UK DECAY T-SHIRTS AND MERCHANDISE
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AUDIOLIFE UK DECAY STORE (“Official” UK Decay Merchandise)
- Full colour prints on high quality American garments
- New range of designs
- Expedient delivery of order
- Available on, T Shirts, Ladies Shirts, Longsleeve, Sleeveless, Hoodies etc.
The garment prints are fade resistant and machine washable, with
a fastness equal to or better than other print methods on 100% cotton
Competitive prices, T Shirts- £13.00 – £14.50, longsleeves £19.00,
Ladies £14.50 – £16.00
Most major cards accepted.
“Authentic” UK DECAY Live event product
We at UK Decay Communities have built up a reputation serving our community.
We have already serviced hundreds of happy satisfied customers with our products and pledge to continue to do so into the future.
Up until now, any small profits that have been made from the proceeds have been fed back into the day-to-day running of the website and to help the re-establishment of the band.
We would like to thank all of our previous customers for their patronage
and to offer our warmest welcome to any new customers. If you buy a UK Decay T Shirt or garment at a live event or in our online store, we see you all as members of our community; the Community of UK Decay!
Keeping it ‘Glocal’
About our “Authentic” screen printed garments
Screen printed garments against computer printed transfers and laser prints.
Currently all our “Authentic” live event shirts are still screen printed
by hand at a small plant in Luton. The screen printing method is an old tried and tested method that has withstood the test of time and works well.
However there are certain limitations; full colour is very difficult and
so too is fine textures. Each colour (including white) has to be ‘screened’
separately, using an exclusive master screen – made up uniquely for the colour.
If more than one colour is used the garment has to be ‘screened’ repeatedly for each colour, cleaning and changing the colour master screen on each pass.
In addition, the ink on the garments has to be dry before each ‘screening’, so you can see the labour process is very time consuming.
Most of our current designs have one or two ‘screenings’ ie Unexpected Guest has a Red screen and a white screen, For Madmen Only has a front white screen and a rear white screen.
Within the design itself, there are certain considerations to be taken into
account when producing a successful print. Generally, lines have to be sharp and bold, gradients don’t work very well. The way cotton takes up the ink makes it necessary to over saturate the colour area in order to realise the required effect – in other words think of it like as using a very high contrast on an image editing application or better still using vector type graphics.
So, photo type images usually do not work very well!
Another consideration in producing the master artwork for a two or more colour design is that each colour used requires a separate but synchronised master screen; therefore needing a separate master artwork.
As an example, on the For My Country design there are two
colours, white and orange. The orange bleeds into the white background on a black material. Getting the orange sky with the clouds and texture to look right, was a difficult process. The original for My Country single cover was used as a base, the image then manipulated into two separate images, one containing everything that will end up white and the other containing everything that will end up orange.(No need for black as it is on a black backdrop) Keeping the sizes and positions synchronised is all important as any mistakes made here will end up several processes down the line and be expensive in time and money to put right.
To make matters even more confusing, the plant requires each colour master to be black, ie the master for the orange in the sky on the For My Country design ends up black on a white background and even worse so does the white, so the artwork has to be created inversely for a black back drop! There are clear areas for mistakes and often tweeks are necessary after a test screening, often leading to a readjustment of the artwork.
So why not use PC transfers that don’t have these issues and can easily print in full colour?
Computers are the way of the world and in many ways get better at doing things all the time, however when it comes to durability and quality, at this time we think all the problems of screen printing still seem worthwhile. The advantages of screen printing verses PC print can be summed up with those two words, durability and quality!
We are not ruling out digitally printed garments for the future, when and
if that happens we will make the production method clear on the designs inour shop.
Changes to the way we sell our merchandise
In April 2010 we rolled out a new online T Shirt Store which is powered by a new online service called Audiolife. We feel the service has certain advantages over our current methods of selling merchandise, particularly our online and international sales.
The advantages are firstly that they are a print on demand, which means they only print the garment when a customer orders. Secondly that they can print up to full colour (most UK Decay designs are white on black admittedly but hey we do have some with colour)
Thirdly, Audiolife fulfill the entire order and ship the product to almost
anywhere in the world. Finally they have a fine range of quality cotton American T shirts, Ladies trim-fit, tanktops, longsleeved, hoodies to choose from.
But what about digital printed quality (as mentioned earlier) and shipping costs?
The test purchase we made looks and feels awesome! It arrived
in the post two week after ordering. Considering Audiolife are a US company based in California, that’s not bad considering it was shipped from there to my home in the UK. The postage for the T Shirt came to $6.50 (£4.30). So, with the £13.00 for a print on the ‘Hanes’ model, the total cost to buy my shirt and get it posted to me was £17.20. Although perhaps a couple quid more than what we buy our screen-printed garments for, we think it’s still a great deal. Especially, considering the high-quality of the shirt and the print!
Here’s what Audiolife say about the printing method,
“We use a new digital technology that chemically bonds ink to cotton molecules, resulting in brilliant colors and sharp photographic quality with no overprint around the edges. The image is soft, breathable, vibrant and durable – nothing like the stiff “decal” feel that results from heat-transfer or screen print methods. Images are fade resistant and machine washable, with a fastness equal to or better than other print methods on 100% cotton.”
