Tale of Two T-Shirt Sales
January 26, 2009
The big t-shirt news of this particular Monday isn’t the Threadless $3 off for 3 days sale. Neither is it the new shirts available at that site, cool though some of them are (e.g., The Grand Escape).
And it isn’t the 10% off for two weeks sale at T-Shirt Hell. But it is the reason for that sale. The site “where all the bad shirts go” is closing down. I first saw the story at TechCrunch, where Mike Arrington quotes TSH’s Sunshine Megatron’s goodbye.
I started this company in June of 2001, nearly 8 years ago, with the intention of producing the best satirical, the most controversial, the funniest t-shirts on the internet. Generally speaking, I feel I’ve accomplished that and am satisfied with what we’ve put out. I made a shitload of dough along the way. I’ve done cocaine off the better body parts of supermodels. I’ve even raped and killed a mountain panda in the hills of Shaanxi. But these perks are besides the point.
I just don’t feel like dealing with idiots anymore. I’ll give you an example of the kind of misguided morons we deal with on a regular basis at T-Shirt Hell. We released a new shirt a couple weeks ago that says “It’s not gay if you beat them up afterwards”… we’ve been besieged with emails from angry people complaining about the “fact” that the shirt is hate speech or that we’re promoting gay bashing and should take it down immediately.
The Obama image is from TSH, by the way. I hadn’t heard of TSH before today. So I am reminded of the people who, when told about Elvis’ death, remarked that it was a good career move.
Bestee Finalists at Threadless
January 23, 2009
For someone who tends to mock awards, I tend to post about them a lot. So it is with cognitive dissonance, as well as with pleasure, that I link to the Bestee Award nominees at Threadless.
My vote goes to “Grandpa Cassette” by Zack Finfrock. I like some of the other work at Zack’s site, particularly this strip about the webcomic creative process.
Threadless Again
November 17, 2008
Threadless t-shirts are for the young and trendy (or whatever the hip word for trendy is these days). But they are not just for such people; I remarked on The Graying of Threadless a few months ago.
I’m following up on this for a couple of reasons. The more recent one is that someone whose age seemed similar to (and may even exceed) my own noticed the shirt I was wearing today, smiled, and said “Threadless.” This was in the Roslindale branch of Staples, which I don’t think is usually regarded as a hipster hangout.
The other reason is a week old. Monday is new release day at Threadless. Today’s batch had its highlights, particularly “Let It Flow!” But last Monday saw one of the best new release days ever (or even evah!) with designs like “The Mississippi Phoenix” and “Small Mammal Flying Machine.” The latter provides the image for this post.
Threadless Sale Extended
August 31, 2008
The Threadless sale has got even better since I posted about it a week ago. It has been extended through September 7th. And over 100 shirt designs are now only $9.
On the other hand, the sale has got worse. There are a lot of “Sold out” signs against design/size combos. In particular, the $9 shirts seem to be those available in only a few sizes. For example, “Defend the Kingdom” is available only in kid sizes now.
Threadless Sale
August 25, 2008
It’s back to school sale time at Threadless. My favorite of the rather impressive new crop of shirts is “Three Little Pigs: Mechanized Assault.” Like most other shirts, it’s on sale for $12 this week.
The Graying of Threadless
July 21, 2008
I got my first Threadless t-shirt back in 2005. It was a while before I saw anyone else wearing one. As time went by, I saw more and more people wearing them: usually people in their teens or 20s.
Recently, I’ve started to see Threadless shirts on people like me: parents, and not always particularly young parents. The photo is of a people who’s very much like me, wearing his favorite t-shirt: Patchwork. By the way, I ensured that I am not the oldest wearer of Threadless shirts by buying some for my dad.
Timely T-Shirt Sale
June 2, 2008
The Threadless summer sale is on for the next week or so. Ts are $10 and up, and there are also deals on prints, hoodies, etc. It’s a particularly strong day for new designs, including “Hey Mr Blue” here.
I think I have enough Ts to get me through the summer and beyond, but my almost-2 son might get a few new ones.
Threadless: Prints and Inc
May 20, 2008
The Most Innovative Small Company in America? Threadless, according to Inc. magazine. The cover of the current issue highlights the $30M in sales and 30% margins. The Customer is the Company is the title of the article, which describes the way in which Threadless outsources value chain activities, including design, to its customers.
I join Jason at 37signals in congratulating the Threadless guys.
It’s a big week for them. On Monday, they added prints to their product range. Here’s Tree Town, my favorite of the first three shirt designs to be available as prints. It’s $35 for a limited edition art print.
Platform for T-Shirt Printers
May 1, 2008
If you want to print t-shirts using designs provided by others, take a look at Pikiware. Mashable Mark describes it as a company providing a fulfillment system designed to work with digital garment printers.
Let’s broaden the appeal of this post. Following this paragraph, there will be a t-shirt para, then a Web 2.rightnow para! And Pikiware isn’t just for t-shirt printers, it’s also for people who print hoodies! and mugs! etc!
If you’re reading this because you’re interested in t-shirts, then you might be interested to know that April 28 was the (IMHO) best shirt release Monday at Threadless for a while. My favorite of the new crop is “Attack of Literacy!”
If you’re reading this because you follow web stuff, then the point of this post is that Pikiware is the latest example of the platform trend. If Web 2.0 was about user-generated content and the web as platform, then Web 2.rightnow is about vertical platforms: platforms to enable others to build particular things on the web.
Hey, that oxymoron, vertical platform, deserves its own post.
Bestees and New Ts at Threadless
March 10, 2008
And the winners of the Bestee awards are… many. Partly Hungry Skies, pictured here, won for Title of the Year. It looks, if anything, even better on the kids’ color of light blue. To provide some context, the Bestees are also known as the Threadless awards.
Today, being Monday, is new shirt day at Threadless. One of the new designs shares a name with one of our distinguished local Boston bloggers: Collateral Damage. By I’m not sure what I mean by “distinguished.” When the term is used about me, I think that it means “possessing gray hair.”
