# Bringing history of photography to the masses, is it a crazy idea?



## elisa_hopt (Jun 7, 2015)

Hey fellow photographers,
we are a bunch of friends with some *basic* photography skills but a huge passion for it. We are also enthusiasts about the history of the medium and started self-printing some t-shirts a while back just for ourselves. Now we decided to check if others would be interested in proudly wear a t-shirt that makes you feel like you are bringing a piece of a gallery or museum wall around town, thus spreading a bit of culture and knowledge.
Come and check out our Henry Fox Talbot t-shirt, if you don't know who Talbot is I'll just say he invented the negative-positive process back in the mid 1800!

Talbot - Tree 1842

We are not here to sell the t-shirts, since this is a project driven by passion we would really appreciate some honest feedback so we can decide to invest more time on it. Tell us just anything =)
Thanks a million,
Elisa


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## Derrel (Jun 7, 2015)

The web page is really good! Simple, with an excellent rollover zoom-in feature, and just a tiny bit of good information on William Henry Fox Talbot and his original process of "photogenic drawing"; I thought it might have been nice to mention too that he wanted to call the images "Talbotypes", but that never caught on. I mean Daguerre had no problem with self-naming!


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 7, 2015)

Derrel said:


> The web page is really good! Simple, with an excellent rollover zoom-in feature, and just a tiny bit of good information on William Henry Fox Talbot and his original process of "photogenic drawing"; I thought it might have been nice to mention too that he wanted to call the images "Talbotypes", but that never caught on. I mean Daguerre had no problem with self-naming!



@Derrel , good point about the Talbotypes! And thanks for the feedback =)


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## W.Y.Photo (Jun 23, 2015)

This is the best Idea I've heard in a long time, photography is so inundated in our culture nowadays that it wouldn't surprise me if people would be interested in learning this stuff. The T-shirt could be a huge conversation starter. I'd buy it if my financial situation was slightly better.


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## MOREGONE (Jun 23, 2015)

Very cool.

I have been pondering an idea along these lines, but instead of the history of photography, it is a moniker/phrase of sorts to be the theme of the line.

Good luck with the project. Going to look into the vendor you guys are going through for the shirts!


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## vintagesnaps (Jun 23, 2015)

I can't find anything to verify this is legit. It isn't showing up in a search on the state of California's website of registered businesses (as an LLC). What name is the company registered under?

The site refers to 'us' and 'we' and 'our' and all I can find is the first name of one person. I can't find a street address (which I believe a registered business must have) - the site says Pacific Heights which is just the name of a neighborhood.

I didn't see a date when the company was founded; the Facebook page appears to have started in March.

The Terms and Conditions don't even have the name of a company - it says '...govern [business name]'s relationship...' etc. And a .me website shows up as - Montenegro??

What charity is $1 supposed to be going to? The site mentions it would go to a '... charity organization whose mission is to maintain the heritage...' etc. etc. What charity would that be?? The site mentions a poll to choose one - what poll???

I can't find any indication this is a legitimate venture.


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 23, 2015)

vintagesnaps said:


> I can't find anything to verify this is legit. It isn't showing up in a search on the state of California's website of registered businesses (as an LLC). What name is the company registered under?
> 
> The site refers to 'us' and 'we' and 'our' and all I can find is the first name of one person. I can't find a street address (which I believe a registered business must have) - the site says Pacific Heights which is just the name of a neighborhood.
> 
> ...



Thanks for the feedback, all valid points. As I stated in my previous post and you might have guessed by now this is a dry-run to test both the product market fit and the market size, but don't let that stop you from buying the single test t-shirt we prepared so far, it is printed by spreadshirt.com (Spreadshirt Inc., a Delaware corporation) and is pretty rad. =)

Why are we doing this? As you might know, San Francisco has an unfortunate Tax of 800$ per year for setting up an LLC, since the main driver of this project is passion and not revenue (we all have our jobs and are content with our salaries) we would like to have a good idea if this is a viable idea before investing money (and time).



