All t-shirt suppliers use this code when describing their different garment options, and you might have been wondering, what is GSM? We thought we might go through that for you to help clarify this term.

GSM stands for Grams per Square Metre – so it’s referring to the weight of the fabric. However, a lot of people often form the opinion that lightweight fabric equals poor quality and heavyweight fabric equals good quality…..this is not always the case!

In fact, a lot of t-shirt suppliers who have lightweight t-shirts available actually charge more for this option.

So what does equal quality?

There are a few different types of fabric finishes available, and these are usually the things that determine the quality of a fabric. Here’s a brief description of a few different terms you might come across when you’re looking for your next run of tees:

• 40s or 40 singles / 30s or 30 singles / 20s or 20 singles etc – This refers to the fineness of each strand of cotton thread used to weave your t-shirts. A higher number means a finer thread, so in turn a softer, finer fabric is created with better drape/hang – it basically flows better and sits nicer on your body.




• Brushed Cotton means exactly that! The cotton is brushed to remove any excess lint and fibers from the fabric, resulting in a soft, smooth feel.




• Combed Cotton uses a combing method to remove short fibers and to straighten or arrange longer fibers into parallel order to create a smooth, fine yarn. Combed cotton is usually used to produce finer (lightweight) t-shirts and is softer than Brushed Cotton. – American Apparel, AS Colour, Gildan (64000 style only)




• Ring Spun Cotton is made by twisting and spinning a rope of cotton fibers. This results in a really soft feel yet very strong fabric. – All American Apparel, AS Colour, Gildan (64000 style only)




• Enzyme Washed Cotton has gone through a special process using enzymes to produce a really soft finish and smooth look to the fabric. – American Apparel Power Wash tee

So next time you’re looking at your t-shirt options, take the GSM into account but be aware that there are other factors for consideration!

A few months back we were sifting through our enquiries we get through the website, and we came across an intriguing email. It read…

“Good afternoon from the UK. I am writing because I have a request. I work for a company called FESPA, we are a federation of associations in the Screen and Digital print industries. We also arrange events and exhibitions for the industry. In October this year we have an exhibition in Singapore (FESPA Asia www.fespaasia.com) Having identified your company as being the leader in online screen printing in Australia, I would very much like to have a conversation about the potential of your CEO/Managing Director being able to present to other screen printers in the Asia Pacific Region at our event. I look forward to hearing from you.”

Now…we do get all kinds of spammers through the website, so initially I put this down to some sort of Nigerian scam, but it certainly stroked the ego a bit so I had to check it out.

Low and behold it turned out to be legit!

I thought, “What an awesome opportunity!” and was stoked on the idea. But as the show gradually got closer, anticipation gradually turned to flat out fear. I hadn’t spoken in front of people since school, and that was 20 years ago.

I hurriedly prepared my slides for my presentation titled, “The 8 Key Secrets to Growing Your Screen Printing Business Online”, and while getting the “keys” down I started thinking, “I’m going there to give give people these keys, and we haven’t even mastered them yet”

Anyone who knows me, knows that I am a bit of a perfectionist and I don’t like to start or do something until the process is perfect. This was a real challenge for me, I was going there to share this stuff I “knew”, but also knew that we weren’t as good at it as we could be. I felt a little hypocritical I guess.

But I pushed on and the day came to jump on the plane to Singapore.

Once I arrived at the show, I met everyone and then nervously awaited my turn to present. I had a 45 min slot and was a little worried about filling the time.

Then it was my turn…eek!

The MC was very generous with his introduction making it sound like I had accomplished a lot more than I thought I actually had, (as you can probably tell I’m not that comfortable with being talked up!), and as I approached the stage my heart felt like it was going to jump out of my chest! I got up there looked, around the room and blurted out some Aussie greeting that I don’t remember but was probably something like “Hey, How ya’ doin’?”

Through a shaky voice I started talking…and the rest was a bit of a blur. After the initial minute or so, I really started feeling more comfortable and by the end was really amped. I actually said to my wife later on, “I think I could actually do more of this.”

