Discuss the wholesale blanks industry: Factory direct, custom labels. You can also use this forum to locate a wide variety of wholesale products including t-shirts, hoodies, mousepads, coffee mugs and other imprintable products.
I would really appreciate some help with a problem I'm having. My company is about to start our first production run (still looking for a screenprinter and such), but are not really sure which t-shirt brand and model to go with.
We are designing for urban streetwear, but before you think that I didn't search, our shirts are not the typical oversized shirts, but are rather, fairly normally sized shirts. Particually we are looking for a shirt that has the following qualities:
1.) Feel: Fairly tough as opposed to soft (we did check out American Apparel, but found it too soft for our liking). AAA is a pretty good representation of what we are looking for, but the quality of the shirt is not really up to par
2.)Price: We do have a reseller's/seller's permit and pricing we are expecting to be in the ballpark of $2-4 a shirt
3.) Number needed: Our first run we are aiming for somewhere between 50-75 shirts
4.) Fit: Preferably the collar will be fitted, the shirt will be semi loose, closer to tight than your typical baggy streetwear, and the length should come down to slightly below the waist
5.) Colors: We are looking at black, red, green and possibly purple. We are definitely going to need some assortment of black, red, and green
6.) We are based in California, fairly close to Stanton, which according to the boards has fairly good reviews.
7.) Durability: Should be as durable as possible, meaning the material does not break down in washing machines, and the color should stay
Secondary Stuff:
1.) Tagless
We are looking for any suggestion as to brand and specific tee (i.e. Hanes Beefy-T, etc.). A shirt the quality that obey typically uses would be best, but they produce their own overseas so that's not a viable option with the number of shirts we need.
Actually I have never seen a Gildan in real life yet. I've read many good things about it on this forum and others, and if I'm not mistaken it is used by lots of different companies.
I think they fulfill most of your requirements - rough texture, tight necks, slightly bigger than most, $2-4/shirt, wide range of color choice (not sure about purple, though) & durable. They aren't tagless, though.
I was also thinking ProClub. They aren't as loose and baggy as people tend to think.
They come in a wide variety of colors, are in your price range (unless you go with the BIG sizes), fitted collar (too fitted for me), but they are not tagless.
They will also stand up to washing, and are very durable.
The AAA Platinum Tee (style 1701) is advertised as having a slimmer neck and tear out neck tags, but on the other hand the cotton is probably a bit soft (ringspun) and light weight (5.5oz).
AAA do have a few different styles though, so if you haven't yet tried them all it might be worth checking the others (since you found them close but not quite there).
Specific T-shirt 
