T-shirts printing

Well, this is a very complex subject and unfortunately goes far beyond the boundaries of what I can cover in a short blog post, but I am going to do my best to cut through all the legal jargon and describe in laymans terms exactly what this means to our business as an apparel decorator and to you as a consumer, so grab a cup of coffee and settle in because this is truly another mind boggling bill that was enacted by Congress, in their infinite wisdom, and signed into law in August of 2008, and believe me, it can give you a migrain.

In short, CPSIA is an acronym that stands for Consumer product safety improvement act, of which the original intent was to rework the Consumer Product Safety Comission, giving them more authority and improving consumer product safety after high lead content was discovered in childrens toys that originated in China. The end result however, is straining nats and swallowing camels, and doing irrepairable damage to the screen print industry as well as many other industries that provide childrens products in an economy that can ill afford even more business opression. My comments here will be geared toward the screen print industry since that is what Artistic Apparel LLC does and what we know the best.

Please don’t misunderstand our concern for childrens safety. That is far and away our primary concern, and have done our best as a business to conform despite the heavy burden that has been laid at our feet for no logically apparent reason. In its original form, the CPSIA imposes Lead and Phthalate standards for childrens products being used by those children 12 years of age or younger, and backs up these standards by a mandatory third party testing and certification process. The mandatory third party testing must be done by a CPSC acredited lab. Currently these tests are costing between $50 and $150 for each instance, greatly adding to the cost of Childrens products. To further clarify my point see the etsy’s gallery of unaffordability to see how this is impacting small home crafters.

All of this sounds good on the surface, afterall, we do want to protect our children. The problem is, the bill is drafted in such a way as to require testing of anything that is put on a shirt for lead and sometimes phthalates ( for ages 3 and under ) that is not natural fiber, and this test must be performed on every new batch run and each additional component. ( Four different button styles, four different tests, three different colors of ink, three different tests. )  It is true that the CPSC has now said that component part testing is acceptable, but our ink manufacturer has told us that this is a physical impossibility since they manufacture between 30 and 40 batches a day and with a three to four week lead time for testing, creates a logistical nightmare that they do not have the space or means to confront. Now, here is the real thing that makes no logical sense, According to our ink manufacturer, there has not been any lead content in their screen printing ink for over 30 years, as a matter of fact, I personally have the test results in my office for the product I use and lead content is 0.00, but this is not acceptable to the CPSC because the lab was not a CPSC acredited lab, and the component parts of the ink were tested and not the final batch.

Why is this a big issue all of a sudden right now? Well, until December 30th of 2011 there has been a stay of enforcement on mandatory third party testing that has now been lifted. The bottom line here is that if you want new soccer shirts for your children 12 years of age of younger, don’t be surprised if you have a very difficult time finding them for any reasonable cost if at all, unless they have no logo’s, names or numbers. And don’t take this lightly, manufacturers that knowingly distribute childrens products without the proper testing and certification are subject to $100,000.00 fines per incidence and maximum of $15,000,000.00 with possible imprisonment of up to 5 years. Should you be inclined to do more study on this subject, the Consumer Product Safety Comission’s site is a good source, start here. http://www.cpsc.gov/about/cpsia/cpsia.html

Embroidery or Screen Printing? Which option is the best choice for your situation?

We are confronted with this question just about everyday in our business and the answers can become clear by asking yourself a few simple questions.

How large will your order be?

Often the numbers will dictate the most economical route to take as screen printing can get substantially less expensive than embroidery with larger quantities.

Will your shirts be used as promotional giveaways, or for employees to improve morale and professional appearance?

It is quite common to use screen printed T shirts as promotional giveaways as they can be quite economical, particularily in larger quantities, but they may not be suitable to portray a professional image if used for employee attire. In this situation you may opt for an embroiderd polo or button down shirt.

Is there a lot of fine detail in your logo?

If your logo contains a lot of fine detail screen printing may be a more feasible option. While embroidery is a step above screen printing it is also somewhat dictated by the physical characteristics of thread. It may become necessary to simplify or drop some detail from your logo to make it workable for embroidery.

Often by asking yourself a few simple questions, the choice becomes clear based on your needs and intended use of the product.

Follow these simple tips when ordering your custom screen printed t-shirts for a quicker and more trouble free experience. The first thing to be discussed is the difference between screen printing and digital garment printing.  In general screen printing is a more labor intensive process than digital printing and requires color separations and individual screens to be made for each color in the design. Digital garment printing on the other hand is simply a shirt printed in a printer much like the paper printer that most of us use everyday to print photos or documents.

The subject of a different article, but for now suffice it to say that digital garment prints work better on white or light colored shirts and are better suited to short run orders.

Artwork is a prime factor in getting your shirts printed in a timely manner. The better the artwork, the better the finished product. I’m sure you have heard the old adage “Junk in, Junk out”, well, this is truly the case when it comes to screenprinting. Artwork falls into two basic groups depending on what software program produced it or where it came from.The first group I will talk about are Raster images. Raster images will have file extensions such as .bmp, .jpg ,.tif, or .psd and are pixel maps which are dependent on resolution (dots per inch ) to maintain clarity. The higher the dpi, the clearer the image will be. While Raster images are great for digital printing, they can be problematic for screen printing in that file sizes are typically large and color separations can be more difficult, not to mention the pix-elation that occurs when up sizing images. If a Raster image is the only option that you have, be sure that it is sized appropriately for screen printing and in a high resolution (at least 300 dpi original resolution) before sending to avoid additional art charges or unnecessary delays.

The second group is called vector images. Vector images are preferred by screen printers due to their flexibility in resizing without degradation, smaller file sizes and ease of color separations. Typical file extensions for vector images are .ai, .eps and .cdr. Vector images use point coordinates and mathematical equations to define elements in an image as opposed to pixels and can therefore be re-sized without discrimination. Vector images are your best bet for getting a fast turnaround and avoiding additional art charges when ordering your custom t-shirts printing.

Color selection is also something to be considered ahead of time to help expedite your order. Your printer will need to know the pantone colors that you would like to be used in your t-shirts printing.

Shirt Selection can be confusing, but basically there are two main fabric weight classes to select from, 5.6 oz or 6.1 oz. Beyond that style will need to be decided, Ladies or Men’s, short sleeve or long sleeve, pockets or not, scoop neck v-neck or regular, as well as shirt color. It will save much time if all of this is decided ahead of time, and whether you purchase your shirts from our company or not, please feel free to shop and make selections with our online Catalog If your custom t-shirts printing order includes any individualization such as names or numbers prepare a list displaying properly spelled names, numbers, and sizes to help avoid confusion.

We hope that this article has been helpful in making a custom screen printing order a little less daunting. Artistic Apparel has been in the decorated apparel business for 6 years and is a supplier of quality apparel, Screen Printing, and promotional products. Please visit our web page here, Artistic Apparel