Kirkwood Trading Company custom t-shirts in St. Louis

Custom Work Safety T-shirts

Custom work safety t-shirts have become a must have in recent years with the rules and regulations by OSHA. So in order to be in compliance on job sites companies must outfit their workers in safety green or safety orange t-shirts. The logical choice is to customize these with your company logo on them. Some companies will see this as a new expense and having to spend more money now than they had to in years past. However smart companies will embrace this regulation and see it as a very cost effective marketing opportunity.

For companies that embrace these regulations then they understand they’ll have several walking billboards in the form of custom work safety T-shirts out and about town. We have worked with several companies who use their custom work safety t-shirts as their only form of advertising. The most popular companies to benefit from this are lawncare companies, independent contractors, and tree care companies. However we have several companies who embrace the custom work safety t-shirts because you never know what opportunities can arise when your company name is spread around town.

The nice thing about custom work safety t-shirts is that most of the time companies choose to put a simple black screen print on the shirts because black shows up great on safety green and safety orange apparel. Keeping it a one color print means the shirts are as cost effective as possible.

And work safety gear has come a long way and is not limited to t-shirts. You can now get tall tees, hoodies, zip hoodies, long sleeve shirts, jackets, hats, beanies, and even all of these types of styles with reflective striping on them as well. So there are a lot of options as the need for custom work safety t-shirts and apparel grows.

If you are in the market for custom work safety t-shirts or apparel, give Kirkwood Trading Company a call. They’ll be happy to meet with you and discuss options and pricing based on your specific need. Screen printing in St. Louis for over 20 years we have streamlined our screen printing process saving our clients time and money while adding the convenience.

Kirkwood Trading Company

Custom T-shirts for wedding party

The custom t-shirts for wedding party is a huge trend that doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. Whether it’s team bride, team groom, last fling before the ring shirts or tanks, it’s a popular trend that hasn’t even hit it’s twilight. In fact this trend may last decades because it’s actually pretty fun. Why noy show off the matrimonial posse with matching tees or tank tops? It gets everyone involved and it’s an immediate ice breaker and fun for all who wear!

One thing for certain, our orders for custom wedding party tshirts and tanks was up 100% this year. People are enjoying the experience and what better way to show solidarity when you have a destination bachelor or bachelorette party to say Memphis or Nashville, two big hotspots for midwest wedding parties. We’ve printed the subtle to the outrageous and everything in between. That just depends on the taste of what is typically the best man or the maid of honor. However, we don’t judge. We get a kick out of all it. Since it’s a great way for a party to come together we enjoy working with the wedding party on what arguably is the best night of the whole getting married experience.

Kirkwood Trading Company carries a full line of t-shirts from standard cotton to super soft blends as well as tons of tanks for both women and men. Another popular choice is custom hats but keep in mind the turn around on custom embroidered hats is a little longer than screen printed tees and tanks. And one thing we know for sure is typically these wedding party t-shirts are a last minute idea. Albeit a great last minute idea but last minute nonetheless.

But for many it’s a one time occasion and I’m not talking about the bride or groom. I’m talking about the bridesmaids and groomsmen. Who knows how many times any particular person will get to experience being part of the wedding. Wedding party t-shirts make a great commemorative piece.

Contact Kirkwood Trading Company for your next wedding party t-shirts and we’ll be happy to make sure they are shirts to remember.

Kirkwood Trading Company screen printing in St. Louis

T shirt printing for schools

Schools utilize custom tshirts and logo wear for many reasons be it spirit wear, faculty and staff shirts, team shirts, and even fundraising. Schools understand the power of marketing which is why you never see a school who does have logo wear. It’s cost effective promotion that is effective because students and faculty alike are proud to announce their affilitioin with a particular school.

Kirkwood Trading Company screen prints logo wear and spirit wear for schools of all sizes ranging from small montessori schools to large Universities and everything in between. We print for schools in a few different ways. T shirt printing for schools is the same for each school. The only difference is the purpose for each schools specific needs.