> What charity is $1 supposed to be going to? The site mentions it would go to a '... charity organization whose mission is to maintain the heritage...' etc. etc. What charity would that be?? The site mentions a poll to choose one - what poll???



This is (I think) the cool part of the project, since we don't really need to make money out of these t-shirts (given that we cover the 800$ tax I mentioned + some expenses for the website) we can give the rest to charity. In our mind one charity will be selected by the users every year but to give you an idea of the kind of recipients we have in mind these are top of our list:

rescuedfilm.com
eastmanhouse.org

Thanks again for the time you spend giving us feedback, we are happy to reply to any other question you might have,
have a great day
Elisa


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 23, 2015)

MOREGONE said:


> Very cool.
> 
> I have been pondering an idea along these lines, but instead of the history of photography, it is a moniker/phrase of sorts to be the theme of the line.
> 
> Good luck with the project. Going to look into the vendor you guys are going through for the shirts!



Thanks for your comment, lately there has been a surge in niche t-shirt lines (maybe people got bored of wearing unpersonal designs?) and we would like to mix this with our passion for photography, history and culture. Following the example of Andy Warhol we want to put iconic images in front of as many people as possible (and carry full attribution to the photographer).

We haven't looked yet into a proper vendor for printing the t-shirts (just using spreadshirt.com for now, not really great  on quality and customization but for ourselves worked well so far). If we decide to develop the project further we'll spend some time checking other options. If you have any suggestion we are listening =)

Have a great day,
Elisa


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 23, 2015)

W.Y.Photo said:


> This is the best Idea I've heard in a long time, photography is so inundated in our culture nowadays that it wouldn't surprise me if people would be interested in learning this stuff. The T-shirt could be a huge conversation starter. I'd buy it if my financial situation was slightly better.



Thanks!! We really need some words of appreciation (along with constructive criticism). Our goal is to bring photography and the PHOTOGRAPHER center stage in the life of people, millions of people are exposed to images every day and have no clue nor context what they are looking at. Think for example at “The Kiss by the Hôtel de Ville,” taken in Paris in 1950 by Robert Doisneau, if you walk in Paris you'll see t-shirts, mousepads, iphone covers and all sort of souvenirs with a reproduction of it and NO MENTION of the photographer. We would like to fix that, if possible.

Have a great day,
Elisa


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## vintagesnaps (Jun 24, 2015)

You didn't provide any of the information I asked about.

Under what name is your company registered as a business? Who is involved in this business? What is your company's street address? Why does your company's website show up as  .me??


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## vintagesnaps (Jun 24, 2015)

And two of the photographers you have listed as 'the most important photographers of all times' are Durandelle and Genthe?? They aren't well known. That looks like you're just taking info. from the Getty Museum site.


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 24, 2015)

vintagesnaps said:


> You didn't provide any of the information I asked about.
> 
> Under what name is your company registered as a business? Who is involved in this business? What is your company's street address? Why does your company's website show up as  .me??



Thank you for your strong interest in our project. Apparently I failed in explaining the situation. I'll try again, this time with simpler terms: there is yet no company, no address, no registered business. This is a product-market fit test (Product market fit - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia that we (as in "the bunch of us behind it") are running to see if there is any interest out there before investing time in creating the company.

Let me ask you something as well, why do you ask these kind of questions completely unrelated to the product itself? What is your interest in company registrations or website domains? Are you an attorney looking for a job? 

FYI: .me - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia it's one of the many TLDs you can use when you register a website and it also sounds super cool when you read it aloud, try it: open your window and shout "hopt me!", you'll impress the passersby =)

Every other information is at the moment private.
Have a great day,
Elisa


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## vintagesnaps (Jun 24, 2015)

I'm asking because I thought the site showed this company as an LLC, which would mean the company would be a registered business. You won't explain why you seem to have a domain name that indicates Montenegro - that makes no sense for someone who is supposed to be in San Francisco. That is not used by businesses in the US.

You keep referring to 'we' and 'us' and I can't find any info. to indicate anything about who is involved in this venture other than you saying your name is Elisa and the name on the Spreadshirt listing is different.

