nice work threadless team

That is some great news!!!

i love you, threadless. let's cuddle!

coolness

high five!

kewl!!

Much better yo have the always on sale stuff.

weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

High fives!

I guess you didn't drop the ball on this one...

*is excited*

A couple of the Thriftees are sold out in all but children's sizes. Which are still regular price.

WarDrobe... good catch. we'll look into that!

Oh, cool. I wasn't trying to whine or anything.

will there be any changes to color limit because of this?

Great :)

YaY!

I'ts like Classic Coke just came back.

so does this mean the thriftees will be reprinted with some sort of regularity? everything i looked at that i would get was already sold out.

will there be any changes to color limit because of this

nope!

even better! :)

I was so glad when you finally changed the pricing so that more people could afford Selects. The trade-off in paying more for some things and less for others doesn't seem to make nearly as much sense as paying for how much was put into the shirt, one-color shirts being cheaper than 8-color specialty-ink shirts and the like.

I wonder how it will or won't affect business.

And the $10 thriftee was a lot of fun, the thrill of the chase and the chance to get Selects and pricier shirts, or deciding to get a guys 3xl shirt to use in some crafty way just because it was up there tempting you.

so does this mean the thriftees will be reprinted with some sort of regularity? everything i looked at that i would get was already sold out.

designs aren't going to be printed as thriftees, but existing designs can become thriftees. they'll be on sale in those sizes and quantities until they're sold out. a thriftee design may be reprinted later on, but as a reprint, it will go back up to normal price.

got it, thanks iFDL

How often will new shirts be added to the Thriftees? Personally, I'm far less likely to chance a purchase on a shirt that's not in my side than I was under the old Thriftee, and there are only a handful designs up in my size.

But yay for everyone that likes the new changes, I'm sure it'll be exciting when there are new 8-color prints that aren't any more expensive and people won't have to bemoan the potential price of a shirt in a specialty-ink laden submission.

shirt that's not in my size*

I love it (:

thanks, Threadless!!!

Will you consider adding back in the old Thriftee? The whole surprise element of it was a lot of fun, I think we'll miss that.

Man, this announcement should have had trumpets blaring as the page opened for this royal and awesome new pricing scale! thanks guys, i plan on giving each and every Threadless cast member a thank you note with hearts for dotting the "i" 's when i see you later this week.

This is awesome news! Thanks staff, for all you do.

sweet.

Aw man, I don't want to be a downer but this ain't my kind of news! Basically for the same reasons as shakethesheets...



But, YAY.

Saweet! If I could marry the whole darn Threadless team, I totally would. I guess I'll just have to settle for buying ton o' amazing shirts at freakin' sweet prices...

agaain
not to be a downer
but
...

weak.

what is weak about it... would you rather they give the shirt away for free?

can someone please tell me why having $18 tees are such good news? I can't see the benefit...

as a side note: *bangs head against wall for not buying more tees during the sale*

bring back the sale for one more day please!!

I sort of agree, I liked how the pricing became based on how many colors were printed on the shirt (there were some exceptions though). 18 isn't so bad considering they use to be 15..but I had gotten use to the previous scheme.

This sounds great for Americans, but unfortunately it's not very good news for those of us in the UK.

Any orders over £18 is liable for a hefty Customs charge (minimum of £11, if I'm not mistaken).

With this new price, an order of two shirts (at $36) comes to over £20, thanks to an unfavourable exchange rate, which means we can only order one shirt at a time.

This, in turn, means we pay more for shipping.

:(

makes sense! good job!

I wish all the shirts were $5 and shipping was free.

Seriously though it makes sense and as a designer I will feel less pressured to cut color usage. But I do agree that one standard $18 is a bummer for those of us that were looking to buy the $15 shirts....are are a guys Medium and our sizes are hardly ever thriftees because they are the first to go.

All in all a good change in my opinion, but sucks when there were shirts in your cart that just went up in price.

oh dang krakaboom, that means it's probably gonna be like that us in canada. i wonder if i can still get away with ordering two at a time. any more and i end up with customs charges

awesome news about the thriftees though. zweeet zweet

Yeah, I hadn't thought about the customs charge, but that's totally true... bit rubbish, that

ooh..

