Band Merchandise

[sprocketflup]

About to set off on the road for our last gig of the year ( well planned one anyways)

We would really like to hit next year with a more professional approach and set up, and so over the winter break I want to sort out some merchandise.

Ive bought loads of band t-shirts at gigs over the years, Ive been really disappointed with some of it, whereas its gone once through the wash and came out no bigger than a beer mat, whereas other stuff Ive worn to death and had years of use out of it. Oddly enough, the one thats lasted best is a NOFX sweatshirt from thier 1992 'Soul Doubt' tour, still going strong, if a little tattered. Punks not dead.

Anyone got any links where we can source some decent quality gear? we are thinking the usual t-shirts, beanie hats, key rings, mugs etc

TIA
dave sprocketflup

[andydye]

we use awesome merchandise in Leeds for most of our gubbins, they're very good

[skidder652003]

we had 50 t shirts made up (black and white) for £3 a pop, sold em all for a tenner each last year
these guys Pins & Knuckles, very good
http://www.pkmerch.com/

[Skybone]

Try: [url="http://www.shirtysomething.com/index.html"]http://www.shirtysomething.com/index.html[/url]

I had a load of shirts made up a few yeas back for one band, and they've held up well. Run by a bass player as well (Frazer Craske from 80's UK thashers Sabbat).

[BigRedX]

Either a T-shirt printer that is local to you or Awesome Merchandise - whichever is the better deal. These days unless you go very cheap you should be getting good quality shirts. Most places currently offer Gildan which are excellent quality. Expect to pay between £300 and £350 for 100 shirts with a single colour print on one side.

Regarding sizes IME no matter what your core audience looks like the L and XL sizes far outsell everything else. It's worth having a few in every size though including ladies - we've sold T-shirts on several occasions simply because we were the only band at the gig who had them available in the right sizes...

For the rest of the stuff, I'm really not sure. Certainly our audience wants mostly recorded material (CDs and Vinyl) and T-shirts. Every time we've done other things they haven't sold particularly well and we've ended up giving most of them away.

[Lozz196]

As above, Gildan for quality (not too expensive either) and L & XL for the majority of your stock (unless you`re a band with young skinny fans that is).

We take our merch with us for every gig and so far haven`t done a gig where we`ve not sold anything. Usually we find the first time we play somewhere we sell CDs, from then on it`s tees - people want to hear us before wearing us it seems.

[BigRedX]

[quote name='Lozz196' timestamp='1448718544' post='2917626']
As above, Gildan for quality (not too expensive either) and L & XL for the majority of your stock (unless you`re a band with young skinny fans that is).
[/quote]

We're a band with a good proportion of young and skinny fans. They simply don't buy T-shirts. Hence we have sold out of all our XL stock, only have a few L sizes left.