You say you aren't yet a business but you're selling the T shirt already?? You're willing to accept money? but can't seem to provide any of the type information a legit business would be able to provide.  

If all you can provide is info. from Wikipedia that doesn't indicate that this is legit.

Phrasing like 'Every other information is at the moment private.' indicates to me that it's questionable that it was written by someone launching or developing or running a legitimate business in the US.


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 24, 2015)

vintagesnaps said:


> I'm asking because I thought the site showed this company as an LLC, which would mean the company would be a registered business. You won't explain why you seem to have a domain name that indicates Montenegro - that makes no sense for someone who is supposed to be in San Francisco. That is not used by businesses in the US.
> 
> You keep referring to 'we' and 'us' and I can't find any info. to indicate anything about who is involved in this venture other than you saying your name is Elisa and the name on the Spreadshirt listing is different.
> 
> ...



Since we use Spreadshirt as our vendor William Henry Fox Talbot An Oak Tree in Winter History of Photography T-shirts - HoPT there is nothing more we need to do to comply with the law or details we need to provide (well, of course there will be tax season in a couple of months). If you are not sure, give it a try and print your own t-shirts there! Now it really looks like I'm the attorney giving away knowledge =)
If you live in San Francisco we can meet and have a coffee and I'll be happy to further explain our strategy.
All the best,
Elisa


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## vintagesnaps (Jun 24, 2015)

Your privacy page shows HoPT as an LLC - so does the bottom of the main page on your website. To be an LLC you would need to be a registered business. You said you are not a registered business so why are you promoting yourself as being an LLC?

If your name is Elisa then who is Arjuna Del Toso? Businesses usually disclose their officers or board members.


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 24, 2015)

vintagesnaps said:


> Your privacy page shows HoPT as an LLC - so does the bottom of the main page on your website. To be an LLC you would need to be a registered business. You said you are not a registered business so why are you promoting yourself as being an LLC?
> 
> If your name is Elisa then who is Arjuna Del Toso? Businesses usually disclose their officers or board members.



I've this feeling that my words are falling in a void  I've already explained the _how_s and _whys_ of our product market fit discovery strategy. I'm not going to reiterate again or dive into lengthly explanations about why it is an extremely good idea to test your
hypothesis about a product by presenting it as if it was coming from a company (it's well known that people react in different ways to products/services coming from individuals than those coming from a registered company, it's called "empathy"). If you keep digging around the web you will find a couple of more people behind HoPT, most of them are friends or family with a specific skill that helped us in some complex stuff (like registering a domain, or putting online a few webpages), you know, all for free, all as a favor. I will never thank them enough for the support and help.

But the real question here is: why are you so obsessed with names, registration numbers and addresses? Should we really think you are just a troll with too much time to spare? Clearly that would still be fine to us, we appreciate the work that millions of trolls do everyday across web forums to maintain active a multitude of lively conversations.

Nevertheless, to ease your pain and let you finally sleep well again at night, we have modified the website to include a clear explanation of what HoPT is at the moment. Check it out here History of Photography T-Shirts

Aaaaaaand since the goal of this thread is to gather feedback about the product itself, please tell us what you think about our t-shirt Talbot - An Oak Tree in Winter 1842 

Thanks,
Elisa


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## pixmedic (Jun 24, 2015)

elisa_hopt said:


> vintagesnaps said:
> 
> 
> > Your privacy page shows HoPT as an LLC - so does the bottom of the main page on your website. To be an LLC you would need to be a registered business. You said you are not a registered business so why are you promoting yourself as being an LLC?
> ...




I think while this may indeed be an interesting project, you must understand that new members whose initial posts are spent trying to sell  a product are often met with a higher degree of caution, and even skepticism, then more established members.  
"dry run" aside, it is only natural for people to want to verify information before handing over money to a "business".  Its simply a safety mechanism. I am sure that everyone who was wondering those same things will appreciate you answering the questions and clearing up any misconceptions about the business. 
I would also like to add, that when you say "We are not here to sell the t-shirts", but then your only link is to a webpage _*selling the t-shirts*_, I can see where people might _*feel*_ like something funny is going on. 

