Fletcher said. “We were getting too busy and we started looking around at automatic presses.”

CEO shopped around to all of the major press brands looking for an automatic press to fit the company’s needs. Many considerations went into determining the right press for CEO, but one of CEO’s chief concerns was selecting a cutting-edge machine that provided the best in screen printing technology.

“We’ve always tried to be on the leading edge of technology, and it seemed like the Volt was that,” Fletcher stated. “It just seemed like Anatol is really committed to these all-electric machines. To us, it seemed like that’s the future of screen printing.”

There were other considerations that went into CEO’s choosing the Volt. The machine’s smaller footprint was a plus, as CEO faced space constraints, and the fact that the all-electric Volt doesn’t require a noisy air compressor was a major advantage.

“It really helped us out to get an automatic press in a space that you otherwise might not be able to use,” Fletcher added. “It’s so quiet in the shop, the guys that have been doing this for 20, 25 years, they’re so grateful not to have all that stuff humming in the background all the time.”

Once it arrived, the Volt took very little set-up time, Fletcher said. The machine was up and running within the day, and the digital interface has allowed all of CEO’s team members, regardless of their experience level, to easily operate the machine.

Since the Volt was added to its shop, it has taken over the majority of CEO’s printing jobs. The shop does run its older Vastex™ manual press for smaller jobs, and Brother™ and Neoflex™ machines for custom direct-to-garment printing jobs. The Volt has allowed CEO to keep pace with demand and grow its business to take on new customers and larger orders.

“There’s no way without that automatic press that we would have been able to keep up. Our business has probably grown five or six times in volume probably in the last year,” Fletcher said. “We couldn’t run our shop without it. It’s the one machine that if it’s down in our shop, we couldn’t run.”

With the help of the Volt, CEO plans to continue to expand. The next step for CEO will be launching two custom lines of apparel that CEO will sell via its website.

Fletcher credited the Volt with helping CEO to expand easily and confidently.

“The Volt is the best purchase we’ve ever made for our shop. It’s made us significantly more profitable. It’s easy to use. It’s fast. It’s basically maintenance free.”

“There’s not a way to go wrong as far as our experience has been.”