the bluecotton blog

Many of our customers use t-shirts as a fundraiser for their school club or charity event. Some of our customers are entrepreneurs launching their own custom t-shirt line. With you in mind, I’d like to offer some tips on reaching your target audience and maximize your opportunity for sales. The Cadbury Creme Egg has been a staple of spring confections since the 70s, and has some unique qualities that I believe can help you move more merchandise.

1. Timing is everything. The Cadbury Creme Egg is the #1 selling confection…but only between New Years Day and Easter. Make sure your t-shirts are available when people are most receptive to buying them. Strike while the egg’s hot, as it were.

2. Be unique. Sure, there are a lot of other eggs out there, but the Cadbury Creme Egg’s unique form factor makes it a standout. It’s not just another chocolate egg, it has a fondant filling and even a yolk! Surprise your supporters with a super-sweet design. Make your t-shirt more than “just another t-shirt.” Make it a classic…a must-have…a superstar.

3. The Creme Egg is unshareable. Just a like a t-shirt, the Cadbury Creme Egg is a solo adventure. Everyone wants their own and they’re virtually impossible to break in half and share. This works for you. Make sure you order youth and extended sizes so that no sale is lost due to lack of sizes available.

4. Location, location, location. The Cadbury Creme Egg is prominently displayed in the impulse-buy area of the markets. Make sure your shirts are equally accessible and visible to your target audience at every opportunity.

5. Be an irresistible indulgence. Just like the Cadbury Creme Egg’s limited availability during the spring, you can market your product as a limited edition. Encourage customers to purchase your fundraiser t-shirt now so they don’t miss out on the hot shirt of the season.

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Monday, March 21, 2011: Leann Farmer, Customer Service

March is my favorite month of the year. The weather in Kentucky takes a turn for the better and I enjoy long weekends full of great basketball. Sunshiny days usually take the sting out of my NCAA Tournament Bracket predictably going down in flames. See, bracketology is not my forte’. The sheer weight of my own biases drag down any sort of rational selection process. Unlike Dick Vitale or Jay Bilas, I cannot look at the field of 64 and weigh the teams equally based upon their stats and strength of schedule.

Allow me to explain. I was born a Kentucky basketball fan. I grew up listening to Cawood Ledford’s play-by-play of Kentucky basketball games as my bedtime story. Every year I have Kentucky going all the way to the Final Four and winning the National Championship. Anything else is inconceivable. It would be treasonous to choose any other team regardless of the logic employed. Kentucky must win. We must cut nets and hang another banner. It is demanded. It is expected. It’s what we do.

Last year I bought tickets to the NCAA Final Four in Indianapolis. A vast majority of sportscasters and basketball experts picked Kentucky to advance to the Final Four, so I felt justified in spending the cash for a chance to see the Wildcats on the biggest stage in college basketball.

We had major talent in 2010. John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, Patrick Patterson, Daniel Orton, Eric Bledsoe… all taken in the 1st round of the 2010 NBA draft. This was our year. We would hang another championship banner in the rafters of Rupp Arena, I just knew it. I had my Final Four tickets in hand when March rolled around, and was horror-stricken as we were bested in the Elite Eight by West Virginia. I should have just taken that ticket money and paid someone to punch me in the gut.

Even though Kentucky didn’t reach the Final Four, Big Blue Nation was definitely in attendance. I packed my travel bags full of Kentucky t-shirts and wore them proudly everyday in Indy. The bellhop at the check-in to our hotel pointed at my shirt and commiserated over Kentucky’s tough loss to the Mountaineers. Folks in the elevator noticed as well, and told me they had family in Ashland, Kentucky. A kid at the breakfast buffet tapped me on the arm and asked, “Do you know John Wall?”

In this sea of Duke and West Virginia supporters, we scanned the crowds and recognized the familiar UK2K t-shirts (commemorating Kentucky’s acheivement of being the 1st school to reach 2000 wins). We pumped our fists at other Kentucky fans in the distance. We were strangers in a strange land, but Big Blue Nation recognized one another via t-shirt and reached out to shout down the injustice of a Final Four proceeding with our favorite boys in blue. There were loud shouts across the mall “Go CATS!” and smiles and waves and honks from Kentucky fans everywhere I went. In a cruel twist of fate, I had actually paid money to watch Duke win a National Championship. If you are a Kentucky fan, you can taste the irony here.

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We rounded up our favorite five t-shirts with a touch of techie greatness. Click the photo for more information.

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Happy Mardi Gras! Today is Fat Tuesday…the peak and end of the Mardi Gras season. While we normally associate Mardi Gras with New Orleans, the oldest Mardi Gras celebration in the United States goes down in Mobile, AL. Outside of the United States, this time of the year (immediately before Lent) is called Carnival. The Carnival of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil is the biggest carnival in the world, and the biggest popular party on the planet, according The Guinness Book of World Records 2010. The Rio de Janeiro Carnival is also considered the world’s most famous. Stay tuned for more Mardi Gras facts and trivia in our Mardi Gras video that will post later this week. In the meantime, check out a couple of our Mardi Gras inspired designs below.

 

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Twenty eight years ago today, the final episode of the TV Series M*A*S*H set the record for the most watched episode in US television history with 105.97 million viewers.  This record was not suprassed until 2010 by Super Bowl XLIV.

According to Wikipedia, “Stories persist that the episode was seen by so many people that, during the commercial breaks of the episode, the New York City Sanitation/Public Works Department reported that the plumbing systems had broken down in some parts of the city.”

M*A*S*H won a total of 14 Emmy’s during its eleven-year run, and it’s influence on pop culture endures today. Though the show ended twenty-eight years ago on February 28th, 1983, references to M*A*S*H are found in That 70s Show, Family Guy, Futurama, The Simpsons and Scrubs. The M*A*S*H logo spoof continues to be a popular t-shirt design for military-themed sorority and fraternity parties, birthday parties and other military themed events.

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The old adage “April showers bring May flowers” has never been truer here in Bowling Green.  The spring of 2009 was extremely wet and even approached soggy!   Climate data by the University of Kentucky indicates rain on seventeen of April’s thirty calendar days.  April’s 4.4 cumulative inches of rain resulted in some very lush (read: overgrown) lawns and gorgeous spring flowers all over the SouthCentral Kentucky area.

Similarly, BlueCotton was showered with several significant press recognitions and appearances this spring.  The April 2, 2009 USA Today Lifestyle cover featured the Favorite t-shirt survey we conducted back in February.

On April 11th, our fearless leader Mike Coffey went live on Barry Moltz’ podcast, “Business Insanity Talk Radio” to discuss t-shirts as the original microblog.  Click here to listen!

Mike was interviewed for Business Week’s publication Small Biz.  In the April/May issue, “Turn On, Tune In, Tweet Out,” Mike discusses Twitter’s impact on our customer interaction. Twitter is a positive addition to our customer service tools, and we enjoy using the 140 character limit to engage customers.  You can read the article here.

Through April, We’ve been using TwitPic to send photos of customer t-shirts hot off the dryer, actively issuing daily coupon codes for a free custom t-shirt, and tweeting discount codes up to 50% off the total order.   We’re continuing our Twitter campaign through the summer and have some special BlueCotton and Twitter-themed t-shirts on deck to give away very soon.

We’re confident this publicity shower will push us to blossom through the summer!

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