The story begins before our retail store opened, at a time when we didn’t have an outlet for items that were irregular, damaged or defective. They just sat in boxes. Like all clothing manufactures, there is a percentage of inventory that has some sort of imperfection, which would then normally become waste product. Sandy and Jim began talking about how to reduce this product waste. It’s because of this, that our double-up tees were born.
At this point, there was an emerging trend within the mens wear market, of wearing a short sleeve polo shirt over a long sleeve t-shirt. With Jim’s background in the children’s apparel market he had seen this type of shirt and it was very common. An inset sleeve sewn in, to have the appearance of a layered look. Sandy and Jim decided to try it out as a new line item. We then cut the sleeves off of the damaged and defective tees and sewed them into our short sleeve t-shirts. We did it and the response was unbelievably strong. There was really nobody doing it in our market place and what began as a way to utilize waste, turned into a signature item for us.
We continue to use our damaged and defective product when possible. We use the sleeves or we will cut up the t-shirts and sew them into new sleeves. However, because demand is so great we actually now have to manufacture the sleeve detail from scratch, along with using our irregular waste product. As we prepare for our spring 2013 line, we will be featuring a new item that will again achieve the layered look without the layers. This time it will be a plunging v-neck with an inset contrast color and we can’t wait to show you! Every garment tells a story and that is the story of our double-up tees.
