I'm looking for cold hard numbers to substantiate my viability in my business plan with regards to the growth and market of the imprintable t-shirt industry in Canada and the USA.
Have any of you come across some good sites that have numbers to prove that there is a juicy market out there? Aside from the big ones like, Threadless, CafePress, Tshirt Hell....I'm wondering how other smaller businesses are doing.
I've been reading a lot of success stories, however I'd like to get a hold of some more statistical information to solidify my postion.
This would be a great sticky if a lot of people contributed.
I've been using a lot of the Canadian websites:
(add the www)
Statistics Canada - statscan.ca/
Strategis - strategis.ic.gc.ca/
BC Stats - bcstats.gov.bc.ca/
2001 Census Data
Last edited by GutsandGlory; October 27th, 2006 at 02:56 PM.
Canny entrepreneurs have discovered that tees with 'tude are a good fit for today's teens and twentysomethings. Industry sources estimate that consumers buy approximately 1.4 billion cotton T-shirts annually in North America with a retail value of about $20 billion.
You should read the article in the Wall Street Journal about our modest forum administrator.
And there are several other articles out there as well!
Did a forum search and found the article. What a great read. For those of you who haven't read it: (sorry I don't know how to make it cleaner)
Wall Street Journal article
Last edited by Solmu; October 28th, 2006 at 10:48 PM.
Reason: fixed side scrolling
This following data is worth noting because it can set un upperbound on the custom print t-shirt industry. There are two NAIC codes (see US census to see definitions) that are relevant are 448190 "Other Clothing Stores" under which custom T-shirts is a subset, and 323113 "Commercial Screen Printing", under which printed T-shirts is a subset. I think these should be mutually exclusive the way the census forces data to be collected. (i'd be interested in hearing anyone that finds evidence this is not the case). In 2002 (last economic census) both of those NAICS were around $7-8B. So that sets an upper bound at ~$15B in 2002. It contains a lot of non-T-shirt revenue, which is why I say it represents an upper bound. Note that the Nielsen study cited in a post above says the screen-printing industry was $14.4B in 2005, so that's a more recent data point. Also, the study is focused on "decorated apparel", so that is more relevant. Given the explosive growth of custom T-shirts, the 2002-2005 growth rate is credible.
-s
anyone have any more current market data broken down as follows:
- total t-shirt market for N. America (apparently $22B per year)
- what percentage of the market is for basics (blank t-shirts)
- what percentage of the market is for graphic printed t-shirts
- percentage of market for low, mid, high price points
Needed: Market Research Resources 
