Company apparel is more than just a work uniform—it’s a publicity tool. Therefore, you need to design company apparel as attractively and creatively as possible.
Besides modestly priced fabric and a competent designer, there are more tips, tricks, and ideas to getting the maximum return on investment from your company apparel.
Today, we’ll consider these five customization hacks:
- Amplifying colors with shades and contrast
- Choosing the right font and typography
- Associating company apparel with departments
- Printing inspirational quotes
- Making apparel for special events
We’ll also look at the effects of customized and uncustomized company apparel on employees and brands.
1 - Amplifying Colors With Shades and Contrast
A sharper color contrast will create a greater visual impact and reciprocity for your company apparel. This will lead to more brand awareness, resulting in increased customer engagement.
Make your text and graphics more assertive by placing them on a visually contrasting palette.
The image below is an excellent example of deep-colored text and graphics that we printed on a lightened palette, resulting in a catchy, highly contrasting color mix.
Here are some harmonious contrast suggestions to help you avoid color conflict:
- Monochromatic high contrast: varying one color with tints, tones, and shades by adding black or white.
- Achromatic high contrast: using neutral colors only; white, black, and gray.
- Complimentary high contrast: combining a color with the opposite color on the color wheel.
Expert Tip: Every color on the wheel stands directly across a contrasting contemporary. As a general rule, while working with complementary colors, choose one as the dominant and the other as the complimentary.
2 - Choosing the Right Font and Typography
Font refers to text style (typeface). At the same time, typography is concerned with the visual arrangement of text and words.
All text and graphics on company apparel carry a message for your target audience. Therefore, you need to choose fonts that’ll resonate with your target audience.
The image below exemplifies an eye-catching but straightforward combination of font style, color, and typography.
Here are examples of fonts for professional company apparel:
- Helvetica: features unmatched legibility and a professional look that makes it one of the best fonts for logo design.
- Garamond: has been a favorite of Apple and Microsoft Windows and is considered the second-best font after Helvetica due to its gentle curves and precise edges.
- Futura: popular with global brands such as Red Bull, Paypal, and Gillette due to its elegance, strength, and clarity.
- Proxima Nova: comes with 48 sleek, modern, and minimalistic variations, providing numerous formal and professional design alternatives.
Pairing a font with a complimentary choice from above creates impressive visual outcomes. For example, you can combine Helvetica and Garamond on a single company t-shirt without causing conflict.
Also, before pairing fonts, ensure the ascenders and descenders of tailed letters such as b, d, h, and p are proportional. This will maintain typographical symmetry.
Avoid effects such as drop shadows and textures because they erode the professional character of your fonts.
You can combine these fonts or related variants from your graphic design app or word processor.
Another great resource that we use for fonts is the website Dafont.com. They offer thousands of free fonts for download. And, of course, if you need a recommendation, you can always ask one of our graphic designers.
3 - Associating Company Apparel With Departments
Vary the material, design, and color of company apparel according to the job’s demands and the duties of the personnel who will wear it. Also, be clear on where and when your team will be wearing it.
Will the employees wear your design on the job or when they’re off-duty?
If it’s corporate wear, polo shirts are an excellent consideration for administration and field personnel.
Alternatively, provide outdoor staff with custom printed hats for sun protection.
But if the apparel is a company perk or token of appreciation to your employees, hoodies and custom t-shirts are a good idea.
As seen in the image below, associating company apparel with departments makes for easy identification by colleagues and customers.
Consider designing custom athletic shirts for your staff if your business is a personal training company or fitness center. This company apparel will make your employees comfortable and publicize your brand.
The advantages of designing apparel according to departments include:
- Fun: especially if it bears a favorite, inoffensive, witty stereotype from within the department.
- Team unity: represented by a distinct image, quote, or color on the apparel.
- Representation: the presence of departmental apparel among others from different departments naturally answers the question of representation.
