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The holidays are finally here and consumers can celebrate the fact that the biggest shopping day of the year is back!

As small businesses continue to push through the challenges faced this past year and a half, it is important for customers to show support by shopping locally on Black Friday and Small Business Saturday. Global Threads LLC, a Dallas-based apparel company specializing in custom apparel and headwear, is offering a special promotion for you to support local this shopping season. 

Starting on Black Friday, savvy shoppers can take advantage of 15% off a custom order of 25 shirts or more on the Global Threads website. With the holidays right around the corner, consumers can get custom apparel for their large holiday parties and family get-togethers, bosses can get company shirts for their employees as holiday gifts, friends can celebrate the new year in style with new swag to wear during New Year’s Eve celebrations, and so much more.  

With a relentless focus on quality and an endless devotion to customers, the Global Threads team can bring any apparel visions to life. A custom apparel designer on the website is helpful for self-starters that want to go through the process themselves, and those that want help on the design side can submit their ideas in the contact form.

In addition to quality custom apparel, Global Threads also offers its original “Travel the World” merchandise, a variety of apparel options with an original design with the purpose of inspiring people to travel. It is a perfect gift for travel lovers, plus customers who showcase the apparel in their travel adventures have the opportunity to be featured on Global Threads’ social media channels and website.

Global Threads’ Black Friday promotion will run Nov. 26 through Dec. 2, 2021. To qualify for the 15% discount, customers must order a minimum of 25 shirts and the shirts must all contain the same design/print. Shirts eligible for the promotion are Next Level (60% cotton, 40% polyester) and are high-quality with a large variety of color options. Customers must use the code NL6210 to receive the discount.

For more information, visit www.globalthreadsllc.com.

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Usually, it’s a good idea to wait until you have amassed sufficient capital, before starting your business. But sometimes a great opportunity comes along, or the market is exactly right to give your startup the momentum you need. In such times, it can make sense to go ahead and start your company even when you don’t have a lot to work with in the way of funds. However, should you opt to do this, Global Threads LLC outlines some ways to strategize carefully to keep your launch successful and profitable.

 

First, figure out whether you can access any extra funding.

Before you start your launch on a shoestring budget, see if any of these avenues will allow you to access additional capital.

  • You may be able to qualify for a business loan. Check out both government loans and privately funded ones.
  • There is also a variety of grants you might qualify for. The Small Business Administration can direct you toward multiple government-funded grants. In addition, research private grants to see if you can find some specific to your demographic, region, or business type.
  • Consider freeing up some additional capital by getting rid of unnecessary expenses such as subscriptions or services you don’t really use.
  • Reduce the amount you owe monthly by consolidating debt, which can usually reduce your interest rate.

 

Consider ways to keep your overhead low.

If you don’t have a lot of funding to start with, it’s a good idea not to invest too much in your startup. Here are some ways you can keep your costs down.

  • Run your business out of your home, if possible. This means eliminating additional rent, utilities, and property taxes, as well as the cost of commuting. Plus, you may be able to write off work-related expenses at tax time.
  • If you can’t manage all the operations on your own or with your existing team, try to outsource to freelancers, to save payroll costs.
  • Look for low-cost or free business-related software and apps to help you stay on top of your projects and administrative work, and go digital to save on expenses such as ink, printer paper, and mailings.
  • Automate when possible, to free you and your team up from repetitive tasks that suck up time.

 

Affordable ways to market your products or services.

Yes, having a great marketing strategy is crucial – but a great strategy does not have to be expensive.

  • Social media marketing is an affordable way to reach your target demographic as well as engage with clients and measure your reach via analytics.
  • Create great video messaging at low cost with tools like Adobe or ClipChamp.

 

Some extra money-saving tips for small businesses.

No matter where you are in your entrepreneurship journey, it’s important to know how to keep your business as profitable as possible without waste of expenditure.

  • Cut down on expenses where you can. For example, if your lease is about the run out, look for a more affordable apartment in the Dallas-Fort Worth area.
  • Always set a detailed budget, go over your budget regularly, make sure you are sticking with your budget, and adjust it as needed.

