Custom Embroidered Shirts: How To Order Styles in Bulk
When it comes to your custom swag and apparel game, there are certain things you can do to give it a considerable boost: We’re talking fun patterns, vibrant full colors, and of course, custom designs. What better way to order your new custom logo swag than in bulk for the world to share and see?
Running a business? Slap your company logo on an embroidered T-shirt and gift it to your employees or sell it to your loyal consumers. Hosting a large event or gathering? Nothing screams togetherness like matching custom swag.
Whatever the case is, there’s always a reason to order custom swag, especially in bulk. Today, we’re going to focus specifically on custom embroidered T-shirts and how they can help you reach your goals.
Why Order in Bulk?
Ordering a ton of merchandise in bulk has a lot of benefits.
From being one of the rare combatants against the emissions and pollution of shipping to the overall cost, there is no shortage of reasons why you should BIB: Buy In Bulk.
Before we get into the benefits, there are some things you should know about BIB. Specifically, is it right for you?
If you’re in need of a new T-shirt that you can rock wherever you go, you’re probably not looking to spend money on hundreds of them. While there is no minimum quantity of embroidery design for you to buy in bulk, sometimes you just don’t want more than one shirt. So, unfortunately, if this is your case, BIB might not be the best option for you.
Still, if you are looking to supply a large group of people — whether it’s an entire sports arena or just your local office — then BIB might be exactly what you’re looking for, thanks to its cost, environmental impact, and easy creation process.
Wholesale
In the spirit of transparency, BIB isn’t a real acronym. It’s simply a catchy paraphrase for wholesale, the act of buying products in large quantities in order to meet demand or cut costs.
Almost any wholesale producer in the world offers prices that decrease when the quantity of the order increases. For companies that sell a lot of the same product, this is how they turn a profit.
Clothing retailers, specifically, are some of the businesses that utilize wholesale distribution the most. This is because clothing retailers are the most likely to sell large quantities of the same product that happens to be cheap to produce: clothes.
BIB helps to decrease the overall cost and help meet the overall demand of the product — it all depends on how often it sells and its popularity.
Environment
The fashion industry is one of the earth’s biggest polluters.
In fact, the fashion industry accounts for nearly 10% of humanity's global carbon emissions. This is more than all domestic and international travel flights combined.
There are certain fashion companies around the globe attempting to do their part in creating a more sustainable future for the next generations. With that, there are also clothing companies that couldn’t care less about the environment and just want to make a profit.
While there are proven methods that help to cut the emissions of the fashion industry, one underlying factor will forever be difficult to change: shipping.
There’s simply not much that can be done. Orders have to get to their destination somehow, and someone definitely isn’t going to walk there carrying your clothes.
While not a solution in its own right, wholesale helps to bring down the overall emissions output. Instead of buying one T-shirt made overseas and having it shipped all the way to your door in North America, wholesale allows the most to be packed into one trip.
Cost
As we said before, you won’t find a wholesale retailer that won’t lower their prices for higher quantity orders.
It all boils down to basic economics, and it easily benefits both parties: You get a good price for more of a product, and the seller gets to sell and produce more merchandise.
If you did the math, the more T-shirts you ordered would drive the price down for every individual shirt. Let’s say one shirt cost around $10. If you ordered 200 of these shirts, the most likely wouldn’t be $2,000. It would come down to anywhere from five dollars to eight dollars per shirt, depending on the company.
Even your minimum order in bulk is going to be cheaper than buying high-quality designs with your embroidered logo. And this holds for any kind of clothing: dress shirts, work shirts, workwear, outerwear, pullovers, custom hats and custom embroidered polo shirts, sleeveless tank tops, and yes, T-shirts.
Why a T-Shirt?
So, with all of this considered, why should you buy a T-shirt with custom embroidery?
There are surely other embroidered apparel options like sweatshirts, hoodies, polo shirts, sweatpants, beanies, backpacks, baseball caps, totes, and other smaller accessories.
