T-Shirts for Events: reordering
By The Velocity Wear Team
Event t-shirts reorder as a fresh production run: 50 pieces per design, 10-15 working days from artwork approval, plus transit. That timeline means you cannot restock during an event, and rarely between two dates a fortnight apart. Reordering is something you plan between seasons or between tour legs, which makes the quantity decision on the first run the important one.
Can you reorder mid-festival?
No. Production takes 10-15 working days from artwork approval and delivery sits on top of that, so a stall that sells out on Saturday is sold out for that event. Event buyers who have been caught by this once tend to overcorrect and order too much the next time, which swaps one loss for another. The better answer is a curve weighted towards the sizes that sell and an undated design that can be sold after the date - event size splits covers how to shape it.
How do you match colour between two runs?
Reference the original job so the specification is reused rather than rebuilt, and expect a close match rather than an identical one. Dyed cotton varies slightly between dye lots, which is normal across garment manufacturing. On merch this rarely matters, because buyers at a second date are not comparing their shirt to last year's. It matters more if both runs are on sale side by side at the same stall, which is an argument for ordering the full quantity once.
What should you record after the first event?
- 1Sales or issue counts by size, taken at the end of the event before anything is packed away.
- 2Which sizes sold out and roughly when, because that tells you how much demand you missed.
- 3The job reference, fabric weight, garment colour and every ink colour used.
- 4The final approved artwork files, including the versions sponsors signed off.
- 5One unworn shirt kept as the physical reference for the next run.
The size data is the part most events throw away, and it is the part that makes the next order accurate. Two years of it beats any rule of thumb. Keep it with the artwork rather than in a separate spreadsheet that leaves with the person who ran the stall.
Is it better to order more up front?
Often, yes. A single larger run sits higher on the quantity ladder, where the discount builds to a ceiling of 35% off the 50-piece price, and it removes the second production window entirely. The calculation is between the saving on the larger run and the cost of shirts you may not sell, which is why undated artwork changes the maths so much: unsold undated stock is inventory, unsold dated stock is waste. Event t-shirt cost sets out the tiers, and band merch for UK tours covers the multi-date version of the same problem.
Does a repeat run still need 50 pieces?
Yes, on every run. That is the practical limit on topping up between dates - a request for 20 more mediums is not an order we can produce, and the answer is either to reorder 50 with a rebalanced size split or to carry the shortfall. A different garment colour counts as its own design with its own 50. The wholesale t-shirts page has the from-price, and the events and festivals page covers how event buyers usually plan a season of dates rather than one.