 

It’s perfectly possible to get your business off to a great start even if you don’t have a lot of capital to invest in it, initially. You will need to watch your expenses and stay within budget, but even if this means a slower launch than you’d like, it’s better to begin with a solid foundation than to rush into things. With good planning and cautious financial management, there’s no reason why your company can’t succeed on a tight budget.

Global Threads is a company of t-shirt enthusiasts, designers, innovators and problem solvers. From the start, we knew our focus would be on giving life to your visions. We go beyond creative designs. Collaboration has been, and continues to be, at the core of generating great ideas and visuals for our customers. Reach out today for more info at info@globalthreadsllc.com. 

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More people are working from home than ever before, and some experts assert this is indefinitely our new normal, notes McKinsey. This is great news for digital nomads who don't want to be tethered to an office. However, this does come with some unique challenges.

The following guide from Global Threads is designed for individuals who are working from home for the first time. Read on for budget-friendly tips to help you adapt to your new situation.

 

Cover Your Business Basics

If your new lifestyle stems from taking a leap into business ownership, it’s important to address all the necessary details early on. Fortunately, most of these can be easily handled through affordable DIY efforts. Begin with a solid business plan, then look to secure your funding. You’ll also need to establish a business structure. Starting a new business as a sole proprietorship can be the best option at first -- an LLC can be full of landmines if you don’t know what you’re getting into. Finally, file for any licenses and permits, create a business website, and prepare a digital marketing strategy.

 

Create a work-from-home space.

Set aside a designated space in the home for work. Ideally, you will have a separate room you can use as a home office. If not, place a small desk in the bedroom — a secluded place where you can concentrate without interruptions from your partner or kids. Duke University suggests creating an ergonomic workspace to maximize your comfort, such as placing your monitor at eye level.

 

Find ways to immerse yourself in your new corporate culture virtually.

If you’re working for someone else, Immersing yourself in corporate culture is easier when you have in-person opportunities like office team-building events and mid-day lunch breaks with coworkers. So what happens when you're working from home? It's still possible to get to know your new company virtually. Ask about virtual onboarding or team-building events. Many companies are finding ways to keep workers engaged remotely with social events like bingo or book clubs.

If your company doesn't have these options, ask if you can organize a virtual event. This is also a great way to raise your profile and network without spending any money. If you're still struggling, try a one-on-one approach: Ask a senior worker to serve as your virtual mentor.

 

Create clear expectations regarding your work schedule.

It can be difficult to separate your personal and professional life when you're working at home. The work-from-home shift has people working longer hours than in the past. It's important to set boundaries, however. Make it clear to your employer when you are and aren't available.

A shared calendar that colleagues and bosses can access is an easy way to show when you aren't at your desk. Tools like Google Calendar are free to use. It's also important to set boundaries for yourself. Designate a stop time for your workday. When you've reached that point, stash your work papers out of sight and step away from the desk.

 

Find affordable ways to minimize work-related stress.

Per Psychology Today, remote worker burnout is on the rise. Be proactive about minimizing home office stress. Start your mission to minimize anxiety by equipping your office space with an anti-stress toolkit. Place a stress ball on your desk, for example, and keep a plant nearby. Why? Office plants help to alleviate stress. Taking exercise breaks is also a great way to be proactive in the fight against stress. These are affordable — yet effective — steps that can help you keep your cool during a busy workday.

 

With these tips, you can find success and happiness in a home office environment, whether it’s through your own venture or working for someone else. Best of all, implementing these tips won't cost you much.

 

Global Threads is a company of t-shirt enthusiasts, designers, innovators and problem solvers. We go beyond creative designs. Collaboration has been, and continues to be, at the core of generating great ideas and visuals for our customers. Learn more at www.globalthreadsllc.com. 

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Attracting more customers to your business isn’t the only way to increase your revenue. What if you could boost your sales while spending less on marketing? Pouring money into marketing campaigns will not create loyal, long-term shoppers. Instead of spending your budget on acquiring new customers, focus on retaining your existing shoppers. Encouraging repeat purchasing is a great way to get the most out of every customer. Here are some tips from Global Threads LLC to help you turn those first-time buyers into lifelong customers!

