Also, I designed the original shirts using zazzle.com. I love their interface, and won't hesitate to use them again. However, unless I go to the trouble of creating a public gallery and jumping through all of their hoops, I'm unable to share the 'finished product' over the web or through email. Everything is locked down and proprietary, and even drawing upon all of my mild hacking skills, I've been unable to save a copy of my design outside of their website. As rigid as they are about making sure somebody doesn't use their software, copy the product, and then buy from a different vendor, they were very flexible in letting me buy small quantities in a variety of different styles, so I bought a regular man-sized t-shirt for me, and ordered a couple of skinny-gal tanktops for Angy and Cyndy when they arrive in a couple of weeks.
Unfortunately, their user-friendly interface and purchasing flexibility comes with a price--the shirts were a little on the expensive side.
So, I kept shopping, and found a couple of other creative outlets, and this morning I re-designed the shirt with a different font and the text outside of the logo, which I've found that I like it much better. But there is a compromise here, too. The end product, although of good quality, cannot be ordered one-off, and I can't mix different styles. I have to go with all t-shirts, or all jerseys, or all tank tops, etc.--no mixing and matching.
Since I can't order one-off like I did on the first try, these shirts are a bit easier on the wallet. Of course, they take a little longer to do them, and in order to make them affordable, I need to order a minimum of 22 shirts. Of course, I doubt that I have enough interested readers that would want a t-shirt, so I'll buy a few for family and friends as gifts. But if anyone else out there wants one, shoot me an email and let me know what size you'd want--they go all the way up to 4XL. Sometime in the next month or so, I'll go ahead and order case of them.
Front view:
The back:
They should end up running around $15 a shirt, plus shipping. They'll be shipped to me free of charge, but I'll have to turn around and spend an hour or so at the mailbox store packaging and shipping, but that should only add a couple of bucks to the overall cost. I'm estimating about $18 per shirt, and that's with me not really doing it for the money, but for the love.
Like I said, once I get enough interest, I'll order the first batch. As soon as they arrive, I'll post an announcement here on the blog, and I'll contact everyone with details on where to send the money. Pay Pal is out of the question, however--they can kiss my big hairy ass. We'll do it the old-fashioned way.
Mikey
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