Yay youse guys. I was already ordering max one shirt at a time, maybe two if they were sale shirts.. the customs charges in the UK are ridiculous... But the more regular pricing and less pressure on the designers to keep shirt colours down sound like a good thing.

i love threadless
but now that the selects are always 25 dollars and the shirts are a flat rate of 18 add on a 9 dollar shipping fee and threadless isnt as awesome

you used to be able to get shirts for like 21 with shipping and tax
jus sayin
i know theny need to compete and make a profit its just too bad
im still gonna buy tho

Uh...

nice!!!

too bad everyone and their mothers are my size.....

:(

i remember the simple days, when a shirt would cost you 15$...

and when it was printed on a tee that wouldn't actually tear and wear out the first few weeks you wear it...

seriously. the shirts are such bad quality now i have a hard time convincing myself to buy any.

I think it's a good idea. Now we can choose to be cheap or note :x

ok $5 for a shirt would be awesome. But let's be realistic..designers got to eat, and so do threadless employees.

However, $18 a tee might be pushing it in my opinion. One of the reasons i found threadless attractive were the reasonable prices.

Becareful Threadless! You have many loyal and passionate fans/customers which, includes me. But if the prices continue to rise, and the quality of your shirts continues to diminish, I will have to bid you a sad goodbye.

As it stands, I will only buy during sales or if there is a particular shirt i really want e.g. communist party that sells out fast. $18 is too much for this Canadian. I feel sorry for you Brits!

I miss the old days of threadless, where the aim of the site was to put out awesome designs you couldn't find anywhere else, for a decent 15 bucks. People used to notice the shirt and ask me: "Where did you get that?"

Then submissions get crummier and more predictable, and the winners are all cliched, uninteresting material. Then they move from American Apparel, which is one of my favorite companies, to their own shirts. I still bought though, not complaining until now. Yeah, maybe Threadless has grown, which is good, but still, it just doesn't SEEM like Threadless anymore.

Threadless had changed.

I used to buy one to three shirts per week, but now it's like, "ho hum". This price fiasco just succeeds in one area only, to take one more step in the direction of Hot Topic and other cliched mall stores.

casiotone1331, i think its offensive to bag the shit out of the designers when you're the one wearing half their stuff.

things change, and i guess you gotta adapt. nothing in this world stays the same price... tell me one thing that costs the same now as it did 10 years ago.

you're venting without properly thinking about it all

i have no valid opinion on this matter

I'm not trying to bag the designers. I'm bagging the designs. I'm just offering my opinion, and I think even the designers know that people are going to be judgmental about their work. It's part of the job description.

I've had weeks of threadless shirts to think. You're right, I am venting. But in all due respect, my opinion is worth just as much as yours.

I might as well go buy my shirts from Urban Outfitters now. It's going to be way cheaper in the long run. Eighteen dollars for a shirt that comes in an inconsistent, short fit. Gosh, Threadless, nine million dollars in net profits and we have to pay more for tees.

I'm really disappointed Threadless. I remember ordering tees two years ago. I was awed how the company printed independently created designs on an ethically fabricated garment at a wonderful 15$. Well, I suppose those days are over. Say goodbye to affordable and interesting tee shirts, and welcome profit heaven for SkinnyCorp.

Well, I hope the designers benefit from this. To me they along with the people who wear the shirts are the heart of threadless. Without which there would be no skinnycorp. Honestly, I never had a problem with remembering prices in the past..

Ugh I wish I had bought more the last sale...:(

O JEEBUS!!!
now theres some fair pricing!!!

I LOVE THREADLESS!!
and btw...
PRINT MORE SHIRTS ALREADY!!!

FRICK!! I couldn't find my coupon code so I placed my order with my credit card since I didn't want the 'sale' to expire..............

