CUSTOMIZABLE GARMENTS & DRINKWARE FROM THE PTI STORE

by Tuhon Bill McGrath December 21, 2024

Dear PTI Guros, Directors, Schools and Clubs,

I wanted to show you some updates to the PTI store's clothing and drinkware sections and explain why and how I use a Print-On-Demand (POD) company for my printing; in case you would like to do the same for your group.

I would also like your help in finalizing the PTI Fellowship Logos design so it will be ready for my 50th anniversary in Pekiti-Tirsia in 2025.

Let me take you through the design process for the PTI garments in the picture. The printer I use is a POD company headquartered in Riga, Latvia called Printful. They partner with local printers in several countries, and these do most of the actual printing and shipping to the customer. (See the link at the bottom of this page for more info on Print-On-Demand, or POD printing). When someone orders one of these garments on the PTI store, the info goes to Printful, who charges me for the work, and then sends the order info over to their affiliate local printer.

There are two garment types that I've used for the 8 variations shown above, a zippered hoodie and a track jacket. They are both made from the same material, 95% recycled polyester & 5% spandex and come in blank, white garments that you add your design to.

Here is the info page from the printer on the hoodie blank.

Here is the info page from the printer on the track jacket blank.

From those blanks, I was able to make all the designs you see in the top picture.

Here are some close ups of the first row.

See on store page.

Here is the process I use:

Step 1: Pick your item: I chose the two garments you see in the top picture because Printful offers larger sizes in these items; up to 5X for the hoodie and 6X for the track jacket. Since these are "unisex" sized items, and based on European sizes in general, I recommend to most North Americans that they go up one size (for ladies) or two sizes (for guys) to get a good fit (especially if you want to train in these).

Step 2. Pick your design: Here's one out of 23 pages in my library of images I use for items on the PTI store. The images with grey backgrounds mean that the image itself has a transparent background. In line two there is a Fellowship flag with a black background (this is good for going on all black polyester items). The Fellowship flag with a transparent background is for all other colors.

Stage 3: Pick colors, patterns and elements. Here is a look at some of the background patterns for the "All Over Print" (AOP) track jacket and hoodie, with the mock-up of my choice on the right. The fine dotted lines marked "Safe Print Area" means that Printful will guarantee an image to show up right if placed within this area.

There are just a few backgrounds that would look good on a martial arts garment in Printful's own library. , but I can create my own background if you give me your own image.

I am working on a hoodie for Tuhon Jack Latorre that is based on four of his own art designs. Here are Jack's originals:

And here is the final hoodie design based on them: (Note, Jack asked for a black hood with the PTI and Latorre logos on it, but any image could have been used).

This hoodie is now available on the PTI Store: https://pekiti.com/collections/shirts/products/unisex-hoodie

Price differences in garment blanks: When you look at the 50/50 Poly/Cotton and the All Over Print (AOP) designs, you will notice a big price jump between the base 50/50 pullover hoodie and the AOP Track Jacket. This is due to how many extras are built into the price of AOP items. In the photo below, we have the template for adding images to a pullover 50/50 hoodie. The base price includes printing on the front of the garment. Each place you add printing adds $5.95 to the price of the garment. When you go from a pullover hoodie to a zippered one, you have a price increase because of the zipper. Add zippers to the pockets of the track suit and you have a much more costly item.

(Note: POD printers are generally more expensive per item than having a local printer do the work for you if you buy in bulk. For example, Printful charges me for just printing the front of a T-shirt, the same as my local printer charged for printing on both front and back. However, I could never offer this many options on my store back when I used a local printer for my shirts and I no longer have to use my home as a warehouse for my shirt supply).

AOP vs 50/50 garments. Sleeves and Hoods:

I've noticed that I can have much larger images on the sleeves of the AOP garments than on the 50/50 ones. Here are two pictures than show the difference:

An AOP zippered hoodie, with the size of the maximum allowable space for an image on the sleeve shown.

Here are the sleeves on the Green Fade design AOP hoodie. I put this design in the archive because I made the images too long and will shorten them by 2 or 3 inches before putting it back on the store.

Here is a picture of a 50/50 pullover hoodie with the maximum allowable image space on the sleeve shown.

Here is how that size image comes out on the 50-50 hoodie.

Here is a comparison of hood sizes on the 6X size AOP hoodie in green and a 5X size 50/50 hoodie in navy blue. (Why did I order them so big? I normally wear a 3X hoodie when it is made in US male sizes. While I can wear a 3X T-shirt from Printful, I have to go up 2 or 3 sizes in the "unisex" sized hoodies or they are too tight, especially in the shoulders.)

Hood options: While printing on hoods is not offered on the 50/50 hoodies, there is an option for the AOP hoodie. Here are some pics.

This is the template for the AOP hoodie with the blue lined background chosen.

Printful does not give you the ability to move the background around, but when I was working on Tuhon Jack's hoodie, with my own image, I was able to move and size it to my liking.

You can place images in all four quadrants of the hood. Left & right on the inside of the hood (top of pic) and the same for the outside of the hood (bottom of pic).

Here is an experiment for Jack's hood. The image I used contained all four logos on one picture, as Printful does not allow individual placement of images in each of the four Safe Print areas. I had to get the size and spacing right in my image editor and then load it onto the template and move and resize it a bit to get it right. Took a few minutes the first time I did this, but once you understand the process, it's not too difficult. You might have noticed that I placed the logos inside the hood upside down. This is to allow them to be seen right side up when the hood is not on the head, but folded down on the back. Jack decide he wanted a blank black inside of the hood, so if you see him wearing his art hoodie you won't see this design.

Some alternate versions of Tuhon Jack's hoodie.

MORE COMPARISONS OF PRODUCTS:

The 100% polyester hockey fan shirt I wore to this year's summer camp.

A 100% cotton t-shirt.

A 50/50 Ploy/Cotton hoodie.

A 95% poly AOP hoodie. Whole back.

Close up 1.

Close up 2.

I think the full color logos look best on the AOP garments. The cost for these garments are higher, but it is the only way I have to get this kind of detail in full color.

I've archived all the 50/50 designs that had swords on the sleeves and reserved the sleeve designs for the AOP garments as the swords look and fit much better on those garments. This will help keep the prices down on the 50/50 hoodies, since I am only being charged for front and back printing.

More shirt options, with different designs. PTI schools and clubs can ask me for custom work for their groups.

I think this customization helps justify the higher price of the POD items compared to a local printer.

Four print on front only shirts. Printing this way gives a lower cost option for students.

One update we are working on is to add the names of the guros and groups back to the Followship design.

The process to do this requires a reprocessing of several aspects of the design and I don't want to go through this until I have all the final versions of the logos in hand. Therefore, please send me your updates by December 31st.

MUGS:

The small logos with black backgrounds don't seem to do well on the ceramic mugs. I have archived this design and plan on reworking it in January.

DRINKWARE:

The small logo images on the tumblers seem to be a bit clearer than on the mugs, but even so, I think I need to give some of them a brighter background. It is probably best if I have two versions of the Fellowship design, one for large items, such as garments and one for small ones such as mugs and tumblers.

Compare how the dark logos look on the mugs and tumblers with the same logos on the polyester garments and you will see a big difference in visibility, beyond just the size.

I plan on doing all these changes in January, once I get any additional logos from guros and clubs.

Therefore, please don't buy any of this items until I announce the final versions in January.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to All,

Tuhon Bill McGrath

Pros and Cons of Print On Demand: https://dodropshipping.com/pros-cons-of-print-on-demand/