On-demand 3D printing: how it actually works

Everything starts with an STL or OBJ file, in millimeters, up to 50 MB. This file describes the geometry of the part and nothing else: no material, no color, no tolerance.

The unit is the most frequent trap. A model exported in centimeters arrives ten times too small, and the billed volume has nothing to do with the expected part. Check the longest dimension of your object before sending it.

The geometry must be closed, with no holes in the mesh and no inverted faces. The checks to run before sending are listed in preparing an STL file for 3D printing.

The production price has two components. First, €0.50 of preparation per part, which covers queuing and setup. Then the material, billed per cubic centimeter of the part: €0.033 for PLA, €0.038 for PETG, €0.040 for ABS.

The volume taken into account is that of the model, not of the box around it. An openwork part therefore costs less than a solid block of the same size, which gives you a direct lever on price at the design stage.

You can test a volume in the simulator before even creating an account, and find the full rates on the pricing page.

Three materials are available. PLA is the cheapest and easiest to print, and suits decoration and indoor objects. PETG handles heat and impacts better. ABS is the most technical of the three.

The price gap between PLA and ABS is small: €0.007/cm³. On a 100 cm³ part, that is a €0.70 difference. So it is not the price that should decide, but how the part will be used.

A detailed comparison of the three materials is in PLA, PETG or ABS.

Standard is 7 business days. Express goes down to 3 business days with a 30% surcharge on production. These times apply to the workshop; add transport time to get the delivery date.

Lead time does not grow with the number of parts as much as you might think: ten identical parts go through in the same batch, they do not take ten times longer than the first one.

For a product launch or the holiday season, state the standard lead time on the product page and keep express as a buffer in case of delays.

Parts are produced and inspected in France. Bobitech Cloud3D is a service of Bobitech, a plastics manufacturer of about 150 people located in the Plastics Vallée, in Oyonnax.

The inspection covers what you can see and what holds together: surface finish, properly bonded layers, no delamination. A part that fails inspection is reprinted, it does not go to your customer.

The full manufacturing process is presented on the production page.

Two destinations are possible. To you, the seller, for €6.90. Or directly to the end customer for €7.90, in an unbranded package under your shop's name, with tracking sent back to the shop.

Direct shipping is the main offer of the service because it removes an entire step: no receiving, no repacking, no second shipment. The package makes one trip instead of two.

You remain the customer's point of contact: your name is on the label and you are the one who shares the tracking. Nothing in the package indicates that a third-party workshop produced the part.

A product made of several parts is ordered with one STL file per part. Each part is priced on its own volume and carries its own €0.50 of preparation.

If the product needs assembly or components (bulb, socket, screws), you describe it in the production note. The workshop confirms the price before starting production: no assembly work is billed without your approval.

A bedside lamp printed in two parts thus costs around €10 to produce, for a shop selling price of around €39.90. The full reasoning is laid out in calculating your real margin.

There is no subscription on the site: everything is paid per order. Only AI 3D generation runs on credits: 10 generations for €7 or 50 for €29.

Quantity discounts apply automatically: 3% off from 10 parts, 6% off from 50, 10% off from 200. They require no negotiation and no long-term commitment.

If you do not have a product yet, the ready-to-sell catalog skips the design phase: the files have already been through production.