But apart from that, it's a good idea Threadless

I'm with you, Casiotone1331

the designs do seem to have less appeal... not that they are not properly executed, but im tired of wondering what the heck it is about, only to glance at the title and find the unavoidable pun.

but then again, those designs are printed because a lot of people vote high on them. it has nothing to do with the quality of it, and all to do with WHO it is that actually votes.

bottom line is : threadless prints what will sell. and what will sell is what the majority of the people that shop threadless like.

yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes yes

Hmm. $18 a shirt is a lot. I liked that SELECTS were priced based on ink use. For many of them with the same (if not less) special printing/colour use than regular tees, $25 seems a ripoff.

I second zerotails

super sexy sweetness on the sales, but $18 on regulars?
:\ Sorry, guys, but I'm not made of money. I wish I were!

Does that mean there will be no more holiday sales....?
:(

Does that mean there will be no more holiday sales....?

of course there will be a holiday sale!

will there be a surprise
"Select at a Thriftee Price"
every once in awhile? :p

Lower the shipping, please. Or at least include a little bottle of lube with the shirt.

I'm with shakethesheets on this one, sadly. I kind of wish they could keep the old pricing and still have the surprise thriftees *as well as* the new $9/12/15 thriftees, but I'm guessing it wasn't as profitable for threadless that way.

But glad to hear it's such a good change for most people :)

littlem on Sep 08 '08 at 11:06pm
will there be a surprise
"Select at a Thriftee Price"
every once in awhile? :p

I hope so! Bring some fun back into it, guys!

I wanted to explain how we came to the $18 shirt price for Threadless. We did want to ditch the variable pricing, a lot because of feedback we got from you guys and our non-blogging customers. The consensus is, you shouldn't have to pay more because the designer chose to go "further" with their design. What we ended up doing is looking at the consistent average of all of the prices that Threadless tees were at, and came up with the price. The average price was actually a bit higher than $18, but we felt that $18 was a fair, across the board price - especially because it's only a hair more than Girly tees cost for years before we went to the variable pricing.

As I'm sure many of you know, we do this with the best of intentions. And zerotail, we don't actually think our community and customers aren't capable of remembering many prices :) The truth is, however, that we just wanted to simply things a bit. We don't want to make people feel as if they have to understand a pricing structure that's based on what's on the tee, rather than just seeing a design they love, and knowing how much it will cost right off the bat. As always there will be mixed opinions about these things, and as always we don't want anyone to feel as if they're not being paid attention to. We'll do our best to answer any other question you guys have about this.

Thanks guys!

Jeffrey

littlem on Sep 08 '08 at 11:06pm
will there be a surprise
"Select at a Thriftee Price"
every once in awhile? :p

I hope so! Bring some fun back into it, guys!


anything is possible! I know we're all getting up there in our late 20's, but I think we probably have a little spark left for some fun :)

4 regular price, graphic tees at Threadless = $80.40 shipped.

4 regular price, graphic tees at UrbanOutfitters.com = $148.00 shipped.

Casiotone1331 on Sep 08 '08 at 7:16pm
I miss the old days of threadless, where the aim of the site was to put out awesome designs you couldn't find anywhere else, for a decent 15 bucks. ... Then they move from American Apparel...

I get so tired of pointing this out but the guy's t-shirts, which used to cost $15 were not printed on American Apparel, they were printed on Fruit of the Loom.

It was the girly shirts that were on AA and they cost $17 so the price is only up $1 for them.

It was the men's Selects that were on AA and they cost $25, the same as they do now, so the price hasn't changed.

This blog shows average prices in the first few weeks since the variable prices were announced.

In that blog, it was suggested that porices haven't changed much.

This was true from Threadless's point of view. The average prices are pretty steady, so they're not ripping you off.

However, I was worried that the buyer was not necessarily experiencing the "average" price of a t-shirt, since they don't buy every t-shirt. If everything they wanted was in the $20-$25 bracket they'd be paying a lot more on average, since the prices had changed from being constant to being variable.

