Threadless

Infobox Company
name = Threadless
company_
type = Private
foundation = 2000
location_city = Chicago, Illinois
location_country = USA
location =
locations =
key_people = Founded by Jake Nickell and Jacob DeHart
area_served =
industry = Retail
products = Apparel
services =
revenue = $30 million [http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/business/story.html?id=73877548-a5a5-441a-b1d6-9c78cc5729da&p=2 Still hard to see how Facebook will make a buck with social networks ] ]
operating_income =
net_income = $9 million
num_employees = 25
parent = SkinnyCorp LLC
divisions =
subsid =
slogan = Nude No More
homepage = http://www.threadless.com/
dissolved =
footnotes =
intl =

Threadless is a community-centered online apparel store run by skinnyCorp of Chicago, Illinois, since 2000. Co-founders Jake Nickell and Jacob DeHart started the company with $1,000 in seed money after entering an Internet t-shirt design contest.cite news
last = Lawton
first = Jenny
coauthors =
title = Web T-Shirt Company Builds a Community, Business
work = Morning Edition
pages =
language =
publisher = NPR
date = 2006-12-11
url = http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6607681
accessdate = 2007-08-28 ]

Members of the Threadless community submit t-shirt designs online; the designs are then put to a public vote. A small percentage of submitted designs are selected for printing and sold through an online store. Creators of the winning designs receive a prize of cash and store credit.

Operation

Designers upload their t-shirt designs to the website, where visitors and members of the community score them on a scale of 0 to 5. On average, around 700 designs compete in any given week. Each week, the staff selects about ten designs. [ [http://www.threadless.com/help#How_are_the_winning_submissions_chosen Threadless T-Shirts - Service & Help - How May We Assist You? ] ] Each designer selected receives $2,000 in cash, as well as an additional $500 for every reprint.cite news
last = Weingarten
first = Mark
coauthors =
title = 'Project Runway' for the t-shirt crowd
work =
pages =
language =
publisher = Business 2.0 Magazine
date = 2007-06-18
url = http://money.cnn.com/magazines/business2/business2_archive/2007/06/01/100050978/index.htm
accessdate = ]

On occasion, special contests—known as "Loves Threadless"—run in association with various sponsors. These contests set a theme for designs, with a selection of additional prizes being awarded to the chosen winner; special prizes often relate to the sponsor. [ [http://www.threadless.com/loves Threadless T-Shirts - Loves Threadless Competitions and Promotions ] ] The success of this concept led to several spin-off projects by the same company, including ongoing design competitions for t-shirt slogans at OMG Clothing and neckties and wallpaper at Naked and Angry. The competition from OMG Clothing was later integrated into the main website with the introduction of Threadless TypeTees. Multiple other companies have adopted the community model created at Threadless. Nevertheless, in mid-2006, Threadless expanded in a more traditional direction, adding shirts designed by selected artists. These designs, known as Threadless Select designs, are not subject to the voting process.

In the open source community, a Threadless t-shirt or design is considered to be crowd sourced because the designer and the company retain all rights to the design. As the "source" of a design—i.e., its vector graphics file—is not available for download, it cannot be considered "open source".

Threadless shirts are run in limited batches. When shirts are sold out, customers can request a reprint. However, reprinting occurs only when there is enough demand, and the decision to reprint is ultimately up to company. New shirts are released on Mondays. [ [http://www.threadless.com/catalog/soldout Threadless T-Shirts - The full catalog of Awesome T-shirts ] ]

Additional product lines

In June 2006, Threadless added three additional product lines: [ [http://www.threadless.com/news/50888/It_s_Official_Threadless_II_Deathmatch_is_here Threadless T-Shirts - It's Official!! Threadless II: Deathmatch is here! ] ]

Threadless Kids

Selected winning designs printed on American Apparel kid-sized t-shirts and onesies. In March 2007, Threadless launched [http://www.threadlesskids.com ThreadlessKids.com] , a site exclusively featuring these products.

