We used to have a store. Actually, it was just me, pumping out shirts and stickers from my garage. However, I found that over time, I wasn’t particularly happy with the quality of the shirts. The vinyl would crack over time, and I wasn’t the fastest person in the world to get an order out the door. I shut down the store because I didn’t want to too poorly in the name of hackaday. I’ve had TONS of emails asking me to turn it back on.
Today, we’re turning on another store. It isn’t fancy. It isn’t amazing. It should, however, provide higher quality products than we had before, and more different products to choose from. I’ve put shirts, coffee mugs, and stickers in so far. The graphics were all done correctly for each format, so they should turn out very nice.When you buy Hackaday merchandise, you help ensure Hackaday will stick around as long as possible.
Now, lets talk a little bit about where we should go from here.
1. Merchandise
Yes, we know we could go get shirts screen printed. I would rather have custom Merchandise made for us that we could inspect and keep in stock. That is a “one day” kind of thing that we will have to work towards. Right now we have virtually no budget for this and I don’t trust us to provide the customer service a retail store demands. We’re too busy looking for cool stuff to write!
2. Tools/components
Someone always mentions that we should sell tools. I don’t have a problem with it, but it doesn’t make sense to me either. You all know that we don’t make tools. The tools you would buy from us would just be other people’s tools that we bought first. We think the people we know who sell tools probably do a better job with customer service and order fulfillment than we would. Maybe someone has an angle on this I haven’t thought of.
3.Kits
We’ve discussed this and every time, we get excited. We would love to come up with some kits to sell. We have a few ideas floating around but have to work out some things first. This will most likely be our next step. We would be interested in hearing your ideas and input on this one. Obviously, these would be on the simpler side. If any of our writers put in the amount of time and effort necessary for a huge project, they’d probably branch out on their own.
So that’s it for now. Go buy a shirt and a coffee mug. We appreciate it. Oh, and post pics of your stuff in our forums or on the Hackaday flickr pool… or on every wall of every building of your town square.
Maybe someone has an angle on this I haven’t thought of.
HAD esd matts.
Point of that being when people take pics of their projects there will be a HAD logo below it. Cool for us, cool for you.
Like the idea of HAD esd mats. Maybe the price for a pro quality mat could be offset by a corporate sponser like 3M giving a price break in return for advertisment real estate.
Sweet! You’ll be getting some of my money soon!
Would love to see a hoodie with the large logo and text on the back and maybe a small logo and/or text on the front near the top left.
I pretty much live in hoodies (‘cos they’re comfortable, not ‘cos I’m a thug) so would probably get a few if different colours.
Ooops. *in not if
I can do that. If I remember, I will tomorrow!
I’d be down for some hackable gear…like a HaD LED ball cap…
Or, perhaps a HaD branded multitool…
I don’t know how well you can brand a paper clip, rubber band, and a used chewing gum wrapper…
Hmm..I see a challenge….Skull N Cross Wrenches paper clips….made of high carbon steel wire so they double a lockpicks, incandescent filaments, and flechette rounds for my coil gun…
then we run into another issue. If you designed something like that, you should sell it!
You could sell kits that relate to some of the posts that you do, so for instance when you were doing some teaching posts on HV, you could have a kit with some magnet wire, ferrite cores, inductors etc. to make your own flyback transformer.
My Shirt from you still lives, no cracks or whatever :P
GREAT! it depends on which vinyl I was using. I have some that are fine and some that are cracked.
It sounds like a perfect occasion to run the series of particular hack orientated contests. The subject is given every month (or two). HaD readers compete each other in the great need of winning one of those gadgets. It runs that way within plenty of CG (Computer Graphics) societies, keeping the flow of bright solutions and ideas in the great shape. There are certainly several obstacles, eg. world-wideness of participants and prize shipping costs. But hey, being featured as a winner in HaD event is enough encouraging for any remote HaD fan. If not, there are some further steps to take – for instance the winner is able to create their own HaD hack-kit, which would be available via that brand new shop. What would you say?
I remember sometime ago u guys put a section on the site to sell, buy and exchange unwanted projects, spares, parts like a hacking ebay… what happened to it? I ve been looking for it recently and couldnt find the link. Has it been removed? if so, why? any chance to have it back?
nope, it was basically like a cruddy craigslist. performance was poor. sorry. Maybe I’ll add a section back into the forums for that.