While this is true, a custom T-shirt is never a bad idea for a wholesale order. Like everything in the world, there are positives and negatives.
We’ve said it before: you could argue that a custom T-shirt is a been-there-done-that sort of thing.
Maybe it is. It’s either a staple of wholesale or it's overdone — it all depends on what you think and what you need.
T-Shirts Are a Classic
Say what you will about custom T-shirts, but there wouldn’t be wholesale without them.
They are the poster child of wholesale, and odds are you have a custom wholesale T-shirt sitting somewhere in your home right now.
Actually, we’d guarantee, at the very least, that you have been given a wholesale T-shirt at some point during your life.
Being a classic goes both ways. You either love them, or you hate them. But, no matter what anyone says (even us), you can’t go wrong with a custom T-shirt, no matter how many times they’ve been done.
Everyone Wears Them
Everyone owns and wears T-shirts.
Being a classic staple comes with perks. Think about it: short sleeve or long sleeve, women’s or men’s, it doesn't matter — T-shirts are everywhere and everyone’s got at least one.
There’s practically a zero percent chance that you don’t or haven’t owned a T-shirt before. So, all things considered, this is yet another reason why including T-shirts in your wholesale order is never a bad option. We all wear T-shirts, so why not throw yours into the mix?
Throwaway Merch, But…
As we said, there are going to be downsides to everything. Fortunately, this downside is easily fixable.
We’ve all been to a sporting event or large gathering where we’ve been given or bought a custom T-shirt to commemorate the moment. If it was given to you, there’s a good chance that you have no clue where it is or you haven’t put it on since. We call this throwaway merch.
Throwaway merch is exactly what custom T-shirts can easily become. But, as we said, there’s a solution: making them stylish, comfortable, and cool to wear.
Why Embroidery? Are There Other Options?
Now we can get into the fun part: how to properly style your custom T-shirt to ensure people will actually wear it.
As we said, custom T-shirts are often used once and then proceed to become throwaway merch. This is because a free T-shirt is typically cheap, bland, and uncomfortable compared to something you would pick yourself.
Thankfully, embroidery is a perfect way to spice up any bland designs.
What Is Embroidery?
Embroidery is a special and unique way of transferring a design onto a blank piece of apparel, such as a T-shirt.
Instead of using digital machines or the screen printing process, embroidered designs are stitched and woven into the apparel using different colored threads.
Whether you own an embroidered piece or not, odds are you’ve at least seen it before. It’s an underrated design that truly makes any bland article of clothing pop.
Digital and Screen Printing
While embroidery can make any design pop, you still have other options as to how your custom design is going to come out.
Digital and screen printing are the two most common and popular types of printing. Digital printing relies purely on machines to get the job done, while screen printing is its entirely own process involving mesh, ink, and a ton of hands-on work.
These are without a doubt the most used methods of printing for custom apparel, and it would be difficult to make a bad choice.
What’s the Best Option?
You absolutely have to get people to want to wear your custom T-shirts, otherwise what’s the point?
A bland logo and color scheme aren’t going to get the job done. While there isn’t a best or worst option, embroidery gives any logo a unique look that isn’t possible with any other type of printing method. Even though printed options can be amazing, too, we’d highly recommend trying embroidery the next time you place your wholesale order.
KOTN Supply
KOTN Supply is dedicated to creating the best possible custom swag you can ever imagine.
In other words, we’re ending the era of throwaway merch for good. Our products are made with 100% Egyptian cotton, so your shirts will never be uncomfortable or scratchy.
Our apparel is a blank canvas for your imagination to run wild. If you aren’t feeling particularly inspired, we also offer help with creating a design that’s perfect for you. You can check out our full catalog here, but we know you’ll be ordering those embroidered shirts soon enough.
Sources:
Wholesale Buying and Merchandising | Journal of Marketing
Environmental Sustainability in the Fashion Industry | Geneva Environmental Network