Custom Jackets Buyer’s Guide: Softshell vs Puffer vs Varsity vs Denim
By The Velocity Wear Team
A jacket is the piece your customer or your staff wears in public most often, which makes it the most valuable surface a logo can sit on. It is also the category where the branding decision is least forgiving: the method that works beautifully on a fleece will put several hundred needle holes through a waterproof membrane.
The seven constructions
Softshell
A bonded three-layer fabric — woven face, membrane, fleece back — that is wind-resistant and water-repellent without being fully waterproof. It is the corporate default for a reason: it looks smart over a polo, takes embroidery cleanly, and works across most of the year. If you are buying one jacket for a mixed office and field team, this is almost always it.
Puffer and gilet
Baffled or channel-quilted, with recycled or down-alternative fill. Warmest per gram and the most fashion-led of the workwear options. The gilet — the sleeveless version — is genuinely underrated for staff kit: it layers over anything, fits any arm length, and sizing is far more forgiving across a team.
One thing to know: embroidery on a filled panel needs backing, or the stitches pull the quilting and pucker. We handle that, but it is why a puffer costs more to decorate than a fleece.
Varsity
Melton wool body, leather-look or knit sleeves, ribbed collar, cuffs and hem. Almost entirely a fashion and team-identity garment rather than a practical one. It carries chenille, embroidered and leather patches better than any other jacket, which is the whole point — a varsity jacket is a canvas for a crest.
Rain shells
Fully waterproof with taped seams. Essential for anyone outdoors in weather, and the one construction where you should not embroider the shell: every stitch is a hole through the waterproof layer. Heat-sealed transfers are the correct method here, and a supplier who offers to embroider your waterproofs without mentioning this is worth a second look.
Fleece
Anti-pill microfleece or heavier polar fleece. Warm, cheap, comfortable, takes embroidery perfectly, and stops no wind at all. Best as a mid-layer or for indoor and warehouse teams. Specify anti-pill: standard fleece looks tired after a season of washing.
Hi-vis
Where a site requires it, hi-vis is not a colour choice — it is a compliance one, certified to EN ISO 20471 with defined areas of fluorescent fabric and retroreflective tape. Branding must not cover or interrupt the reflective bands, which constrains where a logo can go. Decide the logo placement with the certification in mind rather than after.
Denim
A different product entirely: not technical outerwear but a fashion piece defined by its wash, weight and hardware. Because the process is so different — wash development, custom rivets and buttons, distressing — denim jackets have their own page, with weights from 8 to 14 oz and washes from raw through to acid.
Matching the branding to the fabric
- **Embroidery** on softshell, fleece, varsity and puffer. Durable, premium, survives weather. Needs backing on filled panels.
- **Heat-sealed transfer** on waterproof shells and technical fabrics, where a needle would compromise the membrane.
- **Woven and leather-look patches** where you want a defined edge and a premium finish — varsity especially.
- **Chenille** for varsity letters and crests. Nothing else reads the same way.
- **Screen print** rarely, and only on flat woven panels at volume. Most jacket fabrics are too textured or too technical to take it well.
Choosing quickly
- 1Outdoors in real weather, all day? Rain shell, heat-sealed branding.
- 2Site work with a hi-vis requirement? Certified hi-vis, logo placed clear of the reflective bands.
- 3Mixed office and field team, one jacket for everyone? Softshell, embroidered.
- 4Cold, mostly static, want it to look good? Puffer — or a gilet if arm length across the team is a headache.
- 5Indoors, warehouse, or a mid-layer? Anti-pill fleece.
- 6Team identity, merch, a statement piece? Varsity with chenille or leather patches.
- 7Fashion brand, seasonless, high perceived value? Denim.
Minimums, lead time and pricing
Every construction runs from the same 20-piece minimum per design. Outerwear is more component-heavy than knitwear — linings, zips, hardware, fill — so jacket lead times sit at the longer end of our 10–15 working day range.
Jackets are quoted by construction rather than from a single "from" price, because a fleece and an insulated puffer are not remotely the same garment and one number across all seven would mean nothing. Denim jackets do have a published price, from $38 a piece.
Start on the wholesale jackets and outerwear page for the full range, or see corporate uniforms if the jacket is part of a wider staff kit with polos and shirts to match.
