Custom printing uniforms for your school band, sports team or other organized group may seem like an unnecessary expense – why not just tell all the parents to provide a certain color of shirt and pants, and leave it at that? Unfortunately, as one middle school band director learned last year, asking for parents to provide something as simple as white shirts and black slacks or skirts can have disastrous consequences.
Kids showed up on competition day in tees, polo shirts and dress shirts, and the director learned that there are at least fifty different shades of white. Compared to other bands at the state level competition, even the best dressed kids looked shabby and out of place, and there was no feeling of belonging to a ’team’ among the youngsters. Custom uniform shirts could have made all the difference!
At the start of the next school year, the band leader was prepared. Ordering high quality shirts in bulk and paying for professional shirt printing resulted in an expense easily defrayed by asking each member of the band to buy their own shirt at cost. The design for the shirts was mutually agreed on by the band members themselves, and the color of shirt voted on.
The result? A uniform appearance among the students, a sense of pride associated with their band ‘outfit’, and incredible team spirit when the time came for the group to compete at state level. The overall cost of the uniform printing was absorbed by proud parents, and the entire band benefited.
The same concept can be applied to athletic teams at younger levels, if funding does not allow for expensive jerseys to be distributed. Matching shirts paired with a custom printing job can allow the team to present a confident, united front without a huge expense. You should first collect information on the uniform colors being used by other teams in the league to avoid duplication and confusion, then arrange for each player to provide the size shirt they will need in advance of placing the whole order.
Your shirt printing order should be large enough to qualify you for some sort of bulk discount, and you may be able to save even more by ordering the shirts themselves directly from the printer. If you have to order a few extra to fill out your order, get some adult sizes as you can probably sell them to proud parents to wear on game day.
Encourage your team members and their parents to help with the uniform decisions. You can easily hold a vote for favored color from the selection available, and even assign jersey numbers by request on a first come, first serve basis.
Matching shirts help establish your team as a working unit, and will build pride and confidence. You may even be able to get sponsors for your group that will help defray the cost of printing. Once you place your order for custom uniform shirts, your team will be ready for competition in no time!