Starting A Clothing Line - The Honest Truth 

The Honest Truth about Starting a Clothing Brand: I'm typing this comment while wearing a black BC 3001 t-shirt with a design I love printed by Printful. 11 months ago I set out to create a mid-tier streetwear brand that could essentially run itself, and in all honesty I failed. I invested £35,000 ($49,000) to have my logo, brand identity, and t-shirts professionally designed (I'm a designer but I needed to hire a team of designers much better than myself, possessing different skill-sets). My goal was to put my company's branding and design on par with Nike, Adidas, Apple etc. and well above established streetwear brands like Supreme, Off-White, BAPE, etc. Unfortunately, I overlooked the most important aspect of my company which was the overall quality of the product I intended on selling. 1) Garments - I was in a dilemma because the only heavyweight t-shirt Printful offers is the Gildan 2000 6oz, which is a brand of t-shirt most people in the streetwear industry hate. My customers are people who spend £60+ ($75+) on a t-shirt, and prefer the feel of a heavyweight 7oz Jersey t-shirt. (So, I was out of luck on that front.) 2) Printing - I kept pushing forward hoping the quality of the designs would make up for the quality of the garment. I chose to print on several brands (Next Level, Alternative, Bella+Canvas, American Apparel, Anvil, Tultex, and Gildan). The prints were always the best on the BC 3001 t-shirts. Most of the DTG samples I received were faded, blurry, some were even smudged. It quickly became clear to me that DTG was a bad option for my t-shirt designs. People emphasize the soft feel of the DTG print, but almost all my customers and I personally prefer the feel of a screen-print. Moreover, DTG doesn't allow for blind printing i.e. printing black ink on a black garment. DTG has it's benefits, however; for prints below 5 colours screen-printing will always yield a far superior and long-lasting result. (This was game over for me.) I'm now in the process of switching my t-shirt designs to screen-printing and ordering low quantities of heavyweight garments which keeps my costs high, but I can now justify charging a higher retail price. I'm gonna continue learning and preparing, hopefully I can jump back into the fashion industry better prepared. All the best to Ryan, wish him much success. Quick note: Having sampled almost every POD service out there, I highly recommend Printful based on their consistency. Their print quality was better than most if not all of the companies I tested such as ArtGun, FifthSun, DreamJunction, T-Shirt & Sons and every other print provider I sampled through Printify. Moreover, Printful has the quickest turnaround time, delivery time, and the lowest shipping rates. Also you can monitor the entire printing and fulfillment process in the dashboard. Printful is a good company (and they keep getting better) but their business model is currently at odds with mine. They're just not set-up to serve customers in a mid to high-end market.

Start a series of videos ("The Honest Truth"??) that covers a range of people from all walks of life (even outside of USA lol) who are in this business, briefly telling their story to help inspire other people that they can too! No matter people think them authentic or not, I know I'll always find something from what they say to learn from, that will help me in my goals. Good work B&C :)

Love the ideas that Bella Canvas is telling it as it really is when starting a brand up. Putting your brand name on quality is very important from a marketing stand point.

I recently started a Christian Clothing line 6 months ago and I totally agree with what was said. It’s really a leap of faith and learning as you go. But nothing is impossible. Perseverance and faith helps. I like his designs.

Enjoyed the vid/beat and your discription has brought about that positive vibration 🙌🏾. Thanks

This is an awesome video. Really simple yet really sound advise!! Thank you!

I really appreciated this vid because he spoke my language. I'm a newbie and need an honest look at what you go thru starting out. I'll be launching my line, Lord willing in the next few weeks and all my homework points to Bella and Canvas, Shopify and Printful so far, so thanks for the transparent interview.

I found it to informative and honest, and I don't care what he's doing. If he likes it and he's being productive, who's to say otherwise. I am starting new, with a collection of my fathers artwork. He was a comic book artist and cartoonist for over 35 years. The art he left me is so amazing, retro, and unique. However, I am not an artist. I ordered B/C items and found them to be lovely. I'm just starting out, literally and waiting for my web guy to finish up so I can begin. Fingers crossed. I'm scared but feel in my gut this is the right direction to go at age 55! Now to find that fulfillment company when the orders start coming in :-)

Great video!! Thanks for sharing!

Great content. Love the transparency.

Really good videos. Just subscribed!

thnk you so much for posting this !!

Thanks for the great info!

The links to the halcyon website and instagram seem to be dead, is the company also? Now THAT would be keeping it real :-)

Put her in more videos, she's gorgeous!!!

Great video😎

Quite informative:))

Thanks for keeping it real Bella.

The music in the background is too loud. hope to reduce it for upcoming videos. thanks

Good info!

Great info I’m starting a streetwear fashion line thanks for keeping it real

Hope to be a life long partner in the future, thanks for soo much info 👌🏽

He is using the same shopify theme as I am. NIce!

AS a brand designer and strategist this sucks.

Whats the soundtrack in the background?

sad how neither the website and the IG exist anymore lol...basically it didn't work out

Too bad there's a lot of HIGH-HORSE RIDERS commenting about "authenticity" ... One man's trash = one man's treasure, yet both can be deemed authentic, truthful, honest!

The music in the background is too loud

This kind of design is so dumb and cheap. These people trying to get "passive income" by putting some easy design on a blank and dropshipping. Shopify, while an awesome tool, has brought the scam artists who want to make a quick buck come out of the woodwork.

Lose the music, people. I couldn't hear everything in the conversation, so it made the video pointless.

That guy looks like the bad guy in Alvin and the chipmunks

Looks like the company folded. Domain has expired. Oh, well! It's tough out there.

Right, so he did not actually start a proper clothing company, he is doing a print on demand dropship business.....Nothing wrong with that, but who ever titled this video should have said so. I am off

Check out nunystore on instagram for some dope merch🔥

Plentiful is crap. No consistent in quality. Shopify is expensive.. but good. Not really worth it starting out.

Honest? Truth? Selling clothes using Surfing images by a guy who doesn't surf, with primitive clip art graphics from a guy who by his own admission isn't an artist, and who is obviously not part of the beach or street culture that he is co-opting. How is any of this honest or true? If you are going to make videos about this topic why wouldn't you feature someone authentic, or who has real involvement or experience instead of a rank newbie with no real credibility or style? What this video really says is that with modern social media & DTG anyone can be a total sell out - Not the message Bella needs to put out there. Sorry, but there are real artists & real surfers with real experience and unique, original talent involved with apparel & design startups that deserve your attention.

great news, the company is bankrupted