After the presentation I got the opportunity to sit on a Q&A panel with a couple of other business leaders, which was great too. It was cool to see that what I had spoken about raised the interest of the attendees and generated a bunch of questions, which also gave me the privilege of being able to share everything I had learned over the years.

Making new friends and catching up with old ones…

The other great aspect of attending one of these shows is the friendships you develop with other people doing great things in the industry. We had the privilege of sitting down a couple of times with Mark Gervais who runs the print department in  China’s largest vertically integrated garment manufacturer Shenzou International. Vertically integrated means that they do everything from start to finish, knit the fabric, dye the fabric, cut the fabric…I think you can see where I am going here. They do this for companies like Nike, Adidas, Puma – all the big guys.

The company has 48,000 staff and Mark has 2,000 staff in the print department with 54 automatic printing presses. That sounds like a big job!

Something he said to me was interesting though, He said “Look in reality, you and I, we are doing the same thing. We are taking a design, separating the artwork, shooting some screens and printing some t-shirts. We both face the same problems and issues, ours are just scaled up.”

I guess that was him explaining what he does humbly, but it really made a point with me. At the end of the day we are both performing the same actions for the same end result – Making our customers happy!

We also got to sit down and discuss what they are working on and also how we can implement structured research and development time, into our procedures, to keep in front of the game here in Australia.

Someone who also reinforced this concept with us was Charlie Taublieb. Charlie is the industry’s leading print consultant. We had the privilege of spending an evening with him talking shop and trying to figure out how we can get him out here to work with us.

One thing we learned from him was that we should be working on developing our skills on producing specialty printing and finishes. A lot of printers are scared of them but when you can grasp the basics its not actually that difficult.

So we have implemented weekly R&D time to start testing and measuring everything we are doing and working on. This will continue to put us ahead of the pack, and help us achieve our goal of being the premier t-shirt printer in the country.

What would you like?

With all that said…what specialty finishes are you looking for? Are you trying to achieve a certain result that you haven’t been able to?

Let us know and we’ll do everything we can to make it happen for you.

What is discharge printing? Have a look at the video below and keep reading to find out more…(WARNING: Loud music alert in the video!)

Well, in order to get bright opaque colours onto dark coloured t-shirts, you have to use a “base” print. This is a “bridging” layer of usually white ink that you print the colours on top of. So white goes down on to the t-shirt and then all the colours go on top of the white print. This gives them “pop”. If they went directly onto the black t-shirt they would look very dull and transparent, which some people don’t mind, it gives a “vintage” look to the print.

But it also leaves you with a heavy feeling print. What a lot of people call “plasticy” (I know…a very technical term). The technical term is “heavy hand”.

This is undesirable for a lot of people. The trend at the moment is to have very soft prints that feel part of the t-shirt, or have a “soft hand”. So this is where discharge printing is awesome. Discharge ink actually bleaches the colour out of the fabric and replaces it with the colour you have mixed into the discharge ink. So the result is an opaque but very soft print, as you have dropped the white base print you would normally have to do in order to get the opaque colours on dark t-shirts.

When initially printed the print looks very dull. The colours are almost completely transparent (as you can see in the video). But as they t-shirt goes through the heat in the drying tunnel, the discharge activates and bleaches the dye out of the t-shirt and replaces it with the colour printed. Cool hey?!

Now, before you run out and place your order for discharge printing there are a few things you need to be aware of.

Firstly, different garments discharge differently. Between suppliers, colours, styles and even between identical t-shirts. It comes down to how the garments were dyed, what colour the base fabric was and also if the garment is constructed of 100% cotton, which it has to be, well in most cases, we have successfully discharged American Apparel Tri-Blend t-shirts. For this reason we can’t guarantee results, but will always print a test garment first, and if any issues arise we’ll get your approval before proceeding.

Secondly, PMS colour matching can’t be guaranteed. Colours will be as close as possible. Because of the potential inconsistencies of the original base colour of the t-shirt fabric, you sort of don’t know what to expect. It may also slightly change between different coloured t-shirts as they can discharge a little differently.

