Retail price of t-shirts sucks – - rant! (19)
Published on June 9th, 2008. By The Taddict, under General.
Is it just me or can you not find a unique t-shirt these days, from some of the smaller stores, without spending close to thirty bucks a pop.
Case in point – just the other day I wanted to find some unique designs to add to my collection without spending over what seems to be the norm of 18-24 bucks per shirt. But to my dismay everything I liked from these smaller shops was way over my budget. Don’t these shops realize they will sell more if they cut the cost, or are they simply getting ripped when it comes to purchasing the blanks and having them printed – thus the increase on the retail side? ( I think not, see the example below)
I strongly agree with The Daily Tee’s title post “If You Sell Tees more than $30, You are Capitalist” and would even edit the title from $30 to $24 (more than) which would apply to a high percentage of the stores I visited.
The retail cost of a t-shirt should depend a lot on the overall wholesale cost, but smaller stores shouldn’t have a handicap of increasing t-shirt cost because they don’t sell as much. Decrease your retail price and sell more tee’s, don’t increase your margin by 300% and become one of those stores that only the rich can afford.
Here’s a good example..
For 72 shirts (12-24-24-12) A six color print on a Gildan white tee would only cost me 6.75 from one of the liked online print shops – add a dollar for colors. Price goes down as you print more – for 100 of the same – on the white – it would be 5.00 a print. So if your selling your t-shirts for 28 dollars your making over $20 profit off each shirt!!@
Even if your paying royalties on licensed goods, your retail price shouldn’t be anywhere close to $30 a shirt! Smaller stores, like ones hosted on bigcartel should take note from the larger known t-shirt shops (threadless, dbh, etc) and lower your price if you haven’t already done so. Stores like Johnny Cupcakes have nice designs, but I wouldn’t pay what they are asking per tee (35.99) any day of the week.
just my .02
I know opinions will differ
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19 Comments
Joe on June 9th, 2008
Well, hopefully the shirts you were looking at weren’t printed on Gildan! Because those prices would be more reasonable if they were on higher-quality blanks like American Apparel, Continental Clothing, Alternative Apparel, etc. But let’s go with your example of printing 72 pieces. If they were printed on Continental Clothing (let’s go with a color shirt), say $4.50 per shirt. Add a 3-color print, that’s say $4. Add tags, say it’s $1 (it could easily be more, especially with retagging). And say you paid $400 for your design, that’s $5.56/piece. That would come out to $15.06 per shirt! Even if you do the art yourself, you’ve still paid $9.50 per shirt, which is quite a lot, and makes selling them for $15 below what even your wholesale price should be.
I don’t know what stores you were looking at, but I can promise you that simply lowering prices will not increase sales; in fact, lowering prices can sometimes DECREASE sales by giving the shopper a decreased impression of the value of the item they’re purchasing. Moreover, people buying $15 tees are probably not the same market as the people who are buying $40 ones.
With the advent of Shirt.Woot, I think consumer expectations of what t-shirts cost to produce, in some circles at least, have plummeted. When they see side deals, if shirts are over $10, some people will say they’re too expensive, and don’t even ask about $15! What they don’t realize is that Shirt.Woot is essentially selling their shirts directly to consumers at wholesale prices. And from what I’ve heard, their print quality isn’t very good (I’ve never gotten one myself).
As far as comparing smaller shops to DBH or Threadless, I think it’s just not fair. Smaller shops can have a lot of trouble competing with their prices just because they don’t have the volume in terms of both production and sales. And lowering prices doesn’t, unfortunately, somehow miraculously boost sales to their level.
Since you mention Johnny Cupcakes, you might want to read his take on his business practices, that he just wrote up on Emptees the other day: http://emptees.com/posts/3911-how-i-run-some-parts-of-my-business-don-t-be-a-whore-org He isn’t trying to compete on price or volume. In fact, he’s doing just the opposite, and selling exclusivity. It works for him, because he’s been fortunate enough to have built a devoted following.
Joe on June 9th, 2008
I forgot to mention that if it costs you $9.50/piece, a standard markup would be to $28.50, at least.
Chris @ Rizzo Tees on June 9th, 2008
I’m going to be selling mine for $20, and I thought that was a little pricey!
Al on June 9th, 2008
Interesting post and great comments too. I sell t-shirts through PODs and in order to make it worth my while I have to mark them up to about $25 and $30 (by $10). I used to earn less commission per shirt but after increasing the markup I didn’t notice a downturn in sales. I am a capitalist and not ashamed of the fact. I expect to be rewarded for hard work and I think others should be too.
admin on June 10th, 2008
thanks for your comments, glad this post striked up some conversation
jimiyo on June 11th, 2008
I agree with you mostly, but I also don’t buy clothes much.
It’s weird, I used to sell shirts at $15 at one store, and then another store I let them price it. For the same shirt they would often sell for $30 or $36, and I sold almost the same dollar amount at the beginning. Although in the end the loss leader brought in the more income, but with more hassle.