$30 for a crappy AA t-shirt?? When I make custom shirts locally, I pay no more than $6/shirt (with two-color screenprint) for American Apparels. Hell, I’ve even sold shirts on Zazzle before (made a quick “God Hates Facts” shirt) and the default price was like $20; what gives???
usually, when I’ve done local screen prints there is like a $200 minimum. Then I have to fulfill orders and run customer service. Ideally, we’ll go that route at some point. Right now, this is best. Also, I have never gotten american apparel for $6. I’ve gotten gildan for $6.
gildan for $6 is $1 less than i’m getting them for, where you getting them ?
If i recall correctly, I used 5.6 oz gildans. http://www.jiffyshirts.com/gildan-G500.html $6 was AFTER screen printing(front back) in quantities of 250. I did the vinyl myself though, so the numbers were all different.
they were OK t-shirts, but about 1/4 the price of american apparel. I’d order tons at a time (I did more than just hackaday) and you get free shipping on orders over $60.
Like I said, we have zero budget and want several different items. This isn’t optimal, but it’ll do for now.
scratch that, gildan we’re getting for $3, the canvas are $7.
Yeah, the whole thing is frustrating. Shirts are cheap right? but then we have to get them screen printed, take orders, send the orders out, split the money between the distributors and our accountant… ugh. For now, we’ll do this. In the long run, we’ll see. I’ve been thinking about putting in a multicolor silk press. Maybe one day I’ll be making them again.
+1. $20 is my maximum price point for this kind of thing. $30 simply hurts too much. Would’ve bought one NOW if it had been $20.
How about ads for hacking services? For example you want Gamecube function added to your new Wii or you want something 3D printed on a lemon curry printer.
The hacker sets the price and a small % goes to support HaD.
sounds like a legal tarpit.
Need some HackADay Hats!
Hrm… I’ll see what they have.
Gaaahhh!!!! Went to order a shirt, and they want me to register and shit! Guess I’m spoiled on Paypal…. :(
I don’t guess there is any point in asking for a Paypal option, since it is probably out of your(Caleb’s) control….
I’m an avid reader of HaD and I own a small shirt shop. I would love to run the shop for you. I can beat zazzle prices and add some unique products like camoflauge. I do this with some school spirit wear programs. Once a week I can screen all the hackaday orders and send them out. This would help my street cred, right?
Possibly. I’ve had offers over the years and ignored them. Email me at caleb@ tomorrow and we’ll discuss the possibility.
@Ryan:
Could you accept Paypal? :)
The price is fine if it’s quality rubber print. The good kind will never crack, the bad kind will crack within 10 washes.
Re: merchandise
IMHO if you’re going to stick your name on something, it should be something quality, like Leatherman multi-tools. That just sounds like lots of money and hassle for not much benefit.
Re: tools/components
You can make this work for you without selling things directly. Look at what http://thewirecutter.com/ does. I think it would be great to have a curated list of the best/recommended tools and components (“I’m sick of my cheap RS soldering iron, what should I get instead? What if I want to go up to a temp controlled soldering station?”), and you could gain some benefit from affiliate links to individual items and stores.
Re: kits
You could probably work with Sparkfun or someone on custom HAD kits, or at the very least, do something like I mentioned above for tools and components.
Good luck!
As an ancient follower/user of technology (programmed on paper tape), I am always grateful to technology as a social/cultural environment. The HAD labeled artifacts reflect the deeper metafact of the HAD culture and when artifacts and metafacts combine you have symbols. Symbols are always powerful and sometimes frightening. I will try to ensure my children and grandchildren have access to HAD artifacts.
What about sew-on patches with your logo? I’m putting tons of patches on my backpack, would like to represent HaD as well :)
Adafruit has those right now. We’d love to do some more.
Glow in the dark logo on stickers, mug, baseball cap.
+1 for patches too.
When running my reusable shopping backs, it dawn on me Hackaday shopping bags would be something I buy and use often. Not only for mundane everyday trips to the store, but to put hamfest or flea markets finds in I continue wandering around.