Threadless TypeTees

Winning slogans printed on standard Fruit of the Loom or American Apparel t-shirts using fonts courtesy of [http://www.t26.com T26.com] , the result of the integration of OMG Clothing into Threadless.

Threadless Select

Designs contributed from Threadless designers who have previously won the main competition four times or more, bypassing the usual voting system, printed on American Apparel t-shirts, with the usual restrictions on designs extended somewhat to permit the use of more colours (8 instead of the normal 5), foils and metallics.

Blik Wall graphics

In August 2007, "surface graphics" company Blik began producing a line of decals based upon selected Threadless designs. [ [http://www.threadless.com/news/250126/Blik_Announces_Threadless_WALL_GRAPHICS Threadless T-Shirts - Blik Announces Threadless WALL GRAPHICS! ] ]

Threadless Prints

In May 2008, Threadless announced that they would be printing selected designs on high quality paper. [ [http://www.threadless.com/news/344197/Proudly_presenting_THREADLESS_PRINTS Threadless T-Shirts - Proudly presenting… THREADLESS PRINTS! ] ] [http://threadless.com/catalog/line,prints Threadless Prints]

New T-shirts

In November 2006, Threadless announced that it would begin printing designs on a proprietary brand of tee shirts. Threadless posted in the Blog Forum on its website: [http://www.threadless.com/news/88235/EXCITING_NEWS_ABOUT_THE_TEES_WE_PRINT_ON Threadless T-Shirts - EXCITING NEWS ABOUT THE TEES WE PRINT ON! ] ]

"Imagine a tee that is less boxy than a Fruit of the Loom, but not as skinny as an American Apparel. Imagine a tee whose fabric is softer than American Apparel but not as thin."

The first design printed on the new shirts was titled "I Heart Threadless" and featured the Threadless logo on a charcoal-colored tee. [ [http://www.threadless.com/product/668/I_Heart_Threadless Threadless T-Shirts - I Heart Threadless by Threadless ] ] This change in tee shirts had long been encouraged by community members, although there were some complaints regarding the sizing of the new shirts.Fact|date=February 2007

Beyond this, complaints had also been posed regarding the side seams on the new tees. Worried customers had been voicing their opinions of the new shirts on the Threadless forum; in an effort to ease the concern, Threadless employee Craig Shimala posted "We're still toying with the specs [of the new tees] ." [http://www.threadless.com/profile/218163/squeegebeckenheim/blog/98642/side_seams] On January 3, 2007, Shimala posted, " [Threadless] made some changes based on everyone's input and should be receiving the revised samples soon."

On December 3, 2007, Threadless posted, "Over the past 7 years, we have took [sic] to heart your comments, compliments, and complaints to help create our very own custom Threadless brand tee. [...] Over the next few weeks, we'll be introducing more and more designs on this new and exciting tee and eventually we'll be using them exclusively!" [ [http://www.threadless.com/news/288414/Preview_the_Threadless_custom_tee_On_sale_NOW Threadless T-Shirts - Preview the Threadless custom tee! On sale NOW! ] ]

Retail store

In August 2007, Threadless announced the grand opening of a retail store, [ [http://news.com.com/8301-13577_3-9755674-36.html Threadless to open Chicago retail store in September | The Social - CNET News.com ] ] located at 3011 North Broadway in Chicago. A variety of shirts from the website are available in the store and change every Friday. In the upstairs portion of the store is a gallery, in which customers may sign up for design classes. [ [http://www.threadless.com/retail Threadless T-Shirts - Chicago Store - About the store ] ]

Threadless Tee-V

In March 2008, Threadless began creating and releasing a weekly video segment called Threadless Tee-V.

References

External links

* [http://threadless.com/ Official Website]
* [http://www.folksonomy.org/2006/09/interview_with_threadless.html Folksonomy.org Interview with Threadless Founder]
* [http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/13.06/play.html?pg=3 Open Source Softwear] , Wired feature
* [http://www.inc.com/magazine/20080601/the-customer-is-the-company.html The Customer is the Company - Inc. Magazine feature]
* [http://www.threadless.com/sightings Threadspotting - sightings of various popular figures in Threadless clothes]