 

Make a Great First Impression

By creating a positive experience for every first-time customer, you’ll increase the likelihood that customers will return to buy from you again. Aim to make the shopping experience as effortless as possible! Start by hiring a professional web developer to put together an attractive, easy-to-navigate website. Make sure customers can find what they’re looking for as quickly as possible, even if they’re browsing from a mobile device. Keep your checkout process as simple as possible and minimize the amount of information people need to input in order to make a purchase. Finally, keep your customers updated about the progress of their orders via email!

 

Hire Customer Support Staff

Customer service plays a critical role in your ability to retain customers. Consider hiring a few staff members to round out your customer service team and ensure you have enough people available to handle all of your customer inquiries promptly. According to Arise, over 80% of customers expect a response within 24 hours!

Before hiring staff, implement a payroll system to simplify employee pay. Look for a payroll service that includes the benefits of time tracking: costs down, billing up. Some other useful payroll features include business-wide software integration and real-time insights, so you can stay on top of all your payroll needs.

 

Create a Customer Loyalty Program

Customer loyalty programs are designed to incentivize repeat business by offering special benefits to loyalty program members. LOCALiQ explains that customer loyalty programs come in a few different forms. Free loyalty programs, like punch cards and app-based point systems, give customers a free item or discount after a certain number of previous purchases. Paid loyalty programs require customers to pay a start-up fee, like buying a gift card or downloading a paid app, to start earning rewards. Research your options and come up with a loyalty program that makes the most sense for your business model.

 

Launch a Customer Engagement Campaign

Another effective way to encourage repeat business is to produce a customer re-engagement email campaign. A re-engagement campaign can turn inactive email subscribers into engaged, paying customers! Start by using your email marketing tool to identify people who haven’t interacted with your emails for a couple of months. Once you’ve found your inactive subscribers, write a re-engagement email giving your contacts a reason to stay engaged with your business. Share product updates, exclusive subscriber offers, or promotions on new products. You could even ask your subscribers for feedback so you can better understand what they need.

 

Build a Community Around Your Brand

Keeping customers engaged is easier when they feel a sense of belonging to your business. Try to build a community around your brand so you can encourage this valuable connection. Thanks to social media platforms like Instagram and Facebook, community-conscious branding has become incredibly easy. Use your social media platforms to produce consistent brand messaging that will resonate with your target audience. Get involved in the conversation and respond to your followers as much as possible. Most importantly, let your personality shine! Your customers want to see you as a human, not an impersonal business entity.

Increasing the lifetime value of each customer will help you extract the most value out of your marketing campaigns. Focus on encouraging repeat business instead of directing all your attention toward landing new customers. While new customers are still valuable, they’re even more valuable if you can turn them into lifelong shoppers!

 

Established in 2013, Global Threads LLC is a Dallas-based apparel business specializing in custom t-shirt and hat designs. It is a company of t-shirt enthusiasts, designers, innovators and problem solvers that goes beyond creative designs to give life to customers’ visions. Founded during a study abroad trip in Florence, Global Threads keeps an emphasis on travel with its authentic “Travel the World” apparel and series. The Global Threads team puts a relentless focus on quality products with an endless devotion for their customers. Let’s go beyond the threads. To learn more about Global Threads, visit www.globalthreadsllc.com.

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The screen printing and direct printing are the two printing methods most popular in the market, but there are still many questions about the best way to print t-shirts.

The purpose of this article is to clarify – once and for all – which is the best clothing customization option.

Without further ado, let’s study the aspects one by one.

 

VIBRANT COLORS

Screen printing is not much different than painting a wall. It is necessary to mix colors and achieve the pigments we need. It is also an opaque and relatively thick paint. With these characteristics we are able to achieve all the color tones that customers may desire, including fluorescent colors.

Although direct printing printers can provide a white basis for printing to have more vivid tones, digital printing cannot yet achieve certain tones. Despite a great evolution in recent years, vibrant tones are the most difficult to achieve.

 

TONE/SHADOW CHANGES

Returning to the analogy used in the last point, such as when painting a wall with a roller, it is not easy to print shadows or make changes in the tone of the print along a drawing using silkscreen . There are techniques that allow you to “trick” the eyes, but with a closer look you can see that they are just simulations.

