knife makers T-shirts?

R

redd1981

Joined
Oct 4, 2011
Messages
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Hey guys Im just wondering how many of you custom makers sell shirts with your logo on them?

I know I may never be able to afford a custom knife from you guys but what better way to advertise or get a conversation started with someone who likes knives but has no idea about the custom market.

does blade forums have t-shirts?
 
I don't think we have BF tee shirts, but there is a Bladeforums W&SS patch and hat available. Look at the heading and click BFC Gear.

Many makers who sell at shows have shirts made for them and their booth/table mates to wear, but I don't recall seeing anyone but the big retailers (Cold Steel, SOG, Buck, etc.)selling them to others.

At almost all seminars, the bigger knife shows, and hammer-ins, shirts are for sale. Additionally, most knife groups, like the ABS/Guilds/etc., sell shirts. I wear a knife shirt most weekends, and like you said, it starts many a conversation in the grocery line or hardware store.
 
I buy a hundred or so T-shirts each year and sell them at Blade Show and at my forum. This year we did hats and beer glasses instead of t-shirts. We generally sell them for roughly twice what we paid and still don't break even on the venture because of the overhead to manage shipping and supplying them to the staff for the show, etc. I think it is important to manage the company as a brand and you have to start somewhere. I do what I can pay for with a check, and don't use a CC for marketing.

Listen, to be a successful knifemaker you have to re-sell and re-sell the same customer. You do this with branding. Get a forum, so they can meet and show enthusiasm for their hobby. You name everything you do so that they can memorize the names. You have to be willing to repeat the same pattern. This is so that it can become collectable. This is Jerry Busse 101 stuff. T-shirts and low cost items that can be collected alongside the knives help keep interest up. They drive posts and thread counts, you see them at shows, if you make ladies shirts, maybe a lady drags her husband to your table for one and you can sell him a knife.

There are guys with names who can sell individual knives just as fast as they can make them and their work is vastly more collectible than mine. Wally Hayes jumps to mind. (Needless to say he is also a level of craftsman I will never achieve.) But that wasn't my business model. I went the Busse route, so I do sell t-shirts.
 
bladsmth said:
I don't think we have BF tee shirts, but there is a Bladeforums W&SS patch and hat available. Look at the heading and click BFC Gear.
Click to expand...

Yes, there are BFC T-shirts, hats and such found here: http://www.onestopknifeshop.com/store/bladeforums-hats.html
I was going to mention Fiddleback, but Andy already beat me to it. I know there aren't a lot of knifemakers who sell logo T-Shirts but they are out there. You sort of have to look around and ask. I do know that there are a few manufacturers who sell T-Shirts, like Emerson, Spyderco, Himalayan Imports, Kershaw...etc.
Most sell them in batches as they have them made, sort of on a limited run basis or as they are able to have them made and in stock.
 
Fiddleback said:
I buy a hundred or so T-shirts each year and sell them at Blade Show and at my forum. This year we did hats and beer glasses instead of t-shirts. We generally sell them for roughly twice what we paid and still don't break even on the venture because of the overhead to manage shipping and supplying them to the staff for the show, etc. I think it is important to manage the company as a brand and you have to start somewhere. I do what I can pay for with a check, and don't use a CC for marketing.

Listen, to be a successful knifemaker you have to re-sell and re-sell the same customer. You do this with branding. Get a forum, so they can meet and show enthusiasm for their hobby. You name everything you do so that they can memorize the names. You have to be willing to repeat the same pattern. This is so that it can become collectable. This is Jerry Busse 101 stuff. T-shirts and low cost items that can be collected alongside the knives help keep interest up. They drive posts and thread counts, you see them at shows, if you make ladies shirts, maybe a lady drags her husband to your table for one and you can sell him a knife.

There are guys with names who can sell individual knives just as fast as they can make them and their work is vastly more collectible than mine. Wally Hayes jumps to mind. (Needless to say he is also a level of craftsman I will never achieve.) But that wasn't my business model. I went the Busse route, so I do sell t-shirts.
Click to expand...

In shirts, what's the spread and % of sizes and colours you go through?

Do you stock say pink ones in ladies sizes,

or just sell Ford model T it and sell one colour and style (black) to everyone ?
 
Karda, You know, I completely forgot that they had those...and I have one in the closet. Dang, old age sucks!
 
12345678910 said:
In shirts, what's the spread and % of sizes and colours you go through?

Do you stock say pink ones in ladies sizes,

or just sell Ford model T it and sell one colour and style (black) to everyone ?
Click to expand...

I get a few mediums, a bunch of larges (30 %), Lots of XL (40%), XXL (20%), and the rest XXXL. These #'s are guesses, but I think you see the bell curve there.

I have always done a seperate ladies shirt, and I tried to make them very sexy shirts. No regular jerzey tees. Mine last year had my logo with the words "I bite" on the front. A couple of years at Blade Show Dylan had a little tank top made up that said "I make boys bleed" on the back and his logo on the front. Sold out. Women dragging their fellas over to get a shirt. I was suprised, but the show needed to be more fun for the ladies regardless. I order more mediums and only go to XXL on ladies shirts.

I've only gone with one shirt/color at a time for each gender.
 
