Your brand is more than just a logo - it’s a promise to deliver an experience for both your employees and your customers. That means if you decide to start a custom corporate apparel program, it needs to accurately embody both your company’s brand and persona. Use these tips below as your work on putting together your corporate apparel store to ensure your branded apparel meets your company’s standards.
1. Identify the Type Of Program Your Company Needs
Wondering how to make a corporate shirt or design a corporate apparel store with lots of options? The first step to putting together a strong branded apparel program is determining the purpose or occasion behind it. If you need to form a company uniform program, then you likely will need to consider the comfort of the apparel you’re offering, as well as its price point.
On the other hand, if you’re creating an employee apparel program as part of a reward or in anticipation of a company event like a corporate rebranding initiative, you may want to have appropriate custom apparel that sends the right message.
Plus, if you partner with a provider like Custom Threads, you’re also able to handle the timing of orders and the way they’re processed. You can set up vouchers if you’re planning to cover the cost, send out e-gift cards with a preset amount, or design the program so employees can easily pay for apparel out of pocket online.
Regardless of your reason for needing custom apparel, it’s always key to consider both your company’s brand and the audience who will be wearing the apparel. That way you can ensure it’s successful.
2. Choose Your Logo Embellishment
So how do you put your logo on clothes? Your options to add a logo or custom design to apparel include:
Embroidery
Screen Printing
Direct-to-Garment Printing
Wondering what exactly each process entails? They all use different technology to transfer your design. Below we’ll explore what each option looks like so you can consider which one may be a good fit for the design you have in mind and the style of corporate apparel you’d like to offer.
Embroidery
This process can yield beautiful designs with great detail and unlimited color options. It involves adding the colors your design uses, which can be up to 15 spools at a time, on the embroidery machine, and running it automatically to transfer your logo. The result is a slightly raised embellishment that’s eye-catching and ideal for elevating your brand’s image.
Best Used For: Polos, outerwear, and other dressier custom corporate apparel.
3D Puff Embroidery
3D Puff embroidery follows the traditional embroidery process, the key difference being that foam is placed down first to raise certain parts of the design. From there, the machine runs over the designated area to add your design with thread. For best results, it’s important to make sure your final design contains both raised and flat areas, or you risk it lacking a definitive shape.
Best Used For: Hats for more exclusive corporate events or occasions.
Screen Printing
Screen Printing adds your design to fabric by pushing ink through a screen onto a garment and then allows the ink time to cure so it lasts over multiple washes. With this option, you can use anywhere from 1 to 10 different colors in a design on a wide variety of fabrics. The setup does take time since a different screen is required for every layer of color included in your design. However, the printing can be done in larger batches making the production process move quickly.
Best Used For: More casual looking corporate apparel, such as t-shirts for an event or customer giveaways.
Direct-to-Garment Printing
Direct-to-Garment printing requires a special type of inkjet printer to transfer your design onto apparel. Once the design is in place, the provider sends a special message to the printer, preps the apparel fabric, and loads it into the printer which then adds your design. With this type of printing, your design is not limited to a specific number of colors which offers you a lot of flexibility. However, it’s not able to produce high-volume orders quickly and it can only be done on either cotton or cotton-blend apparel.
Best Used For: Casual corporate apparel for a smaller group of people or a new team member.
Sublimation Printing
Sublimation printing is only done on white polyester fabric and its process adds both the garment color and logo at the same time. It requires a more labor-intensive transfer process as the garment is embellished piece by piece in the special machine and then sewn together afterward to create the finished apparel product.
Best Used For: Athletic corporate apparel for events such as a sponsored bike race.
3. View Custom Samples For Logo Consistency
Not every apparel partner produces their embellished apparel in-house or even offers samples, so it’s important to do your homework about who you’ll be working with. The benefit of working with a partner who does the work in-house is that you can see your optimized design on a sample before production.
This eliminates any unpleasant surprises if your logo is the wrong color, shape, or incorrect in any other way. You can catch any errors before orders come in and clothing is customized. Plus, having this extra step allows you to double-check that the apparel will meet your brand consistency guidelines.
4. Select Apparel For Your Corporate Apparel Store
The next crucial step when you start a custom corporate apparel program is selecting the right clothing to offer in your corporate apparel store. It’s crucial to choose items that take all the program’s stakeholders into account from interns to sales teams, or even your executive team.
Look for a provider with an online selector site that allows you to view a range of apparel options and get a feel for the pricing and style options available to create your custom program. And while you’re looking at apparel styles, don’t forget to also consider the material of the apparel you pick. Make sure what you choose is made from fabric that is comfortable to wear.
You should also consider what type of logo embellishment you want to use. Wondering which fabric is best for embroidery or applique? Try picking apparel fabrics like linen, cotton, or silks. Whereas if you want to print your design, opt for cotton or polyester options. Ultimately, your partner handling the embellishment will be able to provide guidance based on your design needs.
Additionally, consider offering both men’s and women’s apparel to cater to the comfort of everyone. Unisex apparel may seem like a good idea at first, but offering both men’s and women’s style clothing guarantees a better fit for those ordering.
The fit of a unisex top is very similar to the fit of men’s shirts, and it can exclude women in your program who may want a more traditional fit designed for them. Plus, by making both men and women’s styles available, people can choose the tailoring style they prefer, so they end up with apparel they’ll enjoy wearing.
You should also include a variety of options in your corporate apparel store. Maybe you want to offer seasonal clothing, like outerwear. And while it’s good to provide premium quality private label clothing, consider whether your participants would like to see popular name brand apparel options as well, like Nike, The North Face, Carhartt, or Calvin Klein.
5. Set Up An Online Corporate Apparel Store
Next, you want to create easy access to your apparel portfolio for your program participants. One of the best ways to do that is to set up a custom online corporate apparel store.
Again, this is where it’s key to know the provider you’re working with. Many apparel companies use generic online sites which can limit the type and amount of apparel you offer, as well as which payment options you can use. Some providers will even charge expensive fees for the setup of this generic store or add on a monthly maintenance fee for the privilege of ordering from them.
When you start a custom corporate apparel program, a custom-built online store made just for your company can save you a lot of time and hassle. You can put the buying power in the hands of the people ordering apparel, skip the work of manually having to track orders yourself, and enjoy the flexibility of being able to offer as many items as you want or swap out apparel options.
6. Create An Easy Delivery System
Have you ever ordered apparel and been stuck sorting through a box of clothing to organize the different sizes and fits? It can become a cumbersome chore, taking you away from other important work. But a well-organized apparel program includes a delivery system to take away the pressure of handling distribution yourself.
Consider choosing a program where your participants can get their order shipped directly to the doorstep of their desired address. This detail is especially valuable as remote work continues growing across the workforce.
If you’re just starting an employee apparel program for people often traveling on the company’s behalf, this offers an easier way to give them the workwear they need. A truly successful apparel program is built with flexibility in mind, so it can meet the needs of everyone, regardless of where they’re located.