Starting an online business selling cups and mugs is an appealing prospect. Thanks to low barriers to entry and the outlet it provides for creative expression, there are plenty of opportunities to start a lucrative business. In fact, the market size for mugs and cups was $7.6 billion in 2023 and is projected to grow to nearly $11 billion by 2031. With this in mind, there is most definitely room to enter the market.
Whether you are thinking about selling custom mugs or need a bit of inspiration for your current catalog, here are a few tips on starting an ecommerce cup business—plus an extensive list of cup design ideas.
How to start your ecommerce cup shop
Cups and mugs are common household items that nearly every consumer uses on a daily basis. An ecommerce cup shop can be a profitable venture, and here are four steps to get you started:
1. Select a niche
With a product as broad and basic as a cup, you’ll need to differentiate your brand by catering to a niche market. This will ensure that you can build brand loyalty and increase profits by focusing on your target audience. Your own interests can be a great place to start. Are you a major coffee snob? A skilled illustrator? Nerd out on engineering? Consider what you can bring to the table, then conduct market research to gauge potential interest in your niche.
2. Source your products
To get started with cup design, you can browse wholesale marketplaces like Faire, Alibaba, and Printify to source the style of coffee cup or glasses you envision your customers purchasing. Look for suppliers that also offer digital printing services. Alternatively, you might work with artisans or specialty suppliers if you’re interested in selling handcrafted cups.
Keep your target audience in mind when choosing a supplier. Fans of simple, trendy designs might appreciate the lower price point of a dropshipped mug, while ceramics connoisseurs are more likely to accept the higher price tag of a handcrafted mug.
3. Choose a design software
Unless your business curates products from established artists, you’ll be creating custom cup designs of your own. You can outsource this to a professional, or handle the design process yourself with software like Adobe Illustrator, Canva, or Pixlr. If you have limited design experience, you can hone your design skills with these free design applications.
4. Establish a web presence
Set up an online store with an ecommerce platform like Shopify. When you get started with the right tools, you can effectively:
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Market your products. To help get the word out about your products, Shopify has marketing tools to help you connect your store to social media platforms, online marketplaces like eBay, influencers, and popular ad networks.
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Handle payments. With Shopify Payments, you can safely and securely accept credit card payments online.
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Manage shipping. Whether you plan on dropshipping (ordering products from a supplier who ships them directly to your customers) or managing shipments yourself, there are tools to help you manage inventory and get the best rates.
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Monitor your sales. Review performance analytics and use overview dashboards to keep tabs on your most (and least) successful designs.
Free Webinar:
How to Get Started with Dropshipping
Learn how to find high-margin products, add them into your store, and start selling—fast.
Cup design ideas that sell
- Branded designs
- Photographs
- Maximalist designs
- Minimalist designs
- Heat-sensitive designs
- Special occasion designs
- Matching designs
- Location-based designs
- Humorous designs
- Nature designs
- Holiday designs
- Floral designs
- Coffee designs
- Astrology designs
Whether it be a sippy cup, mug, beer pint, or water glass, here are some popular cup design ideas to inspire your own cup business:
Branded designs
If you’ve already established your own brand, you can leverage your name, logo, or image by selling merch. Printing your company logo or tagline on cups or tumblers is an effective way to showcase your brand identity, and it gives your biggest fans the opportunity to spread the word about your brand.
For example, BLK & Bold is a coffee and tea company that capitalizes on its brand to sell merch, including coffee tumblers.
Photographs
Photographs can be a popular design choice for cups—especially if you’re a photographer looking to monetize your art. To minimize your overhead, set up shop as a print-on-demand business, working with a supplier like Printiful to upload photos and ship mugs directly to customers after they place an order.
Free Webinar:
How to quickly start a profitable print-on-demand store
In our free 40-minute video workshop, we’ll get you from product idea to setting up an online store to getting your first print-on-demand sale.
Maximalist designs
Eye-catching geometric designs, intricate patterns, and bold colors can create an aesthetic that appeals to big personalities. Go full rococo or embrace the boldness of the 1980s.
