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Mis-print Monday: Super Bowl Level Sewing Error

Its bad enough that whiny face Peyton Manning won the Super Bowl (Hey, I”m an unabashed Patriot fan) but look at that hat. Biggest stage there is and New Era QC failed and Mr. “175 Yards of Total Offense” got a hat with “Champions” upside down on the back strap. Super Bowl advertising cost over…

Believing What You Read (or not…)

Two quick points on this cover of this issue of ECOTEXTILE: 1. ECOTEXTILE is an excellent source for information on the sustainability end of the business. You can get headlines via email for free or subscribe for the full articles.  2. There lead article this month make a great point regarding sustainability, both environmental and labor claims…

Ship Happens: Part Two (Variation on Mis-print Monday…)

A couple months ago I posted a warning about ship timing.  Before the holidays carriers are covered up with Christmas gift deliveries.  Well… the saga continues as the winter weather takes it’s toll on cities in the North.  A  week ago I fell victim to a horrible shipping error.  We were shipping 3 pallets with $25,000…

KIWO Factory Tour: The Ink Kitchen Goes to Deutschland

The Ink Kitchen visited the KIWO in Wiesloch, Germany. Wiesloch  is a nice little town just outside of Heidelberg, probably the most beautiful city in Germany. I’m going to just say a few words about the company and then let the photos do most of  the talking. I have worked with KIWO for over 20 years and the…

That Was Quick: American Apparel Emerges from Chapter 11

The CEO of American Apparel Paula Schneider says, “This is the start of a new day at American Apparel.” This is in regards to them (as expected) exiting Chapter 11 Bankruptcy at the end of last week. So ends any value to stock that was held and they are now a privately held company, American…

Misprint Monday – Nice Shirt, Real Bad Timing

Before the Sacramento Kings basketball game February 1, the players were wearing shirts celebrating Black History Month. However, in the stands they had about 20,000 shirts with monkeys on them. Not intentionally rude (as they celebrated the upcoming Chinese New Year on February 8th), but utterly clueless. You would have to be living in a…

The Big Business of “Charity”

It was announced by the Washington Business Journal this week that CustomInk bought Represent. Represent is about celebrities (and others) selling t-shirts to make money for charity. Their most well-known shirt being FUCK CANCER by some celebrity actor dude. Reportedly CustomInk paid $100 million for Represent which is owned by basketball star Kobe Bryant and other LA…

Nice Guys Finish Shirts

So, we all get asked to fold and bag shirts on occasion. For us, it might only be once a month or so… which does not necessitate purchasing a folding machine. When we do get asked, we are usually being asked to fold thousands of shirts however. Trying to get a floppy shirt into a…

Response to Brandchannel.com’s Advice to Dov Charney

There is an interesting article at brandchannel.com about Dov Charney, now that he appears to be permanently ousted from the company he started, American Apparel. They report that an investment firm may back him in starting a new garment company. Their advice is basically don’t be bitter and grow up. Not bad advice I suppose…but…

Misprint Monday – Managing Expectations

Printing on shirts is rarely perfect. The question is really how imperfect is it going to be. Part of keeping your customers happy does not happen on the production floor, it happens in the office. Much of what will cause you to have an happy customer later is to manage their expectations up front. Our…

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