Catalyst Promotions Blog

Ordering t-shirts can be a frustrating experience because there are so many things to consider.  This post will help you navigate your next order so that you know you are getting what you want at the best price possible.

What Sizes Do I Need?

Getting a breakdown of sizes is a critical step in ordering shirts.  It may sound obvious, but not everyone thinks about this before calling to place an order.  Even if you don’t have a complete breakdown of the sizes you need, (you may be taking orders) knowing the range of sizes you need can determine what color/style of shirt you get.  All t-shirts come in standard sizes, (S-XL) and most have double and triple XL options.  But not every shirt has youth or big and tall sizes.  If you know you need especially small or large shirts, be sure to check with us to make sure they are available in the style of shirt you are ordering.

The size of shirt also has an effect on how the art will look.  When t-shirts get printed the screen that is used to print them is the same size for each order, regardless of what size shirt you get.  This means the decoration will look a little bigger on youth shirts and a little smaller on a 4XL shirt.  If you want to avoid this, you would need to place a separate order for the standard and specialized size shirts.  This solution can be much more expensive and you should only do this if you are ordering a large number of each set.

What Color Shirt(s) Do I Need?

Every event is different, sometimes you only need a single color for your t-shirts, other times you have to distinguish groups of people(teams, etc) or you may just want a little variety.  In general, White shirts are less expensive than Heathered shirts which are less expensive the Colored shirts.  Another issue to keep in mind is that your art may look great on a blue shirt but look very strange on a red shirt.  You may need to choose your shirt colors carefully or change the color of the art (this may incur a fee).  Another thing to consider is that printing light colors on a dark-colored shirt is more expensive than dark colors.  Think of it like painting a dark wall.  If you try to painting a dark wall white, it takes a lot more paint and effort than painting it black.

What Should I Print On The Shirts?

Ultimately you should print what you want, but there are certainly some best practices.  You cost is going to depend largely on the number of colors that you will print on each side.  So if you want to keep you cost down, print as few colors as possible.

There are some choices for where you can print.  The most common are Full Front, Front Left Chest, and Full Back.  The most configurations are Full Front Only, Front Left Chest Only, Full Front and Full Back, and Front Left Chest and Full Back.  It is usually a good idea to keep any Front Left Chest designs simple because that size is usually too small for a lot of detail or information.

Buying t-shirts can be a confusing process sometimes.  I hope that this post will help give you the information you need to make the choices that fit your event/budget up front.  T-shirts are a very effective advertising medium and we want to make sure you get shirts that you can be proud to have your customers wear.

Art files can be one of  the most confusing and time-consuming aspects of this industry.  There are dozens of different types of file formats and thousands of fonts. Most file formats can be categorized into two types – raster and vector.  Another consideration is how to decide on the best art for your business before calling a company like Catalyst.

Digital art formats have been around for decades and have diversified greatly over that time.  In the 90s the most common types of files consumers dealt with were raster style formats.  What this means is that the image is made up of tiny colored dots called pixels.  Higher quality images have exponentially more of these pixels than lower quality and that allows them to be enlarged to bigger sizes.  File extensions for this type of art file include: .jpg, .gif, .pnp, .bmp and others.  Raster style formats cannot generally be used directly by our industry.

These files must be converted to the vectored format before they can be used.  The reason for this is that they can not be resized in a reliable and “clean” way.  You can see this in these two images.  They are both from the same .png file but one has been increased in size to show the effect.

The one on the left is the original and the one on the right is doubled in size, you can see the pixelation.  These kinds of art files are used for photos, and other web images.  right now few web browsers support vectored artwork.  Some examples of programs that use this kind of file are: Paint, Photoshop and to a lesser extent, Word.

Our industry primarily uses “vectored” artwork.  This means that the file contains instructions for how to draw the art, as opposed to a map of individual pixels.  Because of this, vectored artwork can be scaled to virtually any size and still look perfect. The colors of the artwork can also be separated or changed much more easily. Almost every factory requires us to send them artwork in this format.  Programs that use this type of format include Adobe Illustrator and Corel Draw.

Fonts also need to be converted into vectored artwork.  This not only allows the text to be scaled but prevents issues of someone in the art chain not having a particular font installed on their computer.  So, if you are doing your own artwork, or having it done by someone else, what we need in the end is vectored artwork with all fonts converted.  This will allow for the fastest processing of your order.

What if you do not have access to a program that uses vectored formats?  Don’t worry, will take whatever art you have and do our best to get it converted to the correct format.  We do not expect you to be a master artist, or an expert in computer graphics.  This post is to help you know better questions to ask, and what will ensure the fastest service.

The last consideration is also what you need to think about before placing an order.  Deciding what your art will look like can be more complicated that it seems at first.  There are a couple of things to keep in mind before deciding what you would like on your promotional product.