Direct printing shines at this point. Like any digital print, shadows and tonal changes are easy for this method. Photographic reproductions or illustrations with hundreds of tones are not difficult for DTG (direct to garment).

 

COLORS TRUE TO REALITY

Screen printing has a characteristic that no other production method has. It allows mixing pigments to achieve a specific tone. As we use pantone tables , we can also achieve any tone that our client wants.

Direct printing – and any fingerprint – comes close to a tone, never equaling it to 100%. There is a relationship between the computer, the RIP and the machine that can distort certain tones, and we are unable to guarantee exact colors.

 

DETAILS

There are jobs and jobs. Some productions are of a single color, with a text written in times new roman and others are full of details, half tones and antics.

Screen printing can achieve 99% of these details, especially due to all the technology we use to develop the productions. However, there are always very small details that can escape, especially when printing shirts or thicker items.

Direct printing allows us to achieve small details like text with millimeters with incredible quality. As it uses ecological water-based paints, they are also very thin. Thus, we managed to go to the smallest detail without great difficulties.

 

DURABILITY

This is the big point where our customers get the most. With the exception of embroidery , nothing on the market is as durable as screen printing. This is a fact. It is very common to see personalized clothing with years and even decades, with an impression in (almost) perfect conditions. Since screen printing uses plastic-based inks, it clings to the clothes with nails and teeth.

Direct printing is evolving a lot. If a few years ago we talked about 25/50 washes, today we can – with confidence – talk about up to 100 washes with reduced losses of color vibration. However, screen printing continues to have better durability.

 

COMFORT AND TOUCH

This category is based on my personal opinion. As a comfort, I understand something that has little touch and where I can move without difficulty. By touch, I mean something that has a soft touch.

Plastisol inks, used in screen printing, end up with a relatively large layer over the clothes. When using layer printing, this situation gets a little worse, so when using a very large print, we feel a little discomfort.

Direct printing, on the contrary, uses water-based inks, which are much smoother. In white t-shirts we ca n’t even feel the impression and in color pieces, although it already has a touch, it remains smaller than in screen printing.

 

VERSATILITY

What do we mean by versatility? It is about being able to put the same impression on a wide variety of products. T-Shirts, sweatshirts, shirts , polo shirts , jackets, etc. are items we work with every day.

Screen printing is almost king in versatility. Although there are some articles that we are unable to print (the biggest example will be the polar ones), changing the type of ink or slightly modifying the technique, we are able to print on practically any type of product.

Direct printing is very difficult when we do not print on 100% cotton products. In fact, the minimum percentage of cotton that a direct print job can have is 80%. Below that the final print quality will always be reduced considerably.

 

CONSISTENCY

Consistency is essentially being able to ensure that all parts are printed in the same way, regardless of the type of article we print on.

Screen printing does not distinguish.

  • Be it a t-shirt or a jacket, in theory the print will always be very close on all articles.

  • Be it the first or the last piece, the work should always be the same

Direct printing is also not weird but from the moment we try to print a t-shirt and a sweatshirt, we end up with slightly different results. If we are printing on light backgrounds (without using a white base below the image), we will also get different results between t-shirt colors.

 

SPECIAL EFFECTS

Screen printing allows a series of special effects to be printed. Whether you want 3D printing, with fluorescent colors or that shine at night (luminescent), you will be able to achieve your goals.

 

POPULARITY

Screen printing has been around for hundreds of years. Over that time it became known as the best option for printing clothes. For many people there is screen printing and then there are “others”. It is extremely popular!

 

Established in 2013, Global Threads LLC is a Dallas-based apparel business specializing in custom t-shirt and hat designs. It is a company of t-shirt enthusiasts, designers, innovators and problem solvers that goes beyond creative designs to give life to customers’ visions. Founded during a study abroad trip in Florence, Global Threads keeps an emphasis on travel with its authentic “Travel the World” apparel and series. The Global Threads team puts a relentless focus on quality products with an endless devotion for their customers. Let’s go beyond the threads. To learn more about Global Threads, visit www.globalthreadsllc.com.