Major Brands
- Silhouette -- Maker of the bestselling Cameo and Curio.
- Cricut -- Market leader in the crafts demographic with its Explore Air range.
- USCutter -- Mix of low and medium end professional machines.
- Graphtec -- Widely acclaimed high performance cutting machines.
- Roland -- Famous for 'Roland Reliability' and high performance.
- Sizzix -- Small crafts machines; maker of the Big Shot.
- Brother -- Maker of the popular ScanNCut machine.
Where to Buy Vinyl Supplies
Amazon -- It goes without saying. Amazon has some of the best deals and bundles around. Very few retailers can compete with them for price.
Sign Warehouse -- Wide array of signmaking supplies including some hard-to-find accessories.
MDP Supplies -- Lots of vinyl supplies and some good deals on cutters. UK only.
Beacon Graphics -- A graphic supply superstore with everything from vector designs to heat presses.
Software and Tools
- CorelDraw -- Pro tools with new font management. Trial available, or $499.
- Adobe Illustrator -- Award winning tool can be purchased as a single Adobe cloud plan for $19.99 per month.
- AutoCAD -- An industry leader with eyewatering prices, starting at around $50 per month (for stripped down versions). Ouch!
- Sure Cuts A Lot -- Designed for cutting, with an app for your tablet. Currently on offer at $59.99.
- InkScape -- Free vector-based design tool. Export graphics for use with your vinyl cutter.
Resources and Insights
How to Prepare (Weed) Vinyl for Application -- A nice visual guide for those starting out.
Work at Home Mom Starts a Vinyl Decal Business -- Want to start a small business? This article goes behind the scenes of one mom's successful vinyl decal business.
Vinyl Cutting: Everything You Wanted to Know -- A blog by designer and vinyl cutting expert, Tay, which goes in to exceptional detail on her cutting preferences, tips and useful tricks. Highly recommend read!
The 2016 Guide to The Best Vinyl Cutting Machines -- A comprehensive guide we put together for those not sure what vinyl cutter to buy in 2016.
Extras
My Fonts -- Load up on your fonts and get designing.
DaFont -- Fonts... for free!
Vinyl Ready Designs -- Selection of templates and ready-made designs for around $1.99 each.
Peppermint Creative -- Commercial cuttables and heaps of vinyl-ready vectors that are approved for small business use (non-digital).
Vector Art -- Catnip for vector collectors with dozens of popular bundles.
Logo Shak -- Archive of famous sports logos from over the years. These are raster images so they will require converting.
Brands of the World -- Very cool archive of famous brand logos; claims to be the world's largest free resource of vector logos.
