﻿It’s been through it. It’s been truly not having a great week. You can see
the white coming through. I give this an F.
Have your customers complained about the print on their t-shirts fading and peeling off after
washing? We’re here to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Want to know how? Keep watching.
One of the main reasons why a printed t-shirt might look like this after a
few washes is that your customer doesn’t know how to properly care for it.
We’re here to help you communicate the best clothing care practices to your customers,
and we’ve prepared free resources you can share on your store.
To make sure your direct-to-garment print designs don’t fade for a long time, we
use water-based inks that aren’t prone to fading after washing, and the latest printing technology
that can create photo-quality prints. But that can only go so far if the garment
isn’t taken care of properly. Let’s take a look at the most common mistakes people
make when washing DTG-printed apparel. The first thing that people might get wrong
is only following the instructions on the t-shirt. But we have to keep in mind that
the original manufacturer's care instructions don’t take into consideration the DTG print
that goes on top of the garment. Printed apparel should be machine-washed
in cold water, meaning below 90℉ or 30℃, inside-out on a gentle cycle with a mild
detergent and no fabric softener or bleach. Tumble-drying and ironing can be detrimental
to the lifecycle of the print. DTG-printed apparel can be tumble-dried on a low cycle,
but hang-drying works best. To avoid cracking and fading the print,
make sure you use cool iron inside-out. Let’s take a look at how good and bad garment care
will affect these two identical t-shirts. Here are two t-shirts with a direct-to-garment
print. I’m going to wash both of them three times, one with the correct care settings and one with
unsuitable washing and drying settings. The first t-shirt is washed in 90℉ water,
inside-out on a gentle cycle with a mild detergent and without fabric softener.
The second t-shirt is washed in 140℉ water, with a design on the outside,
a harsh detergent, and a fabric softener.
Here are the results after the first wash. At first glance, differences are not that
noticeable. I’d say that the t-shirt I washed in the correct settings looks pretty much the
same. The other t-shirt looks a little faded compared to the first shirt. But other than that,
it looks much better than I expected. Let’s see what happens after the second wash.
Okay, so the first t-shirt, which I washed with the correct settings,
looks great. The print on the second t-shirt, however, has considerably faded. The colors are
not as saturated, and I can see the white fabric showing through the print.
I’ve washed both t-shirts for the third and final time, and the results are in. Okay, now
I can really see the difference between the two t-shirts. It seems that the second t-shirt shrunk
a little when I compare them side-by-side. The white fabric is showing through, and the colors
are a lot duller. And this is the result only after three washes with the wrong settings.
The first t-shirt, however, looks pretty much the same to me as it did before washing. The
print is still vivid, and the fabric is not showing through. Although I knew that the print
might come off when washing this t-shirt with the wrong settings, I didn’t expect that to happen so
fast. I think this is a really great example of why correct garment care is so important.
All of this is great, but how can you make sure your customers understand
the importance of good garment care? We’ve prepared a video and an illustration that
you can share on your product page and social media, or send to your customers individually
through email. You can download the materials by clicking the links in the description.
I have a few suggestions you can keep in mind to make sure
this information reaches your customers. One of the first places your customers will see
the product is your store. So why not add the video or illustration next to your beautiful
product pictures? But what if they have forgotten about these instructions by the time they receive
the product they’ve bought? That’s where packing slips and
packing inserts can come in handy. You can include this information in text
format on the packing slip. Or you can print the illustration on a postcard and
add it as a packaging insert. This way care instructions will be right in front of your
customer’s eyes. And if you choose to add a packaging insert, they’ll probably want
to keep this cute card in their laundry room as a reminder of best care practices.
To learn more about packaging inserts and packing slips, check out the links
in the description. Last but not least,
talk directly to your customer. This might be the easiest way to inform
your customers about proper garment care. You can set up an automatic message or email your
customers receive after purchasing a product, that has care instructions included.
No matter how you choose to do it, your customers will probably be happy to learn
how to keep their beautiful clothes looking good for a long time.
Are there any other issues you’d like us to address? Let me know in the comments and we might
just make a video covering that topic. Thank you for watching, see you in the next video!