Blue Fish T-Shirts

For one of our first T-Shirt Watch interviews I was lucky enough to talk with Justin Dean of BlueFishTshirts.com. Blue Fish carries a huge selection of some very funny stuff. And that’s just the beginning. We’ll let Justin fill you in.

T-Shirt Watch: Justin, good to talk with you. Tell us about BlueFish.
Justin Dean: Our shop is so all over the place…in a good way. I like to think we’ve got something for everyone and we are adding new stuff everyday. From the crazy new T-Qualizer t-shirts to artistic designs to clever sayings we’ve got most areas covered. But if you don’t find something you like you can always use our product designer to make your own shirt.

How long have you had been selling shirts?
I’ve been in the t-shirt business since 2003, but BlueFishTShirts.com has been open since late 2004.

How did you get started selling shirts?
I was working in marketing and merchandising for a store in the mall. We sold Mr. Chips t-shirts and it was my job to design the displays in the stores. It was amazing to me how many t-shirts we moved in a day at $40 a pop! T-shirts like “Do you have your tickets to the gun show?” sold 10 a day. I thought “I can do that!” and decided to open an online store. I was able to get going pretty quickly with the millions of ideas in my head. I started out with a handful of text designs and sold them at $20 a pop. A steal compared the store in the mall where I was still working.

Do you have a brick and mortar?
We are currently looking at options in the Metro Atlanta area but most likely won’t have a brick and mortar location until 2008 or later. However you can find a selection of our girl’s tshirts in Coach House Gifts stores throughout the US. Chances are your mall has one. We are also carried in a few boutique stores in Australia.

What’s the story behind your name?
When I first decided to start the website I was so eager to get a name up so that I could purchase a domain and get started. When talking with colleagues about my new t-shirt venture it came up that someone needed a “One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish” tshirt. So I created the design and needed to put it online but was drawing a blank when thinking of a name for my website. The customer wanted to purchase so I just chose BlueFishTshirts.com and put the tshirt up for sale. I had every intention of coming up with a “cooler” name later but after awhile the sales started coming in and people were already associating with the brand. Now I’m stuck with it, but people seem to like it.

What are some of your most popular items?
Our most popular shirt right now is the T-Qualizer t-shirt Our necktie t-shirts have been a huge hit as well. Girl’s love our “I’m Not With Stupid Anymore” t-shirt and our new Hummingbird design.

Do you have a particular creative process you follow?
A process? Me? No way! I get up at a different time each day. I switch between Starbucks and Red Bull and I just go with the flow with everything I do. When things come to me I’ll act on them. What you see on the site today could be gone tomorrow. You just never know.

What inspires you?
Everything around me. Birds, trees, world events, anything I see or hear. I’m constantly taking notes in my Blackberry or taking pictures of things I see that inspire me for a new tshirt. I try to keep up with the events happening in the world, the latest movie, and of course the trends of what people are wearing these days. I must read 100 different blogs and news feeds a day.

What celebrity would you most like to see spotted wearing one of your shirts?
I’d love to see Jack Black wearing any of our shirts. He’s the type of guy that we try to design for most of the time.

Do you have any additional stores or businesses?
We operate 27 different websites under our company PolyesterBase, LLC. www.SpamThreads.com is another popular site that we manage. We take spam subject lines and throw them on tshirts. Its so funny, and they are selling like crazy. We’ve also got www.YoMamaTshirts.com featuring Yo Mama jokes on tshirts of course. And another of our most profitable websites is www.MixItUpATL.com where we connect bartenders with private parties. We are taking the idea national next month and should have a new site design by that time as well.

What advice would you offer someone starting out selling t-shirts?
Find something else to do. Just kidding. I would suggest learning web design or saving up to hire a web designer first. You can have amazing t-shirt designs and a crappy site and you’re not going to do that well. Or vice versa: a wonderful site and crappy designs. You need a polished presentation all around, and definitely a good product. Don’t leap into it thinking that you’re going to sell thousands of shirts. It takes time to grow a business, and if you aren’t willing to learn how to grow a business then you have no business selling t-shirts. There are enough crappy websites out there, we don’t need more.

What’s the most important thing you’ve learned about being in the t-shirt business?
Its not an easy way out of a “real job.” I work harder and longer hours now then I have ever done before. I do enjoy it better than any job I’ve had, but its not the easiest. We have thousands of competitors and new ones popping up everyday. Trends change weekly and you’ve got to stay on top of everything 24/7. Its the most fun I’ve ever had but its definitely more work than I had ever imagined.

Hind sight is 20/20. What do you wish you would have done differently? Is there a trend you missed? Marketing angle you were late jumping on?
I wish we would have started advertising sooner. When you are a small company with very little cash starting out its hard to take that leap into paying to advertise and market yourself. But after we started running Google Adwords campaigns and submitting press releases things started to really pick up. Running a business is a gamble but if you do your research and learn where to spend your money wisely, you’ll see a return.

What kind of advertising do you do? What’s worked for you?
We dabble in everything from blog ads, magazine print ads, flyers, stickers, radio and Google Adwords. By far the most effective form of advertising available, and the best return on your investment is Adwords.

Do you use a fulfillment platform like CafePress or Spreadshirt? What has your experience been?
When I first started out I had no money to spend on equipment or inventory. All I had was a passion to sell t-shirts and a few designs in my mind. I knew about CafePress but I wasn’t impressed with the pricing or the quality. I wanted to offer something better for my customers. I searched around and found Spreadshirt. The service and quality from Spreadshirt is amazing. If you are starting out in the tshirt business then Spreadshirt is the way to go. They gave us the platform and the resources to get us started. We still have a wonderful relationship with the Spreadshirt team, although we’ve recently moved into screen printing our shirts ourselves. Spreadshirt handles our “Design Your Own” sales and we handle everything else in house now.

Broad strokes, what kind of sales volume do you do?
100 – 500 month.

Is this your full time job?
Yes it is.

Do you work with designers?
We work with many designers but most of our shirts are designed ourselves. We are always looking for new talent to work freelance for us so shoot us an email if you are interested. We are also hoping to have our Artists section finished very soon. We’ll be featuring original designs from painters, and graphic artists from all over the world. Their designs will be sold on our products and the proceeds will go directly to the independent artist. If you are an artist and want to earn some money on the side selling your work on t-shirts (without the hassle of creating your own site, worrying about printing and finding thousands of visitors a day) then get in contact with us, we’d love to work with you!