After a failed delivery attempt last January, my shipment of Threadless tees arrived with take two. Threadless was introduced to me by SPIT Founder and ‘ol friend Gabe Mercado after he showed me a shirt he was wearing at our usual hang out at mag:net BHS. The shirt was titled Marshmallow Factory and showed a unicorn in the clouds crapping marshmallows to the happy beings below as they screamed “Marshmallows!!!” The five works below are designs I got with respective titles and links.
Threadless designs are pop culture inspired usually leaning towards geek culture. Play of words and imagery are often used to communicate humor. But that isn’t what makes Threadless unique….
… Threadless fascinates me because it is one of the bigger open source shirt manufacturers that’s on the web (they also have a retail outlet now in the USA but their main business is still web based). I say open source because the creative team is composed of the thousands of gals and guys who buy the same shirts they wear: they are all consumers! Anyone with a Threadless account can not only purchase shirts, but submit designs as well. You get up to USD $12,500 if your design is chosen for print and $500.00 in commissions for reprints.
If you aren’t a designer, you can also accumulate points for referrals in the form of writing blog entries on their site, affiliate marketing links, or posting creative photos of you wearing your Threadless. Photos that are chosen get to be placed on the gallery page (see, no need for a product photographer!)
To make the deal sweeter, each shirt shipment comes with an iron on “I Love Threadless” statement which you can put on any shirt you want as well as Threadless stickers. Talk about community!
It is interesting how a traditional business can make use of the Internet to boost not only its sales but marketing as well. Threadless is a fine example of the open market concept which is often preached by Hugh McLeod, Seth Godin and present in books like the Cluetrain Manifesto and The Starfish and the Spider (huge thanks to Zafer Unver of Unilever Food Solutions for this great recommendation).
There’s a short review of the quality, pricing, and customization of Threadless tees.
13 replies on “Going Threadless, Not Shirtless”
how much did it cost? i’ve been hearing a lot about it but hesitant to buy, wickedly pricey if it ships all the way here in pinas
That “She Doesn’t Even Realize” design is made of pure, awesome, unadulterated WIN! I wanna see your shirt to gauge teh right size fo mah rockstar bodeh. Har!
oh yay! your shirts are finally here!
but remember the time i was asking about the shipping time? i got the stuff i ordered in EXACTLY two weeks. and its two weeks only because the person i ordered from has this rule of shipping things only after a week has passed since ordering from her. how cool is that? one week shipping time!
I knew it! I was gonna ask you at Jaipur if it was Threadless, but I was nasa-shy. I’ve been subscribing to the Threadless newsletter and studying their designs (as well as the e-mail campaigns, hehehe). I love the graphics!
I hope someone or some monolith brings Threadless here (and Anthropologie too).
@husband – shirts for guys are $15. some are $20 🙂
@fritz – I’m an exact fit the Guys Small, i think I can do a medium
@liz – the wait was worth it!
@karla – yup you guessed right!
we actually want to do another order. we can all do a bulk order to save on shipping cost 🙂
Hey I just ordered a threadless shirt during the massive sale they had a few days ago. Do they deliver it directly to your house?
Sayang nga that “She doesn’t even realize” shirt was on sale for $5 kaso 2XL na lang yung size. 😛
Shameless plug time. I’m looking to submit a shirt to them and put the design on the critique section. Check the design out on geekofalltrades.wordpress.com, or just clickety click on my name, look at the design, and if you like leave a comment!
End shameless plug.
i lovelovelove the collateral damage design. it’s so…. errrmmm… me.
gabe mercado? the OKAY KA BA TIYAN boy?
😀
@ryan: we wanna bulk order again. wanna join?
@kingdaddyrich: yes, that’s gabe 🙂
Maybe next time dude. 🙂
Woohoo I got my threadless shirt in like 2 weeks!
[…] really fit well when I put it on. The tela isn’t thin and though it isn’t stretchable like my Threadless tees, they’re warm and comfy. Other than that I haven’t seen more of the designs. Have you? […]
Hey, just wanna ask kung ano pinili mo sa shipping? I chose yung 1-2 weeks. Mabilis ba dumating? May nabasa kasi ako na di dumating yung order niya (though binibigyan sila ng store credits sa threadless as replacement).