T-Shirts 101- What are your tips?

I think the shirts you have sold tell the story. Doesn’t matter size, color, etc. What matters is if it’s “special”. Does it have a cool logo? Or from a concert? Or a specific brand?

You judge t-shirts the same way you judge match books, coffee mugs, truckers hats. All these items are so plentiful and cheap to buy. The profit can be incredible, but you have to use your eye to pick out the ones that you know someone will want. Might help to just go on eBay and study the Solds under “vintage t shirt): https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=vintage+t+shirt&_sacat=0&LH_ItemCondition=4&LH_Sold=1&LH_Complete=1&_sop=16

Hint :old concert t-shirts do the best.

We have hundreds of t-shirts for sale. Many sell for an average $15 + shipping. Some sell for $100. They often take a long time to move. But we enjoy going through the t-shirt rack to find a treasure.

I am learning Tee Shirts, too. Some successes:

1. organic cotton does well
2. Bands/Music that are hip, but not too overexposed. (Wu Tang and Radiohead have done well for me)
3. There are good resources on “single stitch” tee-shirts from back in the day.
4. Learn tags for age like Champion, Nike, etc.

Some things I look for:

1. Older ringer Ts.
2. Concert Ts, especially rock, metal, etc. Generally I don’t look for Country, but I haven’t really studied that market.
3. Don’t neglect kid’s Ts, especially if they might be big enough to fit a really petite teen or 20 something.
4. Harley Davidson.
5. Life Is Good. Not sure the market is as strong for these as it once was, but if I can get em cheap enough…
6. OLD Ts. These can even be plain white.
7. I look for stuff with cross over appeal, stuff that might appeal to more than one collecting/buying interest.
8. Older pop culture, political, advertising from places like amusement parks, restaurants, etc.
9. Sizes? Generally, the larger the better, but if its got great graphics or some other strong selling point, I’ll buy smaller sizes. BUT if I only have a few minutes at a thrift and the Ts are sorted by size, I start with the largest first.

That’s it for now….

Definitely agree with Jay that most Ts aren’t fast sellers. But they can be bought cheap, they are easy to ship, and, while they do take up some room, they aren’t huge space hogs.

MyCottage, I had a ringer tee up and ebay called me to tell me it was a VERO as Ringer is a brand. ???
Of course, I explained there were thousands of ringer tee shirts listed and they were like “well, we can’t enforce it on everyone.”

Sizing: The two band tees I sold were both womens and both XS! As a woman, I do not wear concert tees as they are generally oversized, heavy, and boxy. But if I can find a womans cut, I am happy!

I think it also helps to search sellers on Instagram shops as they have a great sense of what is hot for younger folks, too. One thing never changes, young people loving ironic tee-shirts. 🙂

First off, they have to be cheap.
Secondly I mainly go by gut feel. If I see the shirt and go “wow that is awesome!” then odds are someone else will think the same thing.

The hard part about T-shirts now is that all the cheap-o retail stores like Forever 21 are all heavily selling retro style t-shirts. They are even selling vintage concert t-shirts remakes. As soon as I started seeing all the vintage t-shirts in the mall stores and even Wal-Mart I pretty much haven’t shopped them since.

I call it the “Wal-Mart effect”. Once something cool and trendy hits Walmart, it is all over being trendy. Hence why the bedazzled butt cheek jeans like Buckle and Miss-Me prices are tanking- Walmart effect.

One T-Shirt category I do very well on is vintage WWE/WWF/WCW or other wrestling T-Shirts.

Pre-2000 are easy to sell for $30+. Newer ones also sell easily. The rarer the wrestler, the more you will get (I’ve sold some hard to find shirts from the 90’s in the $150 range).

Child sizes are harder to sell, but do sell eventually.

Another category I found some success with is fast-food restaurant T-shirts. Lots of places have limited time promos that they make their employees wear shirts for (even for one day) – the older, the better, but newer ones sell at $10-$15 quickly if in good shape. Avoid the greasy or well worn shirts in this category.

Older concert tees are usually 50/50 cotton blend. If the concert was supposed to have been prior to ~1985 and the tshirt is 100% cotton, it is likely a contemporary copy.

I haven’t look at tees in ages. Should start checking them out again.

Interesting that there’s a market for kids ones. My youngest son (26 now) has been heavily into music since about age 10 and Hot Topic was his favorite mall stop. I have a whole bag of youth larges that I couldn’t bear to part with at the time (Something Corporate, Taking Back Sunday, Death Cab for Cutie, et al). Maybe I should hold on to them for another 16 years:)

@Siglini – the listings look good. If you know the year for the IHOP shirt it may be helpful, but if unsure I would leave it as is.

A couple “speed” or time tips I have for T-Shirts are:

-if you are stuck for time at a store, look at black t-shirts only. Most concert or wrestling shirts are black – it will save you lots of time going through the other shirts if you cherry pick the black ones.