This forum is a community, and like any other community, it takes a little time and effort to be fully accepted as a contributing member as apposed to someone just passing through dropping links. If your real interest is in photography and/or photographic arts, it would be well worth your time to dig in to some discussions and let people get to know you and your photographic interests. we have a little something for everyone here.


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## vintagesnaps (Jun 24, 2015)

Thanks Jason for your explanation.

I keep asking questions Elisa because I don't feel like I've gotten straightforward answers and what you're saying doesn't seem credible to me.


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 25, 2015)

pixmedic said:


> I think while this may indeed be an interesting project, you must understand that new members whose initial posts are spent trying to sell  a product are often met with a higher degree of caution, and even skepticism, then more established members.
> "dry run" aside, it is only natural for people to want to verify information before handing over money to a "business".  Its simply a safety mechanism. I am sure that everyone who was wondering those same things will appreciate you answering the questions and clearing up any misconceptions about the business.
> I would also like to add, that when you say "We are not here to sell the t-shirts", but then your only link is to a webpage _*selling the t-shirts*_, I can see where people might _*feel*_ like something funny is going on.
> 
> This forum is a community, and like any other community, it takes a little time and effort to be fully accepted as a contributing member as apposed to someone just passing through dropping links. If your real interest is in photography and/or photographic arts, it would be well worth your time to dig in to some discussions and let people get to know you and your photographic interests. we have a little something for everyone here.



Thanks @pixmedic, your reasoning is totally understandable and I agree with everything you said, as you can notice I've been asking several times to @vintagesgnaps why she/he wanted to know the people "behind" HoPT because my aim is to record potential "buy intent" from people to be able to assess the market size. Unfortunately, I haven't got a single reply from the user.  A simple "I like the idea but I don't trust the website History of Photography T-Shirts because it looks funny so I'm not considering buying the t-shirt." would have been a much more effective conversation instead of the continuos passive-aggressive flow of comments we got from him/her.

Following on your narrative that @vintagesgnaps is genuinely interested in our product, I'll make extremely clear (again)  what the situation is:

HoPT - History of Photography T-shirts
Company selling the t-shirt and managing the transaction: Spreadshirt Inc (A Delaware corporation)
People behind the company:

Phillip Rooke, CEO
Lukasz Gadowski, Founder
Matthias Spieß, Co-Founder
Rezzo Schlauch, Chairman of the Supervisory Board
Mark Venezia: President
HQ Address: Gießerstr. 27, Leipzig, Germany (Europe)
Legal Address: Spreadshirt, Inc., 186 South Street, 1st Floor Boston, MA 02111, USA
Fax: 1-877-202-0251
TOS: General Terms Conditions for Customers Spreadshirt
Privacy Policy: Privacy Policy Spreadshirt
In 2014, Spreadshirt hit global revenue of 72 million Euro, printed more than 3.3 million articles, and shipped to more than 150 countries.

The role of HoPT in this? We prepared a jpeg file and uploaded to spreadshirt.com. *Everything* else is handled by Spreadshirt Inc.

[vintagesgnaps]_Hey but you are not answering my question, I want to know who is behind the company HoPT?!_[/vintagesgnaps]

As discussed many times, there is no HoPT company, it's not registered and thus there is no address, no phone number, no team, nothing.

If you want to know who is behind the *HoPT idea* (not a registered company), then I'll be happy to share my personal details but since those would be my home address and personal phone number I ask vintagesgnaps to send me a private message with her/his real name and number so I can call back and privately share the information he/she wants.

@pixmedic I still stand my position that vintagesgnaps is ultimately a trolling account or at least shows some trolling personality traits, this obsession with finding who is "behind" things Question re site ownership Photography Forum really doesn't look good, but I appreciate your comment and effort in having a civil conversation and explaining your point of view. I hope my explanation satisfies you and everybody else in this forum.

Rest assured that if we'll decide to register HoPT as a company we will make extremely clear on our web properties who the team behind it is and share all the contact details needed (we heard your feedback and we thank you for it!).

