We Spent 7 Months Trying to Avoid Shopify (We Failed)
Trying to create and sell merch was way more than we bargained for.
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We had one rule when we decided to sell merch:
Let it be better than anything that might get shot out of a cannon at a hockey game.
Seemed like a fair goal. So long as you ignore the fact that I’m pretty sure neither Karina nor I have ever been to a hockey game. They could be slinging Gucci for all the fuck we know.
To clarify, here’s what we picture: Some human-stuffed anthropomorphized critter skates around a rink launching tubed t-shirts into the crowd. Some ‘Hockey Person’ (spitballing here but: Beard? Hat? Twice-broken nose?) catches the thing and unfurls it to find a two-sizes too big, flimsy shirt with a crusty oversized stick-on of the stadium's sponsor.
It’s such shit, he forgets it in the seat next to him when he leaves. The janitor snatches it up, ties it to a stick, and uses it to mop up beer and puke for the next three years. So yeah. That…we didn’t want that.
At the same time, we are both highly suspicious of large corporations.
Somehow these wires got to talkin’ and we decided that Shopify must only sell two-sizes too big puke-rag hockey shirts.
So, with 0 research, we launched into a seven-month journey to avoid Shopify. Because: reasons. Here is how all this went.
Round 1: Whatever the opposite of a Christmas miracle is.
We decided to kick things off with something a bit more unique.
We decided to sell…bookmarks!
No, but hear me out. These were really cool bookmarks. We had them designed by the talented Mariam (who illustrates this newsletter). We went all out. Text, color, double-sided, rounded edges, thick nice paper. The works. They came in a set of six and we were sure we’d get them out by Christmas.
Except…who else in their damn mind has ever thought making money off a single batch of bookmarks was a good plan? Nobody. So, of course, there was nobody who could make AND drop ship them for us.
I checked every bookmark I saw in stores. Reached out to loads of printing services. Then, three weeks before Christmas, a friend of a friend found someone. She told me to email him all of the details. I did. Three days later, I called:
“Hi, Jim, this is Ben.”
“Who?”
“Jackie’s friend.”
“The bookmark kid?” (I’m thirty four)
“Yeah.”
“Yeah. Yeah, email me the details alight?”
“Yeah. Cool…alright.”
So I emailed him again. Didn’t hear back. Two days later, I called.
“Hi Jim, it’s Ben.”
“Who?”
“Jacki–”
“Right, bookmark kid.” (still thirty-four)
“Yeah.”
“Yeah, we got them. Hey, Jackie said these are merch for your company, yeah?”
“Yeah! We’re trying to raise some funds. Planning to do a few things. Tote bags, mugs, t-shirts.”
“T-shirts? I got a t-shirt press here. I bought it a few years back ‘cause we thought we’d sell these funny Pats Jersies, you know? Like, we had one where it was like that movie, The Three Amigos, with Steve Martin, yeah? Except it’s Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, and Kraft, hah! All wearing sombraros.”
“Oh, actually I—”
“And another we were gonna’ do where, OKAY, it’s Tom Brady and Belichick with Kraft as a goat!”
The last we heard from him was one hell of a laugh. When the bookmark samples came, the corners had been “rounded” by some shaky-handed individual with a pair of dull scissors.
We took the holidays off and came back with fresh ideas in January.
Round 2: We don't need to sell our souls to The Man!
We try to be good humans. We really do. But sometimes it’s hard to figure out what that entails.
For example, can I, with confidence, say that no unethical labor was used to make any piece of this laptop I’m writing on? No.
Will I burn in hell for buying plastic straws for my Fourth of July cookout?
Probably.
But as a company. We wanted to make sure our merch DO NO HARM.
So we nixed the bookmarks and decided to move on to t-shirts, totes, and mugs.
We wanted to create high-quality merch that was well-designed, comfortable, and affordable (remember: no hockey gun nonsense).
And, keeping in mind the whole point of this venture was to raise funds, we still didn't want to charge more than $25 for a T-shirt.
So, we searched, and searched, and searched, and in mid-January, Nikita started helping us with designs. He found this super-cool indie company based in Europe that checked all the boxes.
Ethically sourced.
High quality.
Stylish.
Worldwide shipping.
Yay! We held hands, strolled parks, and fell asleep in each other's arms.
We would not burn in hell for this.
Round 3: Yay!—wait, fuck.
The day before we released our merch we received an email from them saying their American operations actually were not ready.
Back to square one.
INTERMISSION: 99 T-Shirt Designs on the Wall
I think this might've broken Nikita a bit.
All of his original designs had been based on the merch the super cool indie company created. Now, everywhere we turned, things had such a generic feel.
Nikita compensated by creating, no lie, about 200 t-shirt designs.
We couldn't test any new producers while this was happening, so merch sat on our site as a 'COMING SOON' and we periodically emailed donors to remind them, "It's coming, we promise!"
Round 4: yes...yes...YES...YES!...aw
I haven't seen one of my best friends in roughly eight years. She lives in El Paso, Texas, and from time to time we call and catch up. This happened in March while we were in the thick of our "WTF are we gonna do about merch?" crisis.
It turned out she'd started working as a sales rep for a custom merch company. No. Way.
We all got on a call with her to talk it over. They could make EVERYTHING. Bookmarks included. They could source all sorts of different styles, materials, and customizations, from all over the globe!
We did it!
…
Do you ever get that feeling when something is too good to be true but you keep with it anyway, thinking maybe...maybe...maybe!
After a month of working on this, choosing products, setting the designs, ordering samples, and so on, it turned out the company my friend works for charges a fee for processing all of these orders beyond what we could afford and you had to purchase them in bulk upfront. (We should have suspected this when the owner kept saying “Remember, merch is not about making money.” But we were desperate delusional lost lambs at this point.)
We couldn’t afford this because our plan for funding was…merch.
So, finally, in April, with our tails between our legs, we slunk over to Shopify.
Round 5: Dear “The Man”, Please accept our deepest apologies. Enclosed, you'll find our souls.
We hit fuck it.
It had been six months since we promised merch. Three different attempts at working with smaller suppliers failed miserably. So, we caved and used Shopify. Of course, it took about 48 hours to set up. We had a few samples sent. They were comfy and clean and not at all like anything someone would hawk out of a plastic cannon at an imaginary hockey game. And from what we can see, they probably aren’t up to anything sinister and do vet their suppliers.
If it turns out Shopify are the psychopaths we worry all corporate monstrosities are. And if we are in fact culpable of causing harm via our merch, there is only one solace we can take. Shopify is massively popular so at least we’ll have loads of company in hell.
Check out our merch to see how we did:
We still don’t have bookmarks tho…
END NOTE: Even if Shopify is a super-amazing above-board company, we’d still prefer to give our business to indie outfits (lol). If you know anyone who does this, we’d love to chat with them.
Ugh. If you have a "fuck it. submit" tshirt, I would buy it yesterday. PLEASE CONSIDER!
When you’re just starting out, companies like Shopify do help. It is tough for a fresh business to be ethical and get what they want out there without pairing up with corporate monstrosity and carve out their own market. Big picture example- This is how it is for low income economies too.