With this change however, everyone gets to pay the same, average price. Keep in mind that for many people, this means that the prices have actually come down.

iFDL on Sep 08 '08 at 11:37pm
anything is possible! I know we're all getting up there in our late 20's, but I think we probably have a little spark left for some fun :)

see, shakethesheets!?! they still have some spark left in their weary bones!! :D

yay!!

you're awesome jeff! sock it to 'em!

god, could people be any whinier? $18 is a good deal, compared to the crappy quality, more expensive shirts i see at urban outfitters and such. haters, go find another place to shop-i think the pricing is very fair.

I dunno, Lori. It's not that 18 is a ton of money, and it's definitely a positive change for the designers, but I'll be far less inclined to buy selects at the uniform $25. And I love selects. And the normal thriftee rocks.

but yay, littlem, yes!

of course threadless is the greatest ever, especially that they genuinely care what their customers think and take the time to respond to questions and concerns, but not every aspect of every change is going to be a positive one.

good stuff dudes. will be ordering a bunch in the nearby future!

even more awesomeness!

THANK YOU

@ lordog: why call us whiners because we find $18 expensive? Not everyone is like you. I am definitely not a hater and love threadless stuff. I only as you call it *whined* because with the new pricing it means I'll be able to afford less tees.

any chance you'll make usps an option for shipping again? shipping at $7 through ups is pretty steep for one shirt.

So you have changed from variable pricing to now having shirts at $9, $12, $15, $18 and $25... sounds fairly variable to me.

Awesome!

Is this not the second time prices have gone up in the past ~5 months?

They moved some prices higher because of ink usage, and have now brought all prices higher.

It just doesn't make sense to purchase tshirt online for $18 a pop plus shipping costs. I can go to a store in the trendy area of town and get a shirt for $25 and try it on, and take it home with me that day.

Now, not to be annoying. But can I ask why prices went up? Why not lower prices to $16 a shirt, just to make the mall the same, you know, in the spirit of threadless when it first started out?

So again, I pose the simple question; why?

supposed to read *them all

holy crap!!! not only are the prices higher, the cheapest way to ship has also been increased to $7.00...

damn!!!

threadless you are awesome....please fix this typo!?!?!

:(

LOL @ threadless fooling anyone into thinking the price change is a good thing because it's "easier to remember". $25 a select is not a good price. I liked select tees being the same as everything else.

Millax-
When we went to variable pricing it was also at the same time that we opened up the submissions to a wide gamut of colors and printing styles. Initially our thinking was that variable pricing helps us be able to print whatever the designer submits, regardless of how crazy. Ultimately we decided that it didn't make sense to have the shirt cost more just because the designer wanted to do awesome stuff with their design. As mentioned above, the $18 across-the-board price is the consistent average of all the shirts' costs.

Squatterjohn-
True, not everyone bought every shirt so for each person the "average" may not feel like an average. However, Threadless runs on averages. Average shirt costs determine the single price, average opinion on garments determine which shirts to print on, average opinion on votes determines designs to print, etc. With every decision, we realize that it will affect different people in different ways. I promise that if we figure out a way to make everyone happy all at the same time, we'll put that plan into motion asap!

Redly Rocket-
I can see how there's some confusion in what you posted, for sure. The difference is that we went from variable pricing where every line of tees had the same structure. The set price now has to do with line... Threadless $18, TypeTees $15, Select $25. The $15, $12, and $9 are sale prices for Thriftees, not regular prices. It's more about consistent pricing per line, than getting rid of an array of prices on one site.

LINK2DPAST-
As I said above "we don't actually think our community and customers aren't capable of remembering many prices :) The truth is, however, that we just wanted to simply things a bit. We don't want to make people feel as if they have to understand a pricing structure that's based on what's on the tee, rather than just seeing a design they love, and knowing how much it will cost right off the bat."

Did he just say Threadless was average? :O


Treason!

i dunno if this was asked, but will selects still appear as thriftees from time to time?

framble... haha no!

glad I got some Selects while they were cheaper!