Lastly, it costs a little more than standard inks. Once the ink is activated it can’t actually be stored and at the end of the print run needs to be discarded. So to allow for this wastage and the additional time it takes to mix up the inks the pricing is marginally higher…but don’t worry we are talking cents not dollars!! And hey, you have an awesome super soft print on dark t-shirts!!

So I hope you are keen on trying out a discharge print on your next run. Let us know if you’d like some print samples. Just get in touch by calling 1300 853 474 use our contact form to let us know what you are after and we will get in touch from there.

Imagine the number of T-shirt designs a screen printer sees in the course of a year – hundreds, if not thousands.  And with all that experience of the t-shirt design industry, just imagine the wealth of knowledge and advice we would be able to offer a new designer!

In ‘Designers’ Guide to the Apparel Printing Industry’, Adam Wagner of GoMediaZine shares some wonderful insights and tips from his interviews with representatives from five major US apparel printers, covering topics such as design trends, file preparation, printing techniques and complex designs.

Multiple links, quotes, and some thoughtful commentary from readers make this already interesting and informative article even more entertaining and useful.  Check it out here – http://www.gomediazine.com/design-articles/interviews/designers-guide-apparel-production/

Let me know your thoughts below.

Make a statement, bond a team, and raise money for a good cause – it’s not surprising that charitable activities and screen printed T-shirts so often go hand-in-hand.  Grandma’s cupcakes might taste magnificent and sell … well … like hotcakes … but T-shirts are bigger and they stay fresh longer.

Inedible or not, there are still quite a few ways you can put T-shirts to work for fundraising:

• Team-themed shirts can foster team identity, unity and spirit both during and after a fundraising event
• Participant tees can advertise and generate enthusiasm for an event while it runs and become wearable memorabilia (to wildly varying degrees of raggedy-ness)
• Profits from the sales of beautifully designed T-shirts – branded or not – can provide much-needed funds for charity
• Themed T-shirt design competitions can promote community awareness of a charitable cause (recent examples: http://www.basingstokegazette.co.uk/news/8448256.Rosie_s_T_shirt_boosts_charity/ and http://www.wickedlocal.com/plymouth/news/schools/x710522855/Sheriff-sponsors-South-High-T-shirt-design-contest-to-increase-awareness-of-domestic-violence)
• Charity fundraisers can wear branded T-shirts while seeking donations, to draw donors to them and publicise the charity’s identity and purpose
• T-shirts specially designed or signed by celebrity sports stars, musicians or artists can become coveted raffle prizes (check these out! http://www.yellowbirdproject.com/)

Bold messages on clothing can be a marvellous way of making a statement – people really notice them, and a favourite T-shirt might well be worn time and time again, until the poor thing is falling apart and haunting the dreams of half the wearer’s local community.  I do declare … and declare … and declare …

Of course, designing one of these threadbare treasured tees isn’t always easy.  While many of us love to wear a funny slogan and make others laugh, or help wake others up to a social problem which annoys us, or simply proclaim our support for a cause we believe in, we might not all be quite so keen to wear a colour that makes us look anaemic, or to feel like we’re walking billboards for corporate sponsors of an event. (This last possibility obviously needs to be carefully weighed against the advantages of offering advertising on T-shirts in return for corporate sponsorship, which may well be worth more than profits from sales and continued publicity after the event.  It all depends on what you want to achieve!)

There’s no hard and fast rule to achieving ongoing broadcast-by-tee once the shirt has been sold and/or the fundraising event is over and done with, but there IS a simple question which should help steer you in the right direction during design: Will this tee be worn with pride, for its own sake? If the answer is a resounding yes, spare a moment to pity the rag piles.  They’ll probably be lonely.

Happy fundraising!

We have always been able to do bulk t-shirt printing but we have recently been able to invest in some innovative screen printing equipment that has given us the ability to print more of these wholesale jobs, faster

and at lower prices.

This means that if you have a t-shirt printing job of more than 250 pcs (sometimes even less) you can benefit from these reduced prices.

