There are some serious changes going on with the way I am running my business. I provide a service, a product and a small bit of entertainment through the website my main website at http://www.yque.com/, but I haven't finished what I've started. The entire approach to http://www.t-shirts.org/ has been to try and make a comprehensive site to bring it all together, to direct information and funnel my efforts into one long-lasting manageable enterprise. In doing so I've opened the doors to several areas that I had previously closed. The time it takes to experiment with every facet of this business has limited my ability to bring a fully functional professional website to my customers, however, this drive to try everything is the fodder that should make this site worth a read if you are interested in t-shirts.
Today I played with http://www.cafepress.com/ , a transfer based t-shirt website, and uploaded some of my latest graphics and slogans to try their interface. I've bitched about the quality of transfers before, but I have to say you can't argue with the functionality of a smooth interface. Just being able to allow customers to upload jpegs, the lowest quality of printable artwork, to items as varied as mugs and license plates is impressive. In less than 5-minutes you can post an image on over a hundred products and get an idea of how your logo/design will look on various garments too. Sure, I'm jealous, but I don't want to be in the transfer business and I've stayed away from the draw of instant gratification, so far.
I posted about 7 separate sites on http://www.cafepress.com/ today (links below):
http://www.cafepress.com/bhutto - Free Benazir Bhutto T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/writersstrike - Writers: Strike Studios: Blink T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/regimes - Regime Change Starts at Work T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/regimeschool - Regime Change Starts at School T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/kindrewind - Be Kind, Rewind VHS Video T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/supers - Super Star T-shirts
http://www.cafepress.com/ihatetheenviro - I Hate The Environment T-shirts
http://www.cafepress.com/highwaystar - Highway Star T-shirts
I can't even begin to think that I would make these types of items for people, one at a time, without going crazy. Coffee Mugs are one process, mouse pads are similar, but another. T-shirt designs fit differently on different types of shirts, dark garments require a transparent background, otherwise they have a white rectangle shape around them, which are just a few of the reasons I have stayed away from offering this type of stuff. More power to them if they can provide all of these items and make a profit, because nobody else really wants to do that. Which is why I felt I needed to embrace their talents without discarding my own skills. I figure I can post my items on their site and if someone finds it through their site and buys it then I haven't lost anything, but I may even make a few bucks at the same time.
Cafe Press has a profit/money sharing setup that allows the user to set a price for the products, above the cost/charges that Cafe Press sells the items at. Any proceeds beyond the prices charged by Cafe Press will go to The User, which in this case is me. Cafe Press's prices are practically retail, as it should be since they are making these things individually, so if you price your stuff too high you may not get many sales. Conversely if you price it at cost you won't make much when you sell items through their website. The good thing about all of this is that you don't have to touch the merchandise or deal with the customer service beyond uploading the logo to their website. Nice.
Part of approach to marketing is also offensive, in the strategic sense, because many of my design ideas in the past end up on Cafe Press and often they end up being presented in such a way that hinders my own marketing. Largely due to the fact that someone can scratch out a few lines of text and have it presented on everything from thongs to clocks with only a couple of clicks. I don't blame the people for also marketing ideas, as some of us may think alike in this low-brow kitschy world of tacky products. Therefore my approach is not to complain, but to make sure that I am there too, placing my products for sale, just like every other amateur. When you have to make money in the t-shirts business there is no pride, it's work and if this gets the job done, then I don't see why I should put my head in the sand and act like they aren't there. I couldn't make half that stuff anyway as I've got my hands full with screen printing.
Today I played with http://www.cafepress.com/ , a transfer based t-shirt website, and uploaded some of my latest graphics and slogans to try their interface. I've bitched about the quality of transfers before, but I have to say you can't argue with the functionality of a smooth interface. Just being able to allow customers to upload jpegs, the lowest quality of printable artwork, to items as varied as mugs and license plates is impressive. In less than 5-minutes you can post an image on over a hundred products and get an idea of how your logo/design will look on various garments too. Sure, I'm jealous, but I don't want to be in the transfer business and I've stayed away from the draw of instant gratification, so far.
I posted about 7 separate sites on http://www.cafepress.com/ today (links below):
http://www.cafepress.com/bhutto - Free Benazir Bhutto T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/writersstrike - Writers: Strike Studios: Blink T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/regimes - Regime Change Starts at Work T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/regimeschool - Regime Change Starts at School T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/kindrewind - Be Kind, Rewind VHS Video T-shirt
http://www.cafepress.com/supers - Super Star T-shirts
http://www.cafepress.com/ihatetheenviro - I Hate The Environment T-shirts
http://www.cafepress.com/highwaystar - Highway Star T-shirts
I can't even begin to think that I would make these types of items for people, one at a time, without going crazy. Coffee Mugs are one process, mouse pads are similar, but another. T-shirt designs fit differently on different types of shirts, dark garments require a transparent background, otherwise they have a white rectangle shape around them, which are just a few of the reasons I have stayed away from offering this type of stuff. More power to them if they can provide all of these items and make a profit, because nobody else really wants to do that. Which is why I felt I needed to embrace their talents without discarding my own skills. I figure I can post my items on their site and if someone finds it through their site and buys it then I haven't lost anything, but I may even make a few bucks at the same time.
Cafe Press has a profit/money sharing setup that allows the user to set a price for the products, above the cost/charges that Cafe Press sells the items at. Any proceeds beyond the prices charged by Cafe Press will go to The User, which in this case is me. Cafe Press's prices are practically retail, as it should be since they are making these things individually, so if you price your stuff too high you may not get many sales. Conversely if you price it at cost you won't make much when you sell items through their website. The good thing about all of this is that you don't have to touch the merchandise or deal with the customer service beyond uploading the logo to their website. Nice.
Part of approach to marketing is also offensive, in the strategic sense, because many of my design ideas in the past end up on Cafe Press and often they end up being presented in such a way that hinders my own marketing. Largely due to the fact that someone can scratch out a few lines of text and have it presented on everything from thongs to clocks with only a couple of clicks. I don't blame the people for also marketing ideas, as some of us may think alike in this low-brow kitschy world of tacky products. Therefore my approach is not to complain, but to make sure that I am there too, placing my products for sale, just like every other amateur. When you have to make money in the t-shirts business there is no pride, it's work and if this gets the job done, then I don't see why I should put my head in the sand and act like they aren't there. I couldn't make half that stuff anyway as I've got my hands full with screen printing.
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