January 25, 2004

9:04 PM

Where do t-shirts come from? I bought a t-shirt from a thirft store with a funny print. It reads "America. Made by Humans." It's a standard baseball style shirt otherwise, but its tag was "American Art Wear." I'm interested in the printing of the t-shirt more than the original manufacturer of the shirt. The manager of the store said something a bit cryptic: that the owner/clothes buyer gets most of the tees off the backs of trucks at trade fairs. Who is in the business of printing t-shirts for this kind of distribution? Who is "American Art Wear"?
posted by rschram to (4 comments total)

It might be a knock-off of American Apparel:
http://www.karmaloop.com/brands/american-apparel.asp

It would be troubling, if so, but not too surprising.
posted by adamgreenfield at 9:15 PM on January 25, 2004

you can call em and find out : >
posted by amberglow at 9:15 PM on January 25, 2004

When I used to live in Eugene, Oregon, I had a work buddy who owned a screen-printing business as a second job. He evidently made lots of shirts like the sort you are talking about - I suppose there must have been some nationwide network of those sort of people long before CafePress came into existence :-)
posted by Happydaz at 12:50 AM on January 26, 2004

I co-own a company that sells shirts. Some stores sell ours (not as many as we'd like, but still...). You either (a) hustle each store either at their location or at a trade show, and/or (b) get yourself listed in a catalog.

It's just like any distribution network. It all comes down to marketing. There's no secret.
posted by mkultra at 6:39 AM on January 26, 2004