I have no problem with the higher price. Sure, to escape customs charges I have to buy one tee at a time, but that's pretty much what I've always done. And $18 for a tshirt is NOT expensive. In the UK a good tshirt with a print on the front will usually cost upwards of £18, which is over $30.

in a few months when they pull this again, don't come crying to me...

jet approves on Sep 09 '08 at 7:52am
any chance you'll make usps an option for shipping again? shipping at $7 through ups is pretty steep for one shirt.

just putting that out there again.

glad I got my order in before these prices kicked in!

By the time I'm done one order, it's about $28.50CAD+$10.00 to bring one shirt here. That's almost 40 bones. For a t-shirt. Hell, even overpriced Abercrombie shirts cost $20.

Shipping could easily be cut in half. What is this, eBay?

Awesome site but I don't really agree with this pricing BS.

redux: I'm with ya my fellow canuck. To be perfectly honest, even if i did accept the new $18 price, it'll have to apply only to new designs. I mean..for some reason i just can't bring myself to buy a shirt now that was only a few weeks ago $15 or $12. :/

to those that say then don't buy it: My response is yes, I won't buy it.

I REALLY HOPE the next sale @ christmas won't be more expensive than previous sales, if ya get my drift.

I'm fine with the price increase to $18, but the shipping is kind of ridiculous now.

goddam threadless, all of those nice thriftees be sold out in me size, yargh!

I liked the incentive for designers to use less colors and basic inks... but I can deal with $18.

personally, i was a big fan of the pay-for-what-you-get variable pricing system. it made a lot more sense to me and felt more... "honest", if you will. the shirt cost more to make and so it cost more to buy -- only pass on costs to the customers who actually create those costs. that said, i understand the desire to simplify things and that not everyone shares the same technically-minded view of pricing that i have, and i recognize that $18 is still a very reasonable price for the types of shirts that get printed at threadless, especially when compared to many of its competitors. plus, the technical quality of the shirts (especially with the custom threadless brand shirt bases) has come a long way since i first came here years ago, and it makes sense that the cost is a little higher than back then. so in the end, i preferred the old system, but i can accept the $18 price.


what really bothers me, though, is all selects being $25 again. i can't help but ask how that's being justified. when selects were initially introduced, they were priced higher because they had extras tacked on to them that only they had. they had the option of a hugely superior variety of printing options, inks, and colors and, at least for guys, they were printed on a vastly superior quality shirt (AA over FOTL). while it seemed lame/unfair that they were all such a high price even if the artist chose to make a one-color print, the majority of Selects were indeed much more technically advanced. and as i said, at bare minimum (for guys anyhow) you were getting a much nicer fabric.

but everything has changed since Selects were introduced. now all shirts are printed on the same nice fabric, all shirts have the same options for printing techniques, locations, inks, and color counts. all shirts are, essentially, equal. the only thing that makes Selects more "valuable" now is the name that comes along with them -- that they were designed by an artist good enough that threadless deemed them worthy of a select. that is the only difference. and to me, that's going against the whole point of threadless -- to do away with "names" in t-shirt design and put anybody, a seasoned pro and just a kid in their basement, on the same playing field, to give everyone an equal chance at getting a great design printed. i'm aware that Selects as a whole are already going against that, at least to a degree, by skipping the voting process. in reality, i'm okay with that -- i don't mind you guys giving specific artists the opportunity to design whatever wild idea that they desire, since you did it as an add-on, as a bonus feature threadless offered, and it didn't take away from other people's chances of getting printed each week. but now that all shirts are of the same physical quality and have the same printing options, how can you still justify making the ones with a well-known name cost more?

sorry i'm so wordy, guys.

I agree with Kevin. And it sucks that a shirt that was $9 in a previous sale is now $25.

I'd have been stockpiling selects if we had any warning about the price increase, but now I can't really see myself buying many, if at all.

i think kevin puts it really well about the selects.

selects and shipping, my two concerns.

I just got my first order of threadless t-shirts today (fantastic service and no import charges :-) ) and came on to the site and saw several the t-shirts i had got had gone up by 50%! Glad I ordered last week at the lower prices.

However, compared to many sites and shops I looked in, threadless still is cheaper and more original and so I think you have a loyal customer as long as i don't need need to pay UK duty ;-)