The table below looks at how customized and non-customized company apparel can affect your brand and employees.
| Custom Company Apparel | Non-customized Company Apparel |
| Company logo on custom apparel fosters a sense of pride and employee loyalty | Employees feel no sense of belonging because the company next door uses the same bland apparel |
| It’s a symbol of professionalism and unity | Shows a lack of thoughtfulness and employee neglect |
| Promotes brand recognition and credibility | Only keeps employees dressed without facilitating brand visibility |
4 - Printing Inspirational Quotes
Printing inspirational quotes on company apparel—such as custom shirts—presents an exceptional opportunity to motivate and inspire your employees.
An action-oriented motivational quote on company apparel can be a rallying call to accomplish a seemingly challenging corporate or departmental objective.
You can also cheer your employees up with a celebratory tagline during a momentous occasion, such as an anniversary, turnkey company merger, or blue-chip acquisition.
Similarly, when employees wear apparel with a single motivational quote, their morale and team spirit improve significantly. The message fosters unity of purpose.
The t-shirt image below bears a statement calling employees to work with excellence and aim for high ideals.
In the creative industry, printing an anecdotal line on your company apparel will inspire your employees greatly. In addition, by warming their hearts, good humor will naturally endear your prospects and customers to your brand.
Here are some popular quote types for you to choose from:
- Life quotes
- Brand taglines
- Attitude quotes
- Motivational quotes
5 - Making Apparel for Special Events
Special events involving public participation are an excellent opportunity for brand visibility. There’s nothing more timely than having your employees wear company apparel in a public event such as a:
- Charity
- Trade show
- Conference
- Product launch
Instill a strong sense of pride in event crew members with custom t-shirts. That sense of belonging will be a surefire impetus for team spirit and loyalty, leading to increased productivity and efficiency.
Unique event company apparel will leave a lasting impression on your customers. They’ll associate similar future events to your company or be reminded of your brand, and brand recognizability is the primary goal of every corporate event.
Below is a shirt that we printed for a race called the Haiti Hustle. We print a lot of shirts for 5K races to commemorate the event.
Promote your business in a fun and yet charitable way by giving out company branded apparel to the public during special events. These gifts can be t-shirts or embroidered caps, depending on the season and goal of the event.
Whether your customers wear them at the event and beyond or keep them as souvenirs, the key is creating and maintaining brand awareness.
In addition, custom company apparel is a great investment during special events because it promotes a positive experience for event attendees and ensures the recognizability of crew members.
Expert Tip: Choose a shirt with a soft material that will be worn more often than a standard shirt.
Be Seen Far and Wide
At fancysweetstx, we use cutting-edge screen printing techniques and embroidery to create durable designs of your choice. Our top-of-the-line products include safety apparel, contractor shirts, embroidered crew shirts, beanies, and vintage shirts.
Contact us, and you’ll find we’re a good fit for your custom apparel needs.
Our customers are the happiest. Just check this out.
“Wow! What an impressive turnaround on our order of embroidered polo shirts. fancysweetstx is very professional, very responsive. We will be back again!”
— Don C.
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s the best fabric for work apparel?
Cotton is the best fabric for work apparel because it’s wearable through all seasons, absorbs sweat, dries up fast, and offers efficient breathability.
Besides cotton, there are other durable, comfortable, and washable fabrics such as:
- Twill
- Poplin
- Oxford
- Flannel
Most fancysweetstx shirts are made of cotton, rayon, and poly tri-blends. The synthetic nature of poly and rayon has given our shirts an anti-shrink reputation.
Can you embroider our logo?
Yes. Our ability to embroider any shape on all fabrics comes from our experienced design team and special embroidery frames for our embroidery machinery.
Can I see the logo before you embroider or print it?
Yes. Upon receipt of your order payment, our design staff will create a digital rendering of your logo, and we’ll email it to you for review and approval. We won’t print or embroider your apparel until we receive your consent.
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