1. Direct point of order. You need shirts for a specific reason and we print what you need.

2. Spirit wear, we can supply your spirit store with all of the latest products and even help with designs too. We carry a full line of apparel from the basic cottons to the soft blends and tons of performance apparel.

3. Free online spirit or fundraising store. Yes you read that correctly. We can provide you with your own dedicated online spirit store free of charge. We’ll build the store with the products you want to offer to the students and faculty with the designs you choose.

While spirit wear is the largest part of what we do for schools we also do a fair amount of class shirts, senior t-shirts, championship t-shirts for sports teams as well as student council shirts, field day shirts and faculty apparel.

Kirkwood Trading Company has been t shirt printing for schools for over 20 years. We know the popular products and what’s in and what’s out. What going to be hot for a year and have all the kids buying and promoting your school.

If you’re looking for t shirt printing for schools contact us at Kirkwood Trading Company and we’ll show you what we can do, price everything out, and give you the appropriate lead times which is very fast.

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Kirkwood Trading Company St. Louis

Custom Logo Tees Fast

Printing custom logo tees fast is what we do. Why wait 2 weeks when you don’t have to. Kirkwood Trading Company prioritizes each order so that they get out in a reasonable amount of time so our customers are looking at days, not weeks. Our typical turn around time is 4-6 business days.

Here at Kirkwood Trading Company we have built our reputation on meeting or exceeding customer deadlines. With our 20 years of screen printing experience in St. Louis we have our process dialed in and have always been completely reliant on all of our services. The only thing we do rely on is the apparel distributors for the shirts and apparel. All of our printing and graphics services are done in-house which saves our customers time and money.

Let’s face it, people are busy and while a large percentage of people have a plan to order t-shirts and give plenty of time, sometimes things slip our minds for a multitude of reasons. That’s okay, Kirkwood Trading Company has you covered. We can assist in the artwork, we have among the most experienced screen printers, and as a company, we know how to prioritize to get your job done.

In order to assist us in providing you with the best service and product possible, here are a few things our customers can do before they place their order.

1. Artwork is key. Jobs go a lot smoother and a lot faster when we receive proper artwork which would be a vector file. This is a scalable file that allows us to provide color separations, size to correct proportions, and print a sharp looking design. If you have a jpeg or bitmap file, these are raster images and cannot be color separated. So these types of files need additional work which can delay a job. This would all be discussed with our client before hand so they know what to expact and what is reasonable.

2. When it comes to shirt style, color, and quantities, knowing these even during the quote process will make things smoother and easier. If you plan on placing an order having all of this information ready is paramount.

The more information we have the more ready a client is prepared on their end, the smoother and faster the entire process will go. Like anything.

screen printing services for Oakvill Missouri by Kirkwood Trading Company

If you are looking for quality custom tshirts in Oakville Missouri, Looking no further than Kirkwood Trading Company. Specializing in custom t-shirts for over 20 years in St. Louis, we have the best prices and fastest turn around. With state of the art technology we can provide the latest printing methods to ensure your t-shirts look as good as possible. We make ordering with us very convenient and hassle free. Our pricing is setup so it’s point blank and you will find no hidden fees or additional costs.

With a 4-6 day order turn around and in-house graphic artists, no job is too big or too small. We can print anywhere from a 12 piece minimum order to as many as 12,000 t-shirts or more.

Convenientl located in the central location of Kirkwood, we have grown our clientele to include schools, churches, businesses, foundations, organizations, and much more.

In addition to screen printing logo wear at point of sale, we can also provide our customers with free spirit wear or team stores as well as fundraising stores. All of these are new services we have provided over the past couple of years to a great reception amongst our clients. No longer is costly inventory a requisite to sell logo wear.

For questions or a free price quote, feel free to contact us at your convenience.

Best practices on how to make money with a t-shirt brand

Tips for a successful t-shirt brand

Let’s face it, if creating a successful t-shirt brand was easy, everybody would be doing it. If you think you have an idea for a successful t-shirt brand,  these tips may just help you out. If nothing else this cliff notes version will help you avoid some common pit falls. Pit falls we’ve seen over 20 years and hundreds of customers who had ideas for a succesful shirt brand and why most flop and while some are still customers today.

