Threadless

stubby43
stubby43 aka Phil is a 25.42 year old boy, has been a member since December 22, 2006, has scored 3,809 submissions, giving an average score of 2.65, helping 191 designs get printed.
Sorry, but I'm kind of getting fed up of threadless ad's showing up on facebook, youtube and pretty much every platform that serves ads.

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SJ27
SJ27 on Oct 25 '11 at 6:48pm
Yeah, but exponential growth is what capitalism is all about.
spacesick
   spacesick on Oct 25 '11 at 6:48pm
big fuckin deal
rhythmdev9
rhythmdev9 on Oct 25 '11 at 6:50pm
Check out page 54 of the 10th anniversary book and you'll probably delete this blog.
L-M-N-O-P
   L-M-N-O-P on Oct 25 '11 at 6:51pm
^ Yup.
stubby43
stubby43 on Oct 25 '11 at 6:51pm
They did it once and said it didnt work, same with the magazine ads.
rhythmdev9
rhythmdev9 on Oct 25 '11 at 6:52pm
The internet obviously works then.
Farnell
   Farnell on Oct 25 '11 at 6:53pm
Threadless is a business and most businesses need to advertise in some way or another. With the amount of money threadless gives to winning subs it needs to make a shit load of money everyday to survive - so for me the advertising is good.
stubby43
stubby43 on Oct 25 '11 at 7:03pm
But threadless built its business around word of mouth rather than actual advertising, which is why up until very recently they never printed a tee that didn't sell out, dont get me wrong, I'm happy with twitter and the fan page because its used to engage with its audience but I dont really see the point of the other ads.

I mean the reason they show up is because I've searched for related terms, which more than likely was threadless, I'm already a part of the audience so its a waste of time advertising to me.

I'd be really interested to see if the ads were actually working.

As for the argument that they give out a lot of prizes, they didnt get where they were today by spending more money than they were taking in, the prize money is built into the cost.

Say they do a limited run of 3000 tees, and they cost around $3 to print (that figure comes from the book crowdsourcing that wrote heavily about threadless), it costs them $9000 to print and $2500 in prizes (just to make it simple, I know $500 doesnt count), their total costs are $11,500.

The average tee is going for $20, which is $60000, thats still a $48,500 profit per run of tees.

That doesnt include stuff like utilities, building rental or staff but its still a hell of a profit margin.
shirtflirt
shirtflirt on Oct 25 '11 at 7:08pm
anyone here remember that harvard school of business study they did on threadless? about being one of the largest online companies EVER without using ANY advertising?

yeah, well those days are the past.
stubby43
stubby43 on Oct 25 '11 at 7:14pm
Threadless is/was such a big deal because it was the first company to use crowdsourcing to build a massive business from scratch, threadless was doing crowdsourcing BEFORE the term had been coined. There such a big deal that almost every book that studies the internet talks about them.

Thats something to be proud of but it doesn't change the fact the advertisements bug me.
WarDrobeInSpareOom
WarDrobeInSpareOom on Oct 25 '11 at 7:15pm
Does it really put you out of your day to see their advertisements in the sidebar? I never notice any ads unless they're blinking or yelling at me.
stubby43
stubby43 on Oct 25 '11 at 7:20pm
I dont know, I guess I'm feeling nostalgic I remember back in the day where knowing about threadless felt like you were in this awesome secret club, people used to get fairly defensive about it and wouldnt tell people where they bought their tees.

I never went that far but still, threadless doesnt feel like that to me anymore.
Bio-bot 9000
Bio-bot 9000 on Oct 25 '11 at 7:20pm
I almost never see banner ads on the internet, including Facebook, because of the marvelous invention of Adblock Plus add-on for Firefox.

Blissfully unaware of the magnitude of advertising, and never again will I be asked to guess the celebrity or find my Credit Score by shooting a duck.
Morkki
   Morkki on Oct 25 '11 at 7:20pm
hipster problems
ivanrodero
ivanrodero on Oct 25 '11 at 7:45pm
Bio-bot 9000 on Oct 25 '11 at 7:20pm
I almost never see banner ads on the internet, including Facebook, because of the marvelous invention of Adblock Plus add-on for Firefox.
Blissfully unaware of the magnitude of advertising, and never again will I be asked to guess the celebrity or find my Credit Score by shooting a duck.


Exactly
spacesick
   spacesick on Oct 25 '11 at 7:46pm
ADVERTISERS PAY BUSINESSES

BUSINESS MAKE MONEY

ADVERTISERS MAKE MONEY ALSO TOO AS WELL

BUSINESSES MAKE MORE MONEY

EVERYBODY IS HAPPY

NOTHING HAS TO CHANGE

EVER
Chipmnk
Chipmnk on Oct 25 '11 at 8:11pm
Hey man, half of those ads feature me.
shirtflirt
shirtflirt on Oct 25 '11 at 8:17pm
i'm ok with those ones
SJ27
SJ27 on Oct 25 '11 at 8:33pm
I'm nostalgic for that too and all, but ultimately Threadless (Skinnycorp) has shareholders who've made an investment and want to see growth. When you're just in business for yourself, it's OK to be that cool thing that only a few people know about if a smaller return is cool for you. But when other people are relying on you, you've got to get the word out and make sales.

