Custom Pin-Back Buttons for Elmont, New York

Most of the people placing this kind of order are team parents, usually one or two of them, working from a roster, a team photo and a group chat full of opinions about what the button ought to say. What they want is not complicated to describe: a supporter button that families can wear at games, carrying the team name, maybe a number, maybe a player's face. It is rarely a design problem. It is a small logistics problem with a design attached, and the parent who volunteered for it is fitting the job in around everything else. This page is written for that person, ordering supporter buttons for a team in Elmont.

A team order, seen from the organiser's side

The shape of a supporter button order is predictable once you have seen a few. There is a headcount that keeps moving. There is an artwork file that came off somebody's phone. There is a question about whether siblings and grandparents get one too, which is how an order for twenty quietly becomes an order for forty. And there is a total that somebody has to be able to explain at the next team meeting without opening a spreadsheet.

Two things make that last part easier. Pick the band, then multiply. That is the whole calculation. And shipping is a flat charge that depends only on how many buttons are on the order in total. That is the entire cost model: buttons times price, plus one shipping number.

Five sizes, and nothing in between

We make round pin-back buttons in five sizes and only three. Smaller than any of those: the 1 inch at $1.49 and the 1.25 inch at $1.69.

The 1.5 inch is the compact badge. It suits a short word, a number, a single initial, a simple mark. Detail gets tight at that size, so the designs that work are the ones that were already bold to begin with.

The 2.25 inch is the one most people picture when they picture a button. There is room for a team name and a number, or a name and a small mascot, without either crowding the other.

The 3 inch is the large one. It is the size to reach for when the button carries a photograph, because a face needs room to read from more than an arm's length. Orders built around player portraits tend to land here.

At 250 of one size the rate is a quarter below the listed one. Forty buttons cost forty times the unit price. Crossing 100 of a size takes 20 percent off every one of them, not just the hundredth. Adding buttons nobody needs is still waste, except in the few counts just below a break, where the larger order is genuinely cheaper.

A worked order, so you can see the whole number

Say the order is forty of the 3 inch button, which is a common shape for a roster plus the families behind it.

Forty at $2.49 each is $99.60 in buttons. Flat shipping for an order that size is $9.99. The order comes to $109.59 before tax.

That is the whole calculation. If you have to present it to a group, those are the three lines to write down.

The shipping tiers, and the one place to look twice

Shipping is flat and steps by the total number of buttons on the order:

• up to 100 buttons, $9.99
• up to 250 buttons, $14.99
• up to 500 buttons, $19.99
• up to 1000 buttons, $24.99

The rate band and the shipping tier both step, and they are counted from different totals. That makes one situation worth a second look: a count sitting just over a boundary. An order of 104 buttons pays the same $14.99 shipping as an order of 250 buttons. If your headcount is hovering at 101 or 102 and you were undecided about a handful of spares, the tier has already been crossed and paid for. The reverse is also true. Trimming 103 back to 100 moves the order down a tier.

Neighbours at an equal remove

Elmont sits 20.4 miles south west of the shop in a straight line. That figure matters less, in practice, than a smaller one. Two of the other places we cover are the same distance away from you, and not approximately the same: North Valley Stream is 1.3 miles out, and Floral Park is also 1.3 miles out. Franklin Square is 1.7 miles, New Hyde Park is 2.3 miles, and Garden City South is 2.5 miles.

That matters for a team order because rosters do not respect lines on a map. A squad often pulls families from two or three of those places at once, and the button is the same button for all of them. One artwork file, one order, one total, one shipping charge worked out on the combined count rather than on each family separately.

Artwork and colour

Buttons print in full colour from artwork you upload. A team photo, a logo somebody drew, a mascot, a flat colour block with a name across it: all of it prints the same way, at whichever of the five sizes you choose.

Two practical notes, both about the circle. Artwork designed as a rectangle will lose its corners, so centre whatever matters most. And the printed surface wraps slightly over the curved edge, which means text and faces should sit in from the rim rather than running right up to it.

Four people this page is written for

If you are the parent who volunteered to organise this, your job is mostly counting. Get a headcount, add the spares you know you will be asked for, pick one size, and the price falls out of a single multiplication. You do not need to optimise the quantity for a better unit price, because there is not one.

If you are the treasurer of a booster club, you need a figure you can defend line by line. The break applies to the whole run of that size, not only the buttons above the line.

If you are the coach, you are usually after uniformity: the same button, the same size, for every family attached to the squad. Pick the size once and order the full count in a single go rather than letting it accumulate as separate small orders, each of which would carry its own shipping charge.

One and a hundred are not the same rate any more: one pays the listed rate and a hundred pays 20 percent under the listed rate. You do not have to ask for the discount, because the count applies it.

Questions that come up

Our Elmont roster pulls in families from Floral Park and North Valley Stream as well. Can that go on one order?

Yes. It is one artwork file and one count. Combining them also keeps you on a single flat shipping charge instead of paying one per group.

What does 40 of the 3 inch button work out to for our Elmont team?

Forty at $2.49 each is $99.60. Shipping at that quantity is a flat $9.99, so the order is $109.59 before tax.

Does the price per button drop if our Elmont order goes from 40 to 400?

Yes, as long as the count is for one size. 40 of the 3 inch is $2.49 each and 400 of it is $1.87 each, because 400 reaches the 250 to 499 band. 400 of the 3 inch is 400 times $1.87, because 400 of one size lands in the 250 to 499 band. Two orders of two hundred are two counts of two hundred, while one order of four hundred is a single count of four hundred and sits a band lower.

Our Elmont headcount keeps moving. Is there a number I should watch as it climbs?

Watch the tier boundaries at 100, 250 and 500 buttons. Landing a little above one of them means the higher flat shipping charge is already in play, so a few extra pieces cost you only the unit price. Dropping back under a boundary moves you down a tier.

We want a player photo on the button for our Elmont team. Which size should we pick?

The 3 inch, at $2.49 each. A face needs the extra room to read properly, and the smaller sizes push a photograph tighter than most people expect.