For us Audiolife saves us time, in developing and creating web stores, fulfilling orders, ordering and storing stock. We are still making a small profit on garments sold on Audiolife, which again will help towards sustaining some of the band and websites running costs. We can hopefully spend the time saved, by getting creative.
All this means that we can increase our range of online designs, three new designs are already available and there will be more as time goes by.
But what about our traditional ‘Authentic’ screen-printed shirts?
Our new online store will take care of sales online and worldwide (It will be easier to obtain our products, for some customers in other areas of the globe!)
However, many of our garments are still sold ‘one to one’ at our shows. It’s this ‘personal’ level that is still so important to us and many that have purchased our shirts in the past.
The screen printed shirts have a ‘warm’, ‘organic’ look and feel. Its sometimes the slight imperfections that make something individualistic
as an object with identity, feel and uniqueness, in one word ‘special’!
So for live shows we shall continue to use our current suppliers.
They will continue with the familiar range and occasionally may supplement with a ‘tour-special’ etc. Stock produced for UK Decay’s live
events that remain unsold will be made available on request from the website.
Branding
In order to distinguish between the two different suppliers, we shall call our Audiolife garments “Official” UK Decay Merchandise (As they are an international establishment)
Our traditional supplied garments we shall call “Authentic” UK Decay Merchandise
DESIGNS
UNEXPECTED GUEST
Brands: “Authentic” and “Official”
“Official”
UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
“Authentic” UK Decay Merchandise sometimes available at live events and by request
As worn by ‘Rodney’ in ‘Only Fools and Horses’. The Classic ‘Unexpected Guest’
T Shirt was produced at the time of the “Unexpected Guest” “Dresden”
single, released in 1980.
FOR MADMEN ONLY
Brands: “Authentic” and “Official”
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
“Authentic” UK Decay Merchandise usually available at live events and by request
One of the most popular of the UK Decay designs. The Classic ‘For Madmen
Only’ T Shirt was produced at the time of the “For Madmen Only”, album released in 1981.
FOR MY COUNTRY
Brands: “Authentic” and “Official”
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
“Authentic” UK Decay Merchandise usually available
at live events and by request
The Classic ‘For My Country – Unwind’ design that was sold extensively during the UK Decay -Dead Kennedys tour of 1980. Brought out to coincide with the single release.
I MET MURDER ON THE WAY…
Brands: “Authentic” and “Official” (coming soon)
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
“Authentic” UK Decay Merchandise sometimes available
at live events and by request
“I Met muder on the way, he wore a mask like today..” The imortal
line from the title track of ‘For Madmen Only’. This new design is a motif
featuring a close-up of the For Madmen Only front cover familiar to Myspace users as the UK Decay calling card.
UK Decay Communities Class Reunion (special)
Brands: “Authentic” and “Official”
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
“Authentic” UK Decay Merchandise sometimes available
at live events and by request
“Class of 1979 – 1989 Reunion III”
The UK Decay Communities Reunion III special.
Dotties brash ‘Mohawk Skull’ motif that has become an icon for the Community of UK Decay.
Unexpected Guest Cover Ladies ‘Bella’ *NEW
DESIGN*
Brands “Official”
“Unexpected Guest single cover”
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
A popular bootleg this one, in differing colour combinations. Now for the
first time presented as an “Official” UK Decay garment.
For Madmen Only 2009 ‘Hanes’ *NEW DESIGN*
Brands: “Official”
“For Madmen 2009 CD ”
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
A tapered down version of the iconographic album cover, designed to fit the bodies natural ‘T’ shape.
Sexual Twist Long-sleeve 2010 *NEW DESIGN*
Brands: “Official”
” Sexual/ Twist 2010 ”
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
Another first, there was no official T Shirt back in the day featuring the1981 “Sexual/Twist” single.
UK Decay Biog 1982 ‘Bella’ Ladies *NEW
DESIGN*
Brands: “Official”
” UK Decay Biog photo1982″
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
One of UK Decays most widely used press shots with the original line-up of 1982.
Italia 2009 Special *TOUR SPECIAL*
Brands: “Authentic” and “Official”
” Italia 2009 Special”
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
Produced specially for the Italian tour of 2009, originating from the “Dresden” single cover.
For My Country 2010 Ladies ‘Gildan’ * NEW
DESIGN *
Brands: “Official”
” For My Country 2010″
“Official” UK Decay Merchandise available on our Audiolife store
A 2010 update to the classic original 1980 ‘For My Country’ single design
Most of our “Official” designs for sale in our Audiolife
store will be available on a variety of different garments including ‘Hanes’, ‘Gildan’ and ‘American’ T Shirts. Ladies garments also include ‘Hanes’, ‘Gildan’ and ‘American’, V Necks, Tanktops and Ladies Shirts. There are also Long sleeve Shirts, Hoodies and Totebags available with our designs.
Some of our designs are inappropriate for some of the available garments, so you won’t necessarily find every design on every garment that is available.
Rear prints.
Most of the above designs are ‘front print only’
Rear prints that are additional to front prints (double printed) work out
more expensive, whether screen-printed or digitally printed. We feel that
at the current time, Audiolife’s additional charge for the rear print, makes for an unreasonably high selling cost to the customer. However, we may make the odd exception, with one or two garments, particularly Hoodies. At the end of the day, we feel the customer can accept or refuse the option. Because the garment is only produced if there is an order, no-one is loosing anything!
But please be aware that any double printed garments, will be more expensive.
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