I've been searching a long time trying to find out how to license such bands as the Rolling Stones and the Beatles and brands such as 7up and Orange Crush to make t shirts. Does anyone know exactly how to go about securing the rights to use these images legally and do you have to pay upfront royalties or do you pay after you have sold the merchandise? Some companies like Junk Food t's seem to have thousands of product licenses but seem to make their sources very secretive. Any advice would help, also people are now into using old t shirts and redesigning them into new styles, if you sold one I assume you wouldn't have to worry about licensing because the original shirt you bought was licensed, would this be correct? Thanks so much!
I would like to license 80's movies and retro stuff ( print a line of clothing for various gift shops and websites) who would i contact to get licensing for these products... Example. Back to the future, ghostbusters, and new tv shows that are hot at the moment.. Sons of anarchy and stuff.
Thank you.
You would have to contact each franchise owner. In some cases, like Universal Studios, you can probably license several franchises at a time. I would imagine this would be very expensive. An alternative option would be to buy wholesale shirts or transfers from licensed distributors. Do a forum search for 'wholesale licensed shirts' and you should find some good sources.
What kind of sales and distribution do you have? Do you sell on a website? Do you sell to retailers or distributors? Do you have sales reps?
Another direction to take is just to do licensed printing rather than the sales and distribution too. It's possible to get a license to print official merchandise (NCAA, NFL, NHL, for example). You wouldn't be able to sell it yourself, just print for companies that sell it. There are licensed companies that use "on-site" printshops all the time, especially in the sports industry during playoffs where product needs to hit the shelves immediately and saving on ship time is critical.
this is the EXACT same thing i logged on to ask about...
i wanted to use robocop on a shirt as well as the stapuff marshmellow man things like that...
so what is THE best course of action?
i'm a small designer with GREAT ideas, so no million dollar equip but million $ ideas!
this is the EXACT same thing i logged on to ask about...
i wanted to use robocop on a shirt as well as the stapuff marshmellow man things like that...
so what is THE best course of action?
i'm a small designer with GREAT ideas, so no million dollar equip but million $ ideas!
Well, to put it bluntly, the originators of the Robocop and Ghostbusters franchises are the ones with million $ ideas. Your ideas are just to take their ideas and put it on a shirt. I'm pretty sure that's been done before.
But anyway, if you want to legally use existing intellectual property in your own designs, you are going to have to contact them and negotiate a license. You are going to need to prove existing production capabilities and distribution channels. You can also expect hefty upfront licensing fees plus a royalty percentage.
If you just want to resell existing licensed designs, find some wholesale distributors.
When you purchase the licensed wholesale shirts, there should be a set of terms and conditions regarding usage and distribution. Read them and see if they cover this specific issue.
But I would think that it depends on what you add to the shirt. If what you add to the shirt would infringe on IP as a standalone design, then it's also infringement when adding to an existing design. But if you were adding original design elements that do not infringe on IP, then I suppose it could be ok.
Licensing famous bands and brands 
Re: Licensing famous bands and brands 