1. Know your market. : We get a lot of customers who come in and and place an order for their custom t-shirt brand. We always ask what their target market is 80% of the time they really have no idea or it’s so broad that they are already fighting an uphill battle. Know your target market and cater to them. For instance, if your brand is targeting high school and college aged kids you might want to put your designs on the Comfort Colors brand shirts and tanks. This brand is uber popular amongst that age group. A little pricier than a standard basic t-shirt but nobody wants a standard t-shirt unless you are one of the larger global brands who can sell their custom t-shirts on name alone. A successful t-shirt brand can take time. Knowing your market can put your brand in the fast lane.

2. Don’t be stingy: The 2nd biggest mistake we find when printing customers t-shirts after not knowing their target market is cheaping out on the shirts. Look, we get it. You’re a start up and you want to keep costs down. But if you go with a basic tee, I can tell you don’t know your targer market because while a basic tee is cheap, everybody has a few in their closet already and unless it’s a super awesome design, people will pass. You want to cater to the current trends which right now are softer more tapered cut shirts. Yes, they cost more than a basic preshrunk cotton t-shirt, but your margin will be greater because if it feels like a higher quality shirt material, people are willing to pay more. A lot of our customers who we print their brand shirts for have the same idea.They want to order the first run of shirts on the less expensive basic shirts and after they sell them and make some money they want to come bag and upgrade to a more modern high priced shirt. This could possibly work but we haven’t seen it personally. Typically what happens is they sell their 100 shirts and when a new design comes out, even though it’s on a nicer shirt, you get buyer regret or a consumer been there done that mentality and sales on another order fall short. Know your audience, and cater the shirt from the very start. Skimping on the right shirt for your market can be the difference between a succesfful t-shirt brand and a disaster.

3. Design and color combination: One of the most effective ways to sell a brand is to have a great shirt color ink combination. If you are selling apparel for beach seekers, you don’t want to use dark colored t-shirts, you want to have bright colored options. Weight wise you would want to stick with light weight, in the case of sun seekers perhaps a performance poly. Either way you go you want to look at the trends which are currently softer lighter shirts with tapering. In order to have your brand stand out, a catchy shirt color with a complimenting ink color can make a dull design very desirable. Where as having the wrong combination can mean the difference between a dud and a shirt that flies off the shelves. A mediocre design with a catchy color combination can make an average t-shirt a successful t-shirt brand.

4. Maximize your quantity: We get customers with the latest and greatest t-shirt idea from all walks of life and we’ve seen it all. There are those customers who come in and want to order 5,000 shirts right off the bat and then there are those who want to start small at 12 or 24 shirts. While you don’t have to already be wealthy to launch a t-shirt brand, having some capital certainly helps. I can tell you right now that every customer who has ordered only 12 or 24 shirts to launch their custom t-shirt brand has never been back for a repeat order, never. Probably becuase in these cases their target market is friends and classmates and at the end of the day, getting paid for the product was probably a lot of work. Consequently we have never had anyone who came in and ordered 5,000 t-shirts to launch their t-shirt brand ever place a reorder either and chances are they probably have 4,500 shirts sitting in a basement somewhere. A successful t-shirt brand will not leave you with an inventory that gets dusty.

At Kirkwood Trading Company, we want you to succeed. If you succeed and we remain your custom t-shirt printer, then we succeed with you. So we tell people start out small. You don’t need to start out with a 5,000 t-shirt order. As much as we like printing 5,000 shirt orders, when it comes to the case of a t-shirt idea, we know that more often than not you end up with a basement full of shirts. We will help you analyze your market and maybe we tell you start with 100 shirts or 1,000 shirts. You can always order more but if it fails, you are stuck with a lot of costly inventory. If you want to start with 24 shirts, we’ll discuss with you why it’s not a great idea and see how close you can come to a targer order for such a brand. It may be more money up front but if you can swing a 100 shirt order at lower price per shirt, you’ll have better saturation with 100 shirts than you will with 24 shirts.

