T Shirt Brand

A lot of people's first business idea is a clothing company. They think of a cool name and logo and want to put it on some hats and shirts. They've got some money saved up from their job, so they do what they think they're meant to do, which is order 100 shirts and hats for their brand. I think many would-be entrepreneurs have gone through this motion, but so few of them ever reorder and keep it going. They quickly realize how hard it is to get 100 people to buy a shirt from them. It can be discouraging for sure, but there are better ways.

One thing I've always kept in mind over the years is that every time an entrepreneur goes through this common clothing company startup phase, there's a t-shirt printer on the other side of the equation making money regardless of the customer's long-term success, because their business is simply screen printing the design onto the t-shirt. If you've ever heard the saying "In a gold rush, sell picks and shovels," I think there's a bit of an overlap here in this example.

But what if you learned how to screen print t-shirts? You could make your own shirts for your own brand at a fraction of the cost while also having a second business printing t-shirts for others. You could also make your own brands shirts to order (as the customers buy them), in small batches opposed to ordering bulk and waiting for them to sell - keeping your hard earned cash on standby instead of in the form of 100 t shirts in the garage.

This way, you would not have to sell as many t-shirts to survive, because your profit margin on each item is higher. And you are more likely to survive as you have a direct-to-consumer income stream as well as a business-to-business income stream.

 

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