Frankly I'd rather they did it through advertising which maintains the "cred" of the original idea but gets the message out to more people than through spec work for Disney in the Atrium which is "selling out."
FRICKINAWESOME
   FRICKINAWESOME on Oct 25 '11 at 9:16pm
Bio-bot 9000 on Oct 25 '11 at 7:20pm
I almost never see banner ads on the internet, including Facebook, because of the marvelous invention of Adblock Plus add-on for Firefox.

Blissfully unaware of the magnitude of advertising, and never again will I be asked to guess the celebrity or find my Credit Score by shooting a duck.


I love me some Adblock Plus. Best invention on top of the best search engine (TM) ever! But threadless ads rarely bother me, Threadless has never really done any obtrusive forms of advertising, and it's still exciting to me when I see a threadless ad during a program either online or on television (mostly wearing the tees) that I wouldn't expect them to infiltrate.

I'm most nostalgic for Threadless making a themed contest that was based on originality and an amazing topic. Many of the Atrium contests are for very worthy cuases, but there's also an equal number of "make something with muppets in them! Or some other property with a movie coming out next month!", as well as the current "make a shirt you'd wanna wear every day" kind of contests. I miss the Mae "Singularity" themes or where they took a line from a song like the Submarines contest and you had to extrapolate from that an image.
jublin
   jublin on Oct 25 '11 at 9:23pm
i like seeing threadless ads because people we know and love are featured in those ads and i can look over and go "oh hey whatup man".

reags
   reags on Oct 25 '11 at 9:31pm
Whoa what timing as I just ran into Threadless banners on ebay and a malaysian tour site o.O
iPear
iPear on Oct 25 '11 at 9:34pm
I don't mind it, having met and being cool with people part of the staff and knowing that they're totally nice people and are worth giving my moneys to.
mike bautista
mike bautista on Oct 25 '11 at 9:48pm
Those ads are for Threadless?
I thought it was for Alvin.
iPear
iPear on Oct 25 '11 at 9:50pm
also, dick in ya hooday
Chipmnk
Chipmnk on Oct 25 '11 at 10:00pm
You can buy me for the low, low price of ketchup.
mike bautista
mike bautista on Oct 25 '11 at 10:12pm
"Buy one half of Alvin, and I'll throw in the other half... for FREE."

- Billy Mays
WarDrobeInSpareOom
WarDrobeInSpareOom on Oct 25 '11 at 10:13pm
Too soon, Mike. Too soon.
Chipmnk
Chipmnk on Oct 25 '11 at 10:15pm
Dang, Alvin rest in peace.
Noh_Body
   Noh_Body on Oct 25 '11 at 10:17pm
some of my best friends were rats.
WarDrobeInSpareOom
WarDrobeInSpareOom on Oct 25 '11 at 10:27pm
He loved to laugh.
iPear
iPear on Oct 25 '11 at 10:28pm
He loved life
iPear
iPear on Oct 25 '11 at 10:29pm
Oh I wasnt even in on the joke, then I said it wrong. I'm so fuck, shit, fuck man... Oh god damnit, fuckdick, man. Godfuck
Chipmnk
Chipmnk on Oct 25 '11 at 10:35pm
Secretsurprise I'm not a dead.
SJ27
SJ27 on Oct 26 '11 at 1:39am
I like seeing Alvin and ads and all, but sometimes I just wanna see the Snorg girl with the massive boobs, or the Snorg girl in her underpants.
d3d
   d3d on Oct 26 '11 at 1:43am
i don't see threadless ads because they don't appear on threadless or flickr or fffound and i don't go anywhere else.
spacesick
   spacesick on Oct 26 '11 at 1:49am
HULK SMASH
gumbolimbo
   gumbolimbo on Oct 26 '11 at 2:14am
Adblock, right. I should install that.
SJ27
SJ27 on Oct 26 '11 at 2:38am
I think I remember Threadless ads on ffffound, but maybe I'm just thinking of Emptees because the ads are the same small size. Emptees was definitely one of the first places I saw them.
ellygeh
ellygeh on Oct 26 '11 at 7:27am
Awesome Article tesco!! Meanwhile, the world keeps spinning!
Haragos
   Haragos on Oct 26 '11 at 7:41am
How dare they advertise their products! MURDER! BLOOD!
Kookaberry
   Kookaberry on Oct 26 '11 at 8:12am
They bug the crap out of me, too. But so does Zappos or any other site that I click just once and then it follows me everywhere until I delete my cookies again.
tesco
   tesco on Oct 26 '11 at 8:51am
Good read, eh? Especially the Edward Bernays stuff. The Think Of Me As Evil? pdf is also worth a read if you're interested in the psychology behind it.
taz-pie
taz-pie on Oct 26 '11 at 9:12am
i have never seen a threadless ad before- didn't even know they had them.
Chipmnk
Chipmnk on Oct 26 '11 at 10:02am
Wow, in others words, Taryn hates me.
SJ27
SJ27 on Oct 26 '11 at 10:05am
They did TV ads on Comedy Central or something didn't they?
fatheed
   fatheed on Oct 26 '11 at 10:06am
Adapt or die.
taz-pie
taz-pie on Oct 26 '11 at 10:07am
are you in the ads, alwin??
wow, u r liek, famous
fatheed
   fatheed on Oct 26 '11 at 11:29am
The dumb thing is, because they are mostly all targeted Google ads based on browsing history and search criteria, it is probably us as regular Threadusers that get the most exposure to them - so they appear to us with much greater frequency. Kind of ironic. Amirite?

I just went to the home page of my football team and Craig's face was at the top of the page. I thought we might have signed him.

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