The first consideration is size and shape.  What kind of art you can have depends largely on what will fit on the item you choose.  For example, you can fit much more information and graphics on a mousepad than you can on a pencil.  If the item you want is small, or has a limited height or width, you may not be able to fit certain more detailed graphics.  In the case of something like a pencil or golf tee, you may be limited to text only.  We will help you find the best options for the product that you choose.

The second consideration is colors.  We offer many items that can be printed in what is called 4-color process.  This means that you can have as many colors as you like, even a photograph.  However, not every item can be printed this way.  For most promotional products, more colors means additional cost.  If you are on a tight budget, let us help you find the right product or let us help you narrow down the colors needed in your artwork.

If you are designing you company’s logo, either for the first time, or you are creating a new one, keep these two considerations in mind.  Create the design that is best for your business, but also remember that complicated, extremely detailed or multi-colored logos may restrict the items that can be easily printed.

If you have any other art related questions, feel free to post a comment or email us at art@catalystpromotions.net.

Ken

Buying products that are produced domestically is important to many people, especially in times of economic hardship.  It is natural to wonder where the products you buy from Catalyst Promotions comes from.  The easy answer to this question is that we offer both domestically made and imported products.  Here is what you need to know to make an informed decision about what products you buy and where they come from.

To start, it is good to know what Made In America actually means.  While researching for this post, I have come across several definitions, but the government has an official standard(even if it is a little vague).  You can look at the document here.  The official standard for Made in the U.S.A. is “all or virtually all”.  I am still a little fuzzy on how big “virtually all” is but I would think it is a much higher standard than the “51% made in the U.S.” standard that I saw on some websites.  What this means is that any company claiming to have U.S. made products must meet this “all or virtually all” standard.

Catalyst Promotions offers many products that carry this label.  You can browse through some of them here.  If buying product that is produced domestically is important to you, we can provide options for you.  There are a couple of things to consider if you choose to make this a priority.  The first is cost.  For a variety of reasons American made goods tend to be significantly more expensive than their imported counterparts.  This could put a strain on your marketing budget.

The second and maybe more significant hurdle is availability.  There are some types of products that are hard or near impossible to find from an American made factory.  We will do all we can to track down the products you are after, just keep in mind that requiring U.S. made product may limit your options in some cases.  This could be a minor annoyance such as limited style options, or it could be that a particular product is simply not made in this country any more.

If the “all or virtually all” standard is not a priority for you, I have good news.  Even though the majority of the products we sell are manufactured oversees, almost all our products are decorated here in the U.S.  I can’t tell you what percentage of labor and materials are domestic in each product, there are too many to calculate each one.  I can say that purchasing promotional products does help employ many people in this country.

Knowing where the product you buy comes from is an important factor in deciding what to buy for many of our customers.  Many business types or situations require product that is domestically made.  We will always be happy to help you find the product that fits your priorities and goals.  You can also know that no matter what product you choose, promotional dollars spent with Catalyst Promotions helps keep the wheels of the American economy rolling.

I thought I would start out by explaining the best way to make sure you have the items you want in time for your event.  The time it takes to complete an order is often longer than the standard 10 days production time.  The reason for this is that there is a lot more to getting an order completed than the actual production of the item.  It can be easy to forget that art and shipping can sometimes add a significant amount of time to the process.

Depending on your needs, the art creation and approval process can be time-consuming.  The best way to shorten this is to have as complete an idea of what you are looking for as possible.  We are always willing to help turn your crayon on a napkin ideas into a beautiful design, but this can take time.  We will do our best to have art for you to approve in 2 or 3 days, but this may not be the end of the process. If the art requires a lot of revision, a few more days could be taken up.  The best way to ensure minimal art time is to send us “camera ready art.”  I will explain what this is in more detail in another post, but essentially it is vectored art and it is the format that we sent straight to the factory.

The next hurdle is shipping time.  This can be anywhere from 1 to 5 days.  Some of our factories have multiple shipping locations.  We will always ship your product from the nearest available location, but if the factory is located in California it’s a 5 day ship.  If you find yourself in a bind expedited shipping is available.  This can be very costly, especially for large or heavy items.  If you need your product by a particular date, please let us know so we can help you choose the best shipping option.

I know that you are not always able to begin the order process within the safety zone described above.  Sometimes your boss comes in and tells you to have something by next week and there isn’t anything you can do to give yourself more time.  Don’t worry, we will do everything we can to help you meet your in-hands date.  One way to start is by browsing through our Rush Items section on our website.  These are products that have a much shorter production time, sometimes as little as 24 hrs.  There will still be art and shipping time involved, but we want you to get the product you need in time that you have.

I hope this will be helpful as you think about what you need and when you need it.  If you know you are going to need something in the near future, go ahead and give us a call to get the ball rolling.  We can delay shipping if you do not want it too early.  Let us help you clear off your to-do list and you can relax a little knowing that you order will be there when you need it.

–Ken