Meanwhile, I ask you to give us your honest opinion about our history of photography t-shirt Talbot - An Oak Tree in Winter 1842  inspired by Talbot (from a product and idea perspective). My feeling at the moment is that the market is not even close enough to be the size needed to sustain the activity, what do you think?

A big hug and have a great day,
Elisa


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## waday (Jun 25, 2015)

@elisa_hopt , when your first post is directing people to a website where we have to put credit card information in, people get a tad skeptical. I know I am.

Skepticism aside, I balked at the price for the shirt, then realized it was American Apparel. I'm kind of surprised you'd choose a company with such a tumultuous past. Why American Apparel?


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 25, 2015)

waday said:


> Elisa, when your first post is directing people to a website where we have to put credit card information in, people get a tad skeptical. I know I am.
> 
> Skepticism aside, I balked at the price for the shirt, then realized it was American Apparel. I'm kind of surprised you'd choose a company with such a tumultuous past. Why American Apparel?



Thanks for your comment! Well, unfortunately Spreadshirt offers a very limited selection of t-shirt vendors (the only other being Gildan afaik). I printed this t-shirt for myself and I'm decently happy about the manufacturing (the gildan one seemed kind of worse), the idea (as previously mentioned) is that if we decide to bring forward this project we'll look into finding a vendor other than Spreadshirt that can provide higher quality fabric and hopefully a better printing technique. For this test Spreadshirt is just extremely convenient because it let us presenting the product to people without having to setup a company, we tried other online platforms (like RedBubble) but were not really satisfied with either the print or the online shop they provide you.

Your comment about pricing is really helpful, pricing is historically the most complex part in setting up a product, would your opinion change if we were to offer high quality fabric and better printing for the same price or do you have a max price you are willing to pay for a t-shirt? And if the latter, may I ask what that threshold is?

Have a great day!
Elisa


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## pixmedic (Jun 25, 2015)

For me personally, $20 is about as much as I would ever spend on a t-shirt, and for $20 it  had better  have a pocket on it.  If I were to consider spending around the $30 mark, it would be for a polo.


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## waday (Jun 25, 2015)

elisa_hopt said:


> Thanks for your comment! Well, unfortunately Spreadshirt offers a very limited selection of t-shirt vendors (the only other being Gildan afaik). I printed this t-shirt for myself and I'm decently happy about the manufacturing (the gildan one seemed kind of worse), the idea (as previously mentioned) is that if we decide to bring forward this project we'll look into finding a vendor other than Spreadshirt that can provide higher quality fabric and hopefully a better printing technique. For this test Spreadshirt is just extremely convenient because it let us presenting the product to people without having to setup a company, we tried other online platforms (like RedBubble) but were not really satisfied with either the print or the online shop they provide you.


Understood that they have a limited selection, but there are other companies out there. I'm not sure if you followed my 'tumultuous' comment. American Apparel is one of those companies that makes me not want to buy from them. For example:

Its CEO has been repeatedly accused of sexual harassment

It was sued for allegedly firing a cancer patient

Its employees are allegedly hired and fired based on how hot they are

A factory worker died on the job

Its been accused of racism

Its ads get banned a lot

It almost went bankrupt

Its CEO allegedly throws dirt at people

It hired unauthorized workers
See the previous list with explanations here: 10 Scandals That Totally Rocked American Apparel PHOTOS 

I won't step foot in their stores or purchase from them. So, there's that.



elisa_hopt said:


> Your comment about pricing is really helpful, pricing is historically the most complex part in setting up a product, would your opinion change if we were to offer high quality fabric and better printing for the same price or do you have a max price you are willing to pay for a t-shirt? And if the latter, may I ask what that threshold is?


I'm a single data point, so please don't change pricing on my sole opinion. However, if the quality of the t-shirt was really, really good, and I really liked the shirt and it was one of a kind made by a local company with hopefully sustainable materials, I'd pay up to $30. Again, this is depending on the shirt and how much I liked it. For this type of shirt, my threshold would be at $20 (with me dragging my feet), even if it's a really good quality t-shirt.

