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Outcry Apparel impressed with their first release last year, and this latest addition to their collection does nothing to hurt that growing reputation. The sweatshirt is currently available for pre-order for the very reasonable price of €25.
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LadyUmbrella at the Pop Up Style Swap Shop
Andy: Here’s part two of Rob from LadyUmbrella’s column about ways that t-shirt brands that are more used to online business can extend themselves in the real world.
Something to try look out for in the offline world of t-shirts is pop up shops.. I don’t know how it is in your town but right now Ireland is thriving with pop up shops..The idea of a pop up shop is simple – a group of brands or retailers team up together, pool resources and acquire a premises for a very short term let.. All the brands involved then work together to promote the life out of the pop up shop and they can be quite beneficial.. We’ve done a few pop ups in the past and I’m currently working on another one, The Blind Tiger Collective, which hopefully might become a more long term thing..And, therein lies the other advantage of doing pop ups..You get to meet lots of other brands in your area and I’ll tell you what, when you put a bunch of motivated dreamers together ideas can flow..
Another avenue for an offline t-shirt life is doing fairs..Now, these can be hit and miss, some of them might be good for your brand and some just might not work..We’ve done a few of them in the past and have sold in random places like Microsoft and a hospital here in Dublin, as well as in pubs and festivals – not all of them were homeruns but they were all enjoyable..And they do spur your on to “double down” your efforts, both online and offline..
The other thing I really like about the t-shirt life offline is that it gives you great online fodder like this video or the picture below to the right.
Elena Selling in Microsoft
Every event you attend will give you a photo opp to showcase your t-shirts – like the picture from Project 51 above..It’ll give you something to let your facebook/twitter friends and followers know about which will ultimately feed into you online activities.. Also, attending offline events should go some way to help build up the “trust factor” for potential online customers..I don’t know about you but I’m still apprehensive about buying online and so it’s logical to assume that some potential customers might also be..Now, if these potential customers see that you’ve been doing X, Y and Z and realise that you’re not some dodgy site your chances of getting a sale have just shot up dramatically.. Or, that’s my take on it anyway..
And so, to conclude, if things aren’t going as swimmingly as you want online don’t box yourself into maniacal tweeting (believe me, I’ve done it) but take a step back and see if there is anything that can be done offline.. There are lots of options out there like pop up shops, fairs and wholesale deals and by just partaking in them, even if they aren’t homeruns, you’ll get a renewed umph and motivation to push on and keep going.. And, ultimately, I think that pushing on is what is vital – nothing happens overnight ..Maybe a little flirt with life offline might give you the pep in the step you need to keep going until you get to where you want to go..
Anyway, thank you for reading and I want to hear your thoughts..Are you at times fed up with online life too? Have you been a part of any offline events? If so, any do’s or don’ts to share? (Um, that could be another blog post maybe if anyone is interested?) Speak freely…Ole!
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The Blind Tiger Collective is a really cool project spearheaded by Dualta Jones of Project A Apparel that is bringing together ten of Ireland’s finest indie brands to open a pop-up shop in Dublin in the run up to Christmas. They’ve written a really good press release, and it’s Saturday night, so I’m feeling lazy enough to just copy/paste that:
Hot on the tail of the collapse of the Celtic Tiger comes 10 Irish Designers as Blind Tiger Collective
The Blind Tiger Collective, a collection of 10 Irish clothing brands, are launching their pop-up shop on the 20th of December in the distinctive Dublin North Inner City.The pop-up will be open for 4 days until the 24th and will give customers a chance buy Irish this Christmas from independent designers.The collective consists of over 10 brands aiming to give the Irish shopper an opportunity to support their local designers and young businesses this Christmas and to do so with distinctive style and swagrrr.
The Blind Tiger Collective will spring to life on the 20th of December until the 24th at Little Green Gallery on Green Street and the temporary space will be retailing exclusive Irish Streetwear and accessories. In the run up to the launch, Dualta Jones, organiser of the event and co-owner of Project A Apparel decided he was tired of large foreign companies opening pop up stores to promote brands that were already saturating the market. He said “I decided that small Irish brands like my own need to come to together and help promote each other in a joint effort a stake a claim on our territory.”
There will be a wide variety of brands at the Blind Tiger Collective pop up like Turtlehead, Swallows and Daggers and LadyUmbrella, ranging from tattoo inspired hand drawn designs, skate apparel, street art and graffiti inspired work, showcasing the diversity of Irish design talent. A lot of the brands in the Blind Tiger Collective work on very limited print runs, some as low as 25 pieces, and when a design is finished its finished for good which guarantees exclusivity.To celebrate the launch night and make the Blind Tiger pop up a bit more special, Galway based screen printer killertees.ie will be screen printing a unique “Blind Tiger Collective” tee. All good collectives need some good music and there will be a DJ for the launch as well as a range of free drinks to get the launch started. With a big push to buy Irish this Christmas and campaigns like “Irish Indie Xmas” getting a lot of attention maybe it’s time to forget the Celtic Tiger and listen to the roar of the Blind Tiger Collective.
“forget the Celtic Tiger and check out the swagrrr of the Blind Tiger Collective.” Follow the ambush at
Facebook : www.facebook.com/blindtigercollective
Twitter : twitter.com/weareblindtiger
Email : blindtigercollective@gmail.com
As you would imagine, I’m all for a project like this, and looking at the people that they’ve got involved it should be a big success as long as they can get enough people through the door. In the past I’ve made it clear that I have issues with the term pop-up shop, and I still do, but at least this seems to be a be an actual pop-up shop, as in a shop that will only be around for a couple of days, rather than when some fancy brand takes a corner of a hotel and calls it a pop-up shop.
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You guys are going to probably think I’m being lazy, but it’s my birthday this weekend and Liz is taking me away to a mystery location (well, it’s a mystery as I write this, I will know when we set off), so I’m getting posts written up ahead of time, and one way to do that is by copy/pasting stuff that people send to me, especially when it’s well written as is the case with LadyUmbrella.
… As for some info about the collection themselves they are the first collection we’ve done that have a screen printed neck label which is kinda nifty (image of neck label and tag on the front of tee attached)..Also, “LadyUmbrella Likes To Float” is our first two tone t-shirt (the back is black) and also features a little pocket and has a nice shape which falls off the shoulder..Then we have the “LadyUmbrella Meets Peter Pan” duo in black and white, named after the shape and design of the collar they sport..These tees feature our first use of patterning in the collar and sleeves and we’re quite pleased with how they look.. All t-shirts are 100% combed cotton except for Peter Pan Black which is 50% Combed Cotton and 50% Modal cotton making it insanely soft, dare I say, our softest tee yet..
Clearly they’re fairly excited about it and with good reason, it’s great to watch a business grow and expand beyond just normal tees to something a bit different. They’ve also changed their prices around a bit, I don’t know what they were before but they’re now more ‘recession friendly’ which suggests they’re lower, ranging from 20€-25€ with free shipping worldwide.
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Looks like I’m all over the new brands today, Outcry Apparel launched just 16 days ago and came out of the blocks strongly with three cool, and kind of dark, designs. Lara Hanlon, who runs Outcry by herself, seems to have done everything right so far, really strong artwork, put together a decent website that gives us everything we need, running the store through Big Cartel so we know it’s safe, and done a photoshoot that shows off the shirts properly. All the shirts are discharge printed (yes!) and cost €15 a piece.
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