Minimalist designs
A minimalistic approach can appeal to an audience interested in a subtle look—but you can still go beyond the classic white mug. Seek out suppliers that specialize in simple, beautiful ceramics and glassware, or work directly with artisans to scale up a maker business. There’s still plenty of room to get creative with a minimalist aesthetic, but you’ll want to avoid loud patterns and bright colors, focusing instead on whites, muted colors, or earthy tones.
Minimalist cup brands tend to focus on function as much as form. Stainless steel drinkware company MiiR, for instance, designs its products around four principles: minimal, sustainable, functional, and enduring. Its monochrome cups are sleek and practical.
Heat-sensitive designs
Make a hot coffee or iced tea more fun with heat-sensitive designs. You might offer color-changing sippy cups for kids or sell customizable mugs that reveal a hidden message when heated.
Special occasion designs
Designs themed around special occasions like anniversaries, birthdays, and other milestones can perform well with any audience, acting as a physical memory of a special moment. If you have a passion for illustration or calligraphy, consider designing personalized mugs for customers’ special occasions.
Matching designs
Matching designs can be a hit with couples or best friends. A common concept for a newlywed couple has the words “His” and “Hers” (or “Soul” and “Mates”) printed on a pair of matching mugs.
Location-based designs
Many consumers are proud of where they live or want a souvenir of a place they visited, and a cup design tailored to a specific city or attraction can be a great way to reach an audience. Consider working with local artists to create designs inspired by local landmarks, history, or events.
Humorous designs
A playful design can make your target customer laugh—and click that Add to Cart button. Whether it be a funny phrase, a comical picture, or a novelty shape, humorous cup designs can leave a lasting impression.
If you’re looking for humorous mug design ideas, just peruse BigMouth’s selection of clever coffee mugs, which come in novel shapes and feature puns and funny slogans.
Nature designs
Designs inspired by nature can be popular with outdoorsy demographics, and there’s plenty of imagery to explore, such as plant species, fungi, landscapes, mountains, and more. To better connect with an audience who loves nature, consider selling a line of lightweight backpacking cups or enamel camping mugs.
Outdoor brand Gentlemen’s Hardware has many nature-themed camping mugs that are perfect for an excursion to the mountains or desert.
Holiday designs
A mug or cup can be the perfect holiday gift. Common designs include Christmas trees, Valentine’s hearts, and phrases like “’Tis the Season” or “Happy Hanukkah.”
Floral designs
Florals are a popular design choice for cups ranging from fine china teacups to everyday travel thermoses. Try creating a line of cups with different floral patterns, or use wildflower diagrams from old books in the public domain.
Coffee designs
Real coffee lovers don’t play about their favorite beverage and may gravitate toward mug designs that celebrate their sacred bean juice. You can go a couple of directions with this: One approach would be to create classic mugs with designs and slogans that appeal to coffee fans (e.g., “But First, Coffee”). The second approach is to sell coffee cups designed to augment the morning coffee experience—think temperature-controlled smart mugs or cups that are perfectly compatible with the best pour-over gear.
Astrology designs
Tapping into the realm of astrology is a way to introduce design elements that allow for a degree of personalization while still remaining standardized. You can create a series of cups with the constellation of each astrological sign or create short horoscopes for each sign.
Cup design ideas FAQ
Is a print-on-demand cup business profitable?
The profitability of a print-on-demand business can vary depending on your marketing costs, the cost of your own labor, and the cost of the products themselves. Since a print-on-demand cup business involves minimal overhead, there is room for a modest profit margin—but only if you can connect with an audience and convince them to buy your product.
What are popular designs to put on cups?
Popular designs to put on cups include humorous phrases, location-specific imagery, geometric patterns, and holiday themes.
What ecommerce platform is best for selling designed cups?
Shopify is a great ecommerce platform for selling cups, as you can leverage various marketing tools, sales metrics, and shipping functionality to best serve your customers.