I did shirts for the first time this year and went with mens and laddies style/ sizes but they wear both the same color and said "Custom built to fit your hand" on the chest and had my makers mark on the back. They are a losing money deal for me, but it is a way to for me to offer something extra to the guys (and girls) that support me

front
View attachment 450266

back
View attachment 450267
 
I started doing shirts so I would have something with my name and logo to wear as walking advertising, it also made it easier to find me at a show. I do sell them but I find that giving a t-shirt to a customer who buys an expensive knife goes a long way. They are walking advertising and appreciate the gesture, plus I can write them off come tax time. I have also been known to trade shirts with other makers.
 
I've been trying to come up with a good shirt idea myself. For goodness sakes don't just put your logo on a brown or OD t-shirt even if you exclusively make tactical knives - that's been done to death, and after a while they all look the same. TM Hunt had 70's style 3/4 sleeve t-shirts with a new graphic made up for BLADE this year, and they were a big hit.

As the other gentlemen said, it's not a money-maker by any means, more of a thank you gift/marketing tool.
 
How do you design your shirts ?


do you have enough artistic skil that you can draw them yourself, or have a friend, or hire someone ?


How do you submit those designs to the printers, is there a file type that they work with ?
 
I did a dozen hats one time. Kept one for myself, gave a few to family, and gave the rest out with knives to customers. I had maybe $7.50 in them, figured it was good advertising. The guy who did them did the artwork based on a sketch I gave him, and we did a partial trade on a knife he wanted. Turned out nice.
 
I have a hard time paying to advertise for someone's brand. You'll never catch me buying your t-shirt unless it's beyond hilarious, and the branding is innocuous.


Giving away a shirt to a custom is an excellent idea however, as most wont mind advertising for something they believe in, as long as they don't have to pay for the privilege.

Brand whores, of course, will pay to advertise for you, but they're also advertising for others at the same time (since they'll likely be sporting a full suit of clothing with emblems of various brands), so you've got to consider what associations that attaches you to.


I do of course buy event shirts, from non-profit groups like the ABS, and the Alabama Forge Council, ABANA, etc.. Those proceeds go to supporting a cause, not a brand.
 
12345678910 said:
How do you design your shirts ?
Do you have enough artistic skill that you can draw them yourself, or have a friend, or hire someone ?
How do you submit those designs to the printers, is there a file type that they work with ?
Click to expand...

I've been designing 2D stuff since I was old enough to grasp a crayon. Being an admitted control-freak, I tend to do that sort of thing myself. Some people even say I have a moderate amount of talent for it. :D

If you already have a logo, you're golden. If you don't, there are a plethora of sites that will let you work one up for free, using their templates/fonts/guidelines. Of course, there are also a lot of folks who will charge you a big chunk of money to put your name in a cool font...

Even if you can't draw a straight line with a rule, and have zero concept of layout principles... if one is a maker of any repute at all, there's a very good chance that one of your fans/clients is a graphic artist and can help you with all that, often in return for a couple shirts or a discount "coupon" for their next knife. Networking is hugely important in this business... ;)

Printers who specialize in short runs are generally open to pretty much any file-type you can think of. Most of them include cleaning it up and transferring it to whatever they prefer working with as part of the standard set-up charges. They realize, and cater to the fact that a person ordering 20 or 100 shirts for promo or fun purposes is not interested in spending a lot of time dealing with specific software/file formats. That's their job.

In short, you're mostly paying for the shirts themselves. The "printing" is really not that big a deal, unless you go hog-wild with 4-color process or other high-end stuff.
 
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12345678910 said:
How do you design your shirts ?


do you have enough artistic skil that you can draw them yourself, or have a friend, or hire someone ?


How do you submit those designs to the printers, is there a file type that they work with ?
Click to expand...

I've done it all three ways. My original logo work was done by a college buddy. He also designed the first shirts. Later, I took the same logo and made up a few shirts of my own design. Then, when the website was getting done, I had the graphic guy come up with something he tought was cool and used it for a mens and womens shirt.

Most logo files are *.eps. Thats a vector scalable image file. Which only means they can print it any size without loosing quality.


I know that selling shirts, or more, buying shirts isn't for everyone. Some folks see it differently. The folks who buy shirts from makers are into the maker's work and they are interested in showing it, and supporting the maker. The customer's enthusiasm is critical. I try to encourage it.
 
Well, we've drifted pretty far off-topic... sorry 'bout that. But here we are...

Fiddleback said:
The customer's enthusiasm is critical. I try to encourage it.
Click to expand...

Indeed. Take a look at the Beckerheads... they have patches, t-shirts, bottle openers, organize both sanctioned and independent gatherings a couple times a year, all kinds of fun stuff. And the swag didn't cost Ka-Bar or Becker a nickle, those folks simply got permission and set it all up themselves. (Ka-Bar/Becker does support all that with knife GAWs/contests, etc.) Point is, very few of those cats only own one or two Beckers... many of them have several, even dozens, and they're almost tireless in encouraging new folks to get into 'em. That's the main thing to take from it. :thumbup:

Most of us don't have quite that kind of scale to deal with, so probably no one is going to design/print/distribute our advertising for free :D ...but I do think fostering the enjoyment of owning your work and even building a sense of community can be helpful. Think of it as a "value-added" feature...

The further extreme is the Busse company. They're famous for regular sales, specials, secret meetings, purposely limiting certain editions and so forth. At Blade they had people packed around their booth screaming like a rock concert, reserved an entire restaurant and set up a buffet in the hall to feed their customers, lotteries... all sorts of crazy stuff to make people feel exclusive and special.

That sort of marketing is a bit much for my taste. But it sure seems to be working for them, they seem to sell everything they can make at what appears to be a pretty good profit margin.
 
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