We have been inundated with these bulk runs in the last couple of months and are currently booked right through to early November.

Here is an example of the clients we have been printing for and the quantities they have been doing to take advantage of the wholesale pricing…

Monash University 10,000 Steps Challenge – 2000 t-shirts – 2 colour front + 1 colour back
Cable Chick – 2000 t-shirts – 2 colour front + 1 colour back
Middletons – 900 t-shirts – 1 colour – front, back and lower back
Flint Clothing – 2100 t-shirts – 7 designs
Relient K – 1152 t-shirts – 2 designs
Red Frogs – 2000 t-shirts + 300 hoodies – 2 col front + 1 col back + 1 col sleeve
Aboriginal Health & Medical Research Council Kick the Habit campaign – 500 t-shirts – 3 colour
Dot Dot Dash – COON Cheese – 1000 t-shirts + 10 Aprons – 4 colour front + 3 colour back

Here is a video of the machine working.

By taking advantage of this innovation you can save up to 20% on you printing costs.

So just get in touch with us if you want to know more about how you can save on your t-shirt printing.

We regularly have people asking us how they get their hand drawn designs into a format that can be used for t-shirt printing. Here is a quick video showing you the basics.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Like they did in the video start with a pencil sketch of what the t-shirt design will look like. Then trace over with a black marker. The key is to use solid black lines so that the scanned the image has a lot of contrast which aids in the vectorising process within Adobe Illustrator. Once vectorised you can add your colour fills.

So get stuck in and get some custom designs done and we’ll get your t-shirts printed for you.

We constantly get inquiries asking what the difference is between screen printing and digital t-shirt printing. So we put together a short video to explain the differences between the two methods.

If you would like to see a video of the digital t-shirt printer in action just check out this post

This video talks about the differences between screen printing and direct to garment digital t-shirt printing. Screen printing is the industry standard method of the two and was invented by the Chinese. It is applied by creating a stenciled design on a mesh screen, which is then placed on top of the shirt.  The ink for the design (either water-based or plastisol) is pushed through using a squegee. Ink used are either water-based or plastisol inks. Plastisol is the current standard in the shirt printing industry.

Direct-to-garment digital printing or DTG is a new innovation in textile printing. It makes use of a customized inkjet printer and specially formulated inks. A special white ink has also been created for textile inkjet printers, which is useful for dark-colored shirts. The white ink is used as a base on which other colors are layered to create the desired effect.

Screen printed shirts are best known for their long life and the variety of designs and inks that can be used. The printed design is expected to last as long as the shirt itself.  Moreover, it is the only quality option for retail purchases, like the ones you find at the department store. However, screen printing also has higher entry level cost because the screens have to be set up first. Longer runs decrese the price though.

Digital printing is your best option if you’re thinking of having only a few shirts designed for a special occasion or as a gift or when you are using a high-color or photographic design. However, the quality of digitally printed designs is not as good as screen printed ones, and the ink tends to fade over the life of the garment. It is best for short runs only and not for larger batches.

So how do you choose which printing method to have? Think about what you need, what you envision the shirt to be like and how you’re going to use it. Keep an eye out for online cowboys who offer only digital t-shirt printing, when in fact you may be better off with a screen-printed design. Know what you want and ask for the best method to use based on your needs and your design.

They held a massive sale that went viral through social media. Thousands of people turned up and trouble started brewing. This is what the BBC had to say –

“Up to 10 police officers were injured after scuffles broke out when 2,000 people descended on London’s Brick Lane for a sale by a US clothing chain.

The Met Police said it was called to the American Apparel event, the first day of a planned four-day sale, because of the unexpected turnout.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

More video footage here – http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8601361.stm

While we don’t approve of the behaviour it is a good example of how popular this gear is and how well you would position yourself if you were to print on them.

Check out the range here – http://www.americanapparel.net/wholesaleresources/

Let us know if you want to use them – http://www.psionline.com.au/contact-us-psi-screenprinting/

Hopefully your t-shirts will cause a riot like this!!