Militant Geek Custom Shirts

Recently I was contacted about the custom t-shirt store, 200 Nipples. However, instead of employing the regular model where people submit designs, the most popular are put into production, and people profit there’s a twist. All shirts have limited edition runs of one hundred shirts apiece. Pricing begins at $1 for the first shirt, $2 for the second, and so on until the one-hundredth shirt sells for $100.

The math geeks out there will recognize this as a simple summation that results in a gross profit of $5050 on a print run of 100 - or an average of $50.50 per shirt. Which is what has me scratching my head. Sure, tee connoisseurs will love to swoop in and grab a great design for $1, $5, or even $10 - but $40? $65? Even if these are ‘limited-edition numbered tees’ is the fact that there are only 99 other shirts in existence enough enticement to spend north or $50?

The second problem that the ramping causes is the slow down in sales. There will be frenzied activity when a new shirt is presented. That interest will quickly evaporate as the number of buyers for whom the price is acceptable is a declining exponential. People will wander away while waiting for the next design and, depending on how long it takes for somebody to shell out $100 for that final item in a run, forget to return. [update: new designs appear on the first of every month, regardless of whether or not the previous design has been completely sold - in this regard they will at least have new inventory entering the pipeline to keep return buyers]

Its an interesting approach and I applaud the guys at 200 Nipples for trying something different. And I could have completely underestimated the interest in a limited run of shirts. But, at this point, I don’t see how this is a sustainable model for either t-shirt buyers or the company. I fear that it will be another example of ‘failed t-shirts’.

Update 2008-08-14: 200 Nipples Doing Fine, My Business Cred Revoked.