I am more utilitarian with my clothing choices, and I would much rather spend my money elsewhere. If I do splurge on clothing, it's not on t-shirts. Sorry. It'd be on polos, dress shirts, suits, pants, shoes, and related accessories (e.g., ties, belts). Not t-shirts.


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## waday (Jun 25, 2015)

pixmedic said:


> it had better have a pocket on it


It's hard to find inexpensive t-shirts and polos with pockets.


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## vintagesnaps (Jun 25, 2015)

I've been a member here for a couple of years so people here know who I am.

The T shirt is a nice enough looking copy of the Talbot photograph; I have no idea if people would want to buy it or how well it might sell.

This has been presented as selling the T shirts, not just asking for suggestions and input. If you wanted to get some opinions maybe you could have shown a photo of your own T shirt to see if people liked it. But you are actually selling them, that seems to indicate a business.

The info. you cited seems to be for Spreadshirt, I'd already looked them up. That's my point, I can look them up like Wade looked up American Apparel and find out info. about the company. You say you're doing market research but then want potential customers to provide credit card numbers to purchase T shirts. That doesn't seem to make sense if you aren't yet in business.

If you are doing marketing to get a venture off the ground there are resources from professional organizations and websites. Some that are photography related are ASMP, PPA, and the Photo District News but those may not relate so much to selling photography themed apparel.


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## elisa_hopt (Jun 25, 2015)

waday said:


> Understood that they have a limited selection, but there are other companies out there. I'm not sure if you followed my 'tumultuous' comment. American Apparel is one of those companies that makes me not want to buy from them. For example:
> 
> Its CEO has been repeatedly accused of sexual harassment
> 
> ...



Awh, I knew they almost failed few years ago but had no clue about their CEO! Check out this fresh news Here Are the Gross Horny Texts Dov Bad Daddy Charney Sent to Employees
As soon as this test we are running is over we'll look into other brands, that's for sure! At least he was fired from the company. Anyway the dream for us would be to source fabric from developing countries by using secure channels that guarantee a safe work environment, decent salaries and a sustainable green production and have then the printing and handling done by a vendor in California. But that's just a dream, we need to scope the market size first =)


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## waday (Jun 25, 2015)

elisa_hopt said:


> Anyway the dream for us would be to source fabric from developing countries by using secure channels that guarantee a safe work environment, decent salaries and a sustainable green production and have then the printing and handling done by a vendor in California. But that's just a dream, we need to scope the market size first =)


Your dream probably won't happen, and I think most people understand that. But, don't deflect. You need to scope the market first, but you CAN source from companies that have a consistent history. You say you need to scope the market first, but in this instance, you sourced first. And you sourced American Apparel.

People DO care about what product they're buying. They WILL care about the brand of the shirt. 

People DON'T care about your unwillingness to find another source or another company.

First impressions mean a lot, and the problem here (at least for me) is that the American Apparel thing took me away from your company, and all I can now think about is the t-shirt source company. That's not a good thing. I got diverted from your company and your product line. You want to drive people to your business, not away from it. If I saw your shirt on a rack at some store, and looked at the tag and saw that company, I'd pass it by without thinking.

FWIW, other places I don't shop: Wal-Mart. Hobby Lobby. Chik-Fil-A. Barneys (not that I could afford anything in there anyways). Abercrombie and Fitch (then again, I'm not a 13 year old...). And any stores that seem to put politics/religion before their products. Or places that have ignorant signs in their windows. Especially ones where a 'requirement' is to 'speak English'. Or where they strictly sell 'Freedom Fries' in place of 'french fries'. But, I digress.


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## MOREGONE (Jun 25, 2015)

I would spend $25 on a niche T-Shirt.  Not my everyday T-Shirts but something that is more personal and reflective of who I am than your everyday big box store brands.


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## vintagesnaps (Jun 25, 2015)

It occurred to me that someone wanting my personal contact info. and not seeming to provide the same can often be the indication of a possible scammer. I think the .me used for the website is a red flag that this might actually be somewhere overseas but I can't tell for sure.


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