Custom Clothing Printing in Dundee: A Local Buyer's Guide
By The Velocity Wear Team
For custom clothing printing in Dundee, the method follows the artwork: screen printing for bold, limited-colour graphics at volume, DTF for detailed full-colour work on shorter runs, embroidery for staff uniform, and sublimation for all-over polyester kit. Velocity Wear is an online supplier, not a shop. You brief and proof online, order from 20 pieces, and finished garments arrive in Dundee on the same tracked UK service used everywhere else.
A City With Two Very Different Apparel Buyers
Dundee is unusual for a city of its size because it supports two serious technical sectors sitting almost next door to each other. The games and digital cluster grew out of Abertay's computer games courses and the studio scene around the city centre, and it orders apparel like a consumer brand: dark garments, character art, event drops, conference booth kit. The life sciences side, built around the University of Dundee's drug discovery and biomedical research, orders like an institution: polos, softshells and layers carrying a small, legible mark with consistent sizing across intakes.
Then there is everything else. Ninewells and the wider care sector, the engineering and manufacturing tenants on the Michelin Scotland Innovation Parc site, the waterfront hospitality that grew around the V&A and the redeveloped docks, and the schools, clubs and charities ordering steadily through the year. Two senior football grounds sit within a few hundred metres of each other on Tannadice Street, which tells you something about how seriously supporter merchandise is taken here.
The Dark-Garment Problem Nobody Warns Studios About
Games studios almost always want black. Black tees, black hoodies, black polos for expo staff. That single preference rules out one method entirely: sublimation cannot print onto dark fabric and cannot lay down white. Sublimation dyes the polyester rather than sitting on top of it, so anything you print is tinted by whatever is underneath.
That leaves screen printing with a white underbase for volume runs, or DTF for shorter, more detailed jobs. DTF carries white ink, which is why it handles complex character art on black cotton or black poly-blends without a fight. Worth knowing before you fall in love with a mockup that cannot physically be made.
What Different Dundee Orders Usually Need
- Games and digital studios: heavyweight black tees and hoodies, DTF or screen print, often a small chest mark plus a larger back graphic for expo visibility.
- Research and life-science groups: embroidered polos and softshells, one colour, small left-chest placement, ordered in waves as new cohorts arrive.
- Student societies and sports clubs: mixed-size hoodie runs with a printed base design and vinyl names added per person.
- Waterfront hospitality and visitor venues: embroidered aprons, caps and polos that survive repeated hot washes without the mark degrading.
- Light manufacturing tenants: embroidered work polos and sweatshirts, with separate over-layers rather than decorating certified garments.
Screen Printing Versus DTF at Dundee Order Sizes
The honest split is about colour count and quantity. Screen printing charges setup per colour, so a two-colour logo on 200 tees is excellent value and a seven-colour illustration on 25 tees is not. DTF has no per-colour setup, which makes it the sensible pick for detailed artwork, gradients, or a society design that changes every year. At high volume with a simple design, screen printing wins comfortably on cost per piece and gives that classic, slightly substantial feel on the fabric.
“"Pick the method to suit the artwork, not the artwork to suit the method you already had in mind."”
Minimum Order, Mixed Sizes and Bulk Pricing
The minimum is 20 pieces per order, and those 20 can be any mix of sizes. A studio ordering for a team of 24 does not need 20 of each size, which is the point people most often get wrong. Bulk discounts reach up to around 40% as quantities climb, so a department consolidating three separate small orders into one run genuinely pays less per garment. The free instant price calculator updates live as you change garment, method and quantity, so you can test that trade-off yourself instead of waiting on a quote.
Timing Around Expos, Term Dates and Conference Season
Production starts at artwork approval, not when you place the order. That distinction matters most for the games sector, where kit is tied to a fixed expo date sitting in the diary months ahead. As qualitative guidance, screen printing and embroidery run around 10-15 working days from approval, with sublimation and complex multi-part jobs nearer 15-20. Tracked UK delivery typically adds 2-5 working days after dispatch to reach Dundee, Broughty Ferry, Monifieth and the wider Tayside area.
Getting Artwork Right Before You Approve
Supply vector files where you can, and be realistic about embroidery. Fine linework, thin serifs and small strapline text below roughly a centimetre in height tend to fill in once stitched, so a mark that looks crisp on screen can turn into a blob on a polo. Simplify it for the embroidered version and keep the detailed original for print. The free Design Studio lets you lay the design out on the actual garment and preview placement and scale before anything is committed, which catches most sizing mistakes in about a minute.