-I use to lay shirts flat to take photos, but found I spent a lot of time getting the wrinkles out – I went to a torso mannequin and it sped up my photo taking. I use clothes pins to make the shirt tighter on the dummy if it is too large.

-I pack/store my shirts in large Ziploc bags and write the description on them and place them vertically in bins by category (concert, sports, wrestling, other are how I have my bins labeled).

-When they sell, I have poly mailers the exact size of the Ziploc bag that they slip into, and make them small enough (in Canada it’s 2cm, or just under a inch) to be mailed as standard “letter” mail. Some larger shirts you will need to push the air out of the Ziploc to make them small enough.

Shirts are my bread ‘n butter items – always sell consistently, cheap to find, bring in OK profit ($10-$15 for most – your not going to get rich, but pay the bills) and cheap if the buyer has an issue (return postage or a total loss isn’t that expensive).

Great advice Inglewood,

I also store my unique T-shirts, each a in small clear plastic bag, with a piece of masking tape as a label. Later on it makes finding and shipping so much easier.

I get the bags at the 99 cents store (non-Ziplock 40 to 50 in a box). I also use these 1 gallon bags for my trucker hats, before boxing them.

Then they are all stored in numbered bins. You can store an awful lot of T-Shirts in a single bin.

I used to ship in a box, because I found a huge cache of free boxes a while back. Now I just don’t want to pay to ship in a box (extra weight for the postage), so they go in Poly mailers.

Good luck and keep it fun.

Lots of good stuff here.

T-shirts have seemed to be long-tail for us compared to other clothing items. I would keep your buy cost at $1, no more than $2. Total price (including shipping) is usually $15-$20, so speed is key in listing, as they don’t hit big money (there are some that do, so you have to research, but most of them are long-tail and low $)

For me, I hit t-shirts last when sourcing (and lots of time I don’t even bother). I usually don’t find much that are worth the time for us.

Excellent topic.
My insites?
It’s all about the Tag-Learn your brands Screen-stars,Giant,Artimonde etc…
Learn about 50/50 blends and single stitch.
Remember to photograph the date that is in tiny always faded print under the graphic
Don’t worry too much about damage on valuable shirts they still sell!
As already mentioned if time is a factor with practice you could vet 100 shirts in minutes just concentrating on Black and Neck Tags
And one more —-if you find one great shirt it’s time to roll up the sleeves and go deep they often come in lots and there are more for the scavenging.

I will always look at T-Shirts. They are easy to store, list, and ship. There’s always the possibility of finding a $50 or even $100+ shirt. I recently sold one for $150. I feel a lot of resellers ignore them just because there are so many packed on the racks at goodwill. I try to only buy ones that I can sell for at least $20 since the buy cost is usually $2 here. The only shitty part about T-Shirts is they are long tail, I’d recommend taking best offer on all your shirts. It’s kinda a volume game for me, I know I can pickup 20 shirts and if I sell a few of them I’ve already made my money back. They are def a bread & butter item. I’d also recommend following some instagram clothing sellers. It’s a really good way to keep up with trends and see what kind of stuff is selling.

Long post
Whoo Hoo! There is a court near me that has a street sale once a year and i missed it last week working.
It poured rain so i wasn’t too upset.
Yesterday while driving by the street at 3pm i noticed someone having a yard sale there and i thought why not check it out.
Driving slowly by i just about crashed the car.
Vintage Greatful Dead tees and more hanging from a fence!
I did ok grabbing 8 shirts(3$ each) but the seller said she had a rack full the previous weekend(Shit!)
The most intriquing shirt is a Jim Morrison Doors tee.
Paper thin 50/50 single stitch ringer with an very old label.
A hipsters wet dream!
The original owner(RIP)was a smoker and the shirts were stored for years.
After doing some cleaning research as some of these shirts are 150 plus this is the process that worked great.
Half fill a sink with cold water
cap full of vinegar
cap of detergent
maybe some oxyclean powder for white shirts.
Mix up and handwash water will get dirty repeat as nessary
Rinse with cold water well.
Lay flat on a thich towel and roll it up squeezing out water.
Air dry.
NO DRYER!
I would only do this with big buck shirts(for Jay ;0)

• This reply was modified 7 years, 10 months ago by Retiredfireguy21.
• This reply was modified 7 years, 10 months ago by Retiredfireguy21.

Unfortunately my local thrifts either charge $3.49 or $3.99 for t-shirts. They’re treated just like any other shirt price wise. This likely plays into my aversion for t-shirts.

In line for check out at a local ARC thrift store, I glanced at the t-shirt rack and saw this beauty with a 50% off tag:

https://www.ebay.com/itm/1979-ATARI-VCS-2600-SUPERMAN-GAME-promotional-t-shirt-50-50-Medium-MINT-USA/192555115369?hash=item2cd52de369:g:gB4AAOSwX3FbD91J

I have a ridiculous price on it now, just in case anyone has a search. Will lower the price in a month or two and expect to get $75 – $150 when it sells many moons from now.