With custom printed t-shirts, like every product, the more you buy the lower the price per piece is. It’s key to find that magical number for your cost verses retail. What will your gross be as well as your net based on a given price point on a given quantity.

Look at these tips for a succesful t-shirt brand as all being equally important. Look at them as a recipe for sucess and if each step is given it’s do dilligence, that could be the matter between a successful t-shirt brand and a flop. Think of these 4 points as a recipe for a cookie. You forget to add the chocolate chips and you don’t have a successful chocolate chip cookie.

If you are in the market for a custom t-shirt brand contact us at Kirkwood Trading Company and we’ll be happy to discuss options with you. We can share current trends, help or critique designs, and give you best practices based on our 20 years of screen printing experience in the Saint Louis area.

Kirkwood Trading Company custom tshirts in Saint Louis.

How to order custom tshirts – save time and money

We get a lot of first time customers who are looking to have custom tshirts printed up and ask how to order custom tshirts. As a way to save you time and money we are creating this guide that you can use when you get started.

The first thing a screen printed is going to want to know in order to give you the most accurate price is the following:

1. How many t-shirts do you need?
2. What kind of shirts do you need – (cotton, poly, ladies, youth)
3. Where is the printing going – (Front, front and back)
4. How any colors is the design?

This will be the basic to information needed to order custom tshirts. The quantity, print locations, and number of print colors all factor in to the final price. Having this information ahead of time will save you time and money. We don’t need to have exact quantities as a ballpark is fine. If you call a screen print shop without knowing what your design will be or your quantity will be, it’s the same thing as showing up to a car dealership and telling the salesman you want a red car. Do you want a sedan, and SUV, what options do you want, do you want a late model? So having more information is better than not enough.

At Kirkwood Trading Company we have several ways that allow our customers to get an accurate price quote in the least amount of time possible.

1. We are always a phone call away.
2. You can also email us with your request
3. We have an online design studio where you can design your own shirts and get the look you want before placing an order or getting a price.
4. Online Quote form – fill in the questions and we’ll take it from there. Very simple.

Another thing that will assist you in how to order custom tshirts is our online catalog. You can click through it and find the exact garment you like. There will be several styles, brands, and colors that you can see and help you to pick out the perfect shirt for your order.

Lastly, when you need to know how to order custom tshirts, here is a little list of the most popular ordere shirts. Great quality, great price point, and with our screen printing you’ll get one heck of a great custom tshirt order.

1. Gildan 5000 – 5.3oz 100% preshrunk cotton
2. Gildan 2000 – 6oz 100% preshrunk cotton
3. Gildan 8000 – 5.4oz 50/50 poly cotton Dryblend
4. A4 3142 – lightweight 100% poly moisture wicking tees
5. Check our Bella and Next Level brands for some more tapered fashing cut tees.

Kirkwood Trading Company screen printing

Design Tshirt online fast

People like the option to be able creat or design tshirt online. In order to get the best bang for your buck we offer a quoting system. Most companies out there have a stock price for an order and being in the screen printing industry for over 20 years, that’s just not really possible. Without boring you with the nuances of the back end of printing. Compare it to going to a car dealership and wanting to buy a car. Each car has a different price based on brand and options. Custom tshirts are no different. What happens is companies have to provide a less than superior product when it comes to a higher end shirt or design compared to a more simple design that has the same price point.

For instance, a black t-shirt cannot successfully have any ink color printed directly on it except white or grey ink successfully. In order to screen print say pink ink on black shirts, an under base is required. The only problem is online designers don’t take into accound that additional step when it comes to automatic pricing. This means the customer is getting a pink print on a black shirt directly and the print is not a high quality print.

At Kirkwood Trading Company, we do not provide auto quotes. We quote each job as they come over through the online designer. Design tshirt online format allows us to give the best price possible as well as a far superior print. When you want to make your own shirt online, we look at each custom tee shirts on their own and quote accordingly.

Design tshirt online is a great fun tool but you’d be best served sticking with a company that will provide an accurate quote. Contact us for the best price on design tshirt online option. You’ll be glad you did.