INK TO THE PEOPLE Launches Website That Fuels Creative Entrepreneurship

Aug. 13, 2012 - PRLog -- Milwaukee, WI -- Earlier this month, a Milwaukee-based garment printing company launched the beta version of their e-commerce website, Ink to the People (INK), putting the design and selling t-shirt power into the hands of the people. Users can create shirt designs through the site’s proprietary design tool or upload their own, set a price (and calculate a profit), set a minimum number of shirts to be sold, then launch their shirt for sale to their friends, social networks and the t-shirt community at large. The shirt goes to print only when enough people have purchased the shirt.

That’s where INK differs from other online t-shirt design companies. The production of a shirt is crowd powered. If a shirt hasn’t sold enough quantity to meet the user-set minimum required for production, then the shirt won’t go to print. There’s no financial loss to the seller, and no charge to the buyers who had wanted the shirt.

Co-founders Todd Richheimer and Jay Berman explain, “Ink to the People came to being because we noticed a real gap in the market. Most design-your-own online t-shirt shops are limited in how you can sell and distribute your product. You have to put money down to produce a product.” They continue, “We thought, ‘why not put the power in the hands of the seller?’ Users can design and sell their shirt before it goes to print. Only when they’ve sold enough shirts, will the shirt go to print. It draws on the model of Kickstarter or Groupon, but for t-shirt design.”

The benefit here is that users can design and sell shirts without fronting the cost. The responsibility for a successful sale of course, then lies with the user.

The site is great for not only artists, but social groups, companies, teams, bands, schools or even families that need a custom shirt for an event or gathering. These users can go in and offer their custom shirt design just to their group. Or even purchase the entire order themselves.\

Ink to the People was developed by Visual Impressions, a Milwaukee-based garment printing and embroidery company. Founded in 1990, the company maintains a reputation for delivering top quality decorated products to customers all over the world. Their 99,000 square foot facility allows them to fulfill orders no matter the size, be it 10 million or 24 pieces.