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Todays Listen While You Read is:
Oh No! Oh My! - I have no Sister (from the S/T album)
There are many things I love about Go Ape, particularly after the heavy duty brain taxing posts of this week. I love the sheer simplicity of it, no virtual community to ponder, just some good designs. I love that the entire site seems to run from just one page, that page is called “index2.php”. All of that stuff just adds to the charm of Josh’s one man operation. The tees are great and the label has masses of potential. I chatted to Josh about his plans and his views on the industry.
Store Information
Contact: GoApeShirts@gmail.com
Tees: American Apparel
Products: Just Tees
Price: $18 (£10 15eur)
Shipping: $4.50, $1 for each additional tee ($4 flat fee for international shipping (you need to add this to your basket)).
How did you get into designing and illustration?
Highlights from the collection pt.1
Well I’ve always been involved in art growing up. I got into oil painting in high school, but after that was too busy with school to continue. I started messing around with illustrator maybe a year ago, and just started picking up on designing that way. I started submitting t-shirt designs to threadless, and I really liked making them. I then decided that I wanted to print at least one of my own designs, because I figured threadless never would. Turns out I was wrong, so now I have two of my designs in print (and 3 coming soon from a couple of new sites).
Were those designers that have created T’s for the line existing friends? If not how did you go about appraoching them, were they receptive to your ideas?
No, but they have become friends because of it. I emailed them and they really liked the idea of the small, independent business. They were very friendly, and we still keep in touch.
Who is your favourite t-shirt designer?
Graphicairlines has to be one of my favorites. They designed “The Persistence of Rock”, which to me is just an amazing blend of Dali and music. They are made up of two members, Tat and Vi, and are from Hong Kong. Really nice people and they make very fun designs. Their website is at www.graphicairlines.com if you want to check it out.
Has starting Go Ape been harder than you thought?
It has been about what I expected. It is sometimes hard since I run it on my own. It can get a little overwhelming at times since I am working a job during the day also. When I am not selling shirts I am working at a hospital, at least during the summer. We’ll see how it works out when I go back to school in August.
How easy has it been to get publicity for the brand? What have you done that worked best for this?
I have gotten a lot of help from people who run blogs such as this. That has definately helped the most. Jason from preshrunk.info really liked the site. Also, uncrate.com blogged about it, which led to a mention on gizmodo.com. Really mostly internet word-of-mouth. I also try to get the word out on myspace, which has helped a little bit.
The site layout is interesting with everything centred around one page, why did you design it in this way?
Haha, “interesting” is a nice way of putting it. The site is still under construction. Basically, I don’t know anything about html or web design. It will be finished soon hopefully.
Where do you see Go Ape going in the future?
It really is just a hobby/side project for me. Just something that I like to run for fun. If people keep buying shirts though, I will keep putting out designs.
What advice would you go other people who might be thinking about starting a t-shirt label?
I wish them good luck! There are a lot of upcoming t-shirt sites, and there’s going to be some tough competition. I’d say do it because you would love to do it, not for the money.
Highlights from the collection pt.2
I;ve been having some issues with images knocking out the sites formatting which is why these are a little smaller than normal, they don’t do the designs justice so I encourage you to check them out on the go ape site. I’d like to thank Josh for taking the time to talk to me and wish you luck with the brand.