I think since whatever the customer will pay is alright with me. Although I like to give customers a deal, it seems they perceive value conversely than one would think. On Etsy, I wanted to unload my shirts so I reduced the price to $15, but it seems I had more inquires when it was $25. Totally ridiculous. I think they think my product is cheap, which its not.
There’s an article on the internet somewhere about a guy who tried to sell a painting for $300. And he couldn’t. So he decided to go to different galleries and raise the price until it sold. He eventually sold it for 10K. It’s silly how people are fooled by perceived value. But good for me if Im looking to sell warez.
admin on June 11th, 2008
i see your point jimiyo – sometimes the price alone could make the customer think the item is more unique or special and increase the purchase power – these comments have enlightened me a great deal and all opinions have there points.
Chris @ Rizzo Tees on June 11th, 2008
This has been a great discussion.
I think perceived value does come down to uniqueness, as admin said. How many sites have McLovin shirts? How many have that one unique, beautiful graphic design that you saw on DBH, Threadless, or Defunker? The McLovin shirt could be on American Apparel, just like these fancier shirts. People often want to be original and seem to be willing to pay more for that.
alyssa on June 13th, 2008
the dollar is really weak right now and the economy sucks. even pizza is like $3 – $4 a slice where i live (new york). so i understand why small tshirt companies have to up their prices. plus it’s not too bad. you’ve got corporate companies like urban outfitters charging $28 – $35 + a shirt when it costs them probably $2 to make (since it’s not made in the USA). now that is something i won’t pay for but i don’t mind spending a little extra to support a small brand
Rangga on June 13th, 2008
small label/shop would have difficult time lowering the price since it they may not be able to cover the overhead cost (rent, bulk print, royalti). Unlike big shop, small label/shop only produce less product thus every piece it carries get much more share of overhead than bigger shop which produce or sell hundreds (if not thousands) of tees in a day.
I agree with Alyssa, it’s important to support your small labels if you want to see them grow. So they can be capitalist too 
Mediocore Clothing on September 12th, 2008
Joe made some great points. I was going to make a post similar to his but he’s already done all the work.
I feel both sides, the pain of the consumer for high priced tees, and the pain of the small indie clothing label trying to compete get decent wholesale prices.
baboo on September 21st, 2008
Talk about ripping off. In my place (Singapore), Club 21 sells some designs from threadless (At first, i thought they are official dealer or something but it turned out that anyone could be official dealer if they were bothered to place the orders and wait for the items to arrive in 3 weeks).
OMG, they charge freaking hell of 37 bucks for shirt that’s only worth 12 bucks if you buy directly from online store (shipping fee has already been included!).
I wonder why there are no other competitors who would sell those shirts at cheaper price to overtake Club 21 reputation and its monopoly in Singapore.
leximae sandvig on October 6th, 2008
i think that tee-shirt retails prices is CRAZY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
cmnns on March 20th, 2009
I agree with pricing whatever you feel customers will pay for, that’s the idea of a free market. However about five minutes ago I became really annoyed when I was about to buy a t-shirt from from 6dollarshirts.com and I realized that their shipping costs ($7.70) are more than the damn shirt itself. Perhaps I’m being a tad unreasonable but paying more $ to ship an item than what it costs itself seems to be a dishonest business practice. There is no way it costs that much to ship a t-shirt. There website should be http://www.6dollarshirts+7.70forshippingthanksforlettingusripyouoff.com
Rizzo Tees on March 23rd, 2009
Wow, $7.70 is alot. I’m not here to bash a competitor, but man, that is alot. I charge about $6 – my site is plugged into the USPS API, so I pull the cost directly from their computers and charge that to the customer. Plus, I often upgrade the shipment to Priority Mail at no extra charge.
I think the $6 shirt + large shipping cost model is just one of many sales models out there, but I hate to see a customer pissed off.
Speaking of Singapore, all you have to do is buy 5 tees and I ship there for free.
marley on April 14th, 2009
I 6dollarshirts defense, the shipping cost per shirt goes way down when you buy more than one. For example, if you buy 10, the order total is about $65. That’s only 50 cents shipping per shirt!
designsbyjm on August 10th, 2009
I charge 30 for a shirt, but it cost me bcause at the moment i place my orde when the customer does, wich means for 1 shirt , 8 dollars for print, 2 to 3 dollars for shirt, and 6.50 for their shipment to me so right there thats already about 17 dollars, and i include shipping in my price wich is about 6 to 7 dollars, so what do i make 5 to 8 dollars in profit, so for the hand drawn art i do , its what i have to do to survive
Niklas on December 10th, 2009
Yes true but one english shop charge up to £150 for a t-shirt imagine that
http://www.brownsfashion.com/product/fashion/mensstore/t-shirts/026024430010.htm
Im going to charge $50 with todays dollar price and im going with a total unique t-shirt so
oath threadline on June 9th, 2008
i agree. we print on american apparel and all our tees are $15 including the shipping (www.oaththreadline.com). though all our tees are limited, we only print about 50 of each we dont like overcharging the people who buy from us. i hardly buy tees because there are just too expensive sometimes.