I’ve seen a few mentions of Alternative Apparel in other threads, but no thread all about it.
Have you ever printed on it? It is just like American Apparel? If not, how does it feel?
We print on Gildan now, but I want to upgrade a bit, and I’ve heard good things about Alternative.
23 Comments
adegreeofseperation said 9 months ago
Alternatives got good stuff feels comfy like AA... sometimes their stock is sucky though and they dont have things you need readily available. But they do offer some neat variations of tees that are fun to play around with.
quixotic said 9 months ago
I’ve printed on Alt Apparel. It prints nicely.
However, I’ve had problems with their customer service and backorders. Also, the sizing seemed to differ a lot.
Time Without the E said 9 months ago
I personally had nothing but trouble with them. There sizes are weird and are almost as much American Apparel
tboxer854 said 9 months ago
Their girls pieces are great! Tanks, tees, henlys are all very high-quality and from what I’ve found a great fit (except the burn-out tanks, they run small.) I can’t speak to their men’s shirts, but in my opinion it doesn’t take much to beat American Apparel’s mens tee.
If you are, in fact, printing women’s pieces, I also highly recommend a company called Bella. Same quality, a little cheaper.
tboxer854 said 9 months ago
Also, they are considerably softer than AA. I know Chip and Pepper University did a custom blank program with them and those tees are suppppperrr soft.
jimmyheartcore said 9 months ago
I don’t really like them either.
The sizes are odd, and it seems like they’re more expensive than AA for anything other than tees.
I will stick with AA! [The original.]
Time Without the E said 9 months ago
word
i am sticking with AA the orginal as well as pima and apparel whiz and thats it.
a.Chen said 9 months ago
I did a run of Alternative Apparel a little while ago.
The shirts felt a lot thinner than AA to me. The collars are way thinner too, some curl after drying.
Before washing, the shirt is slimmer than AA. (the smalls at least).
Personally, I still prefer with AA.
Jenny said 9 months ago
The tunics and tees are awesome for printing, super soft and comfy. The burnout’s however, I had a hard time getting the ink to absorb evenly. It also washed out of some spots faster. The burnout’s get really balled up after a few washes too. That’s just from my limited experience with screen printing.
I also ran into problems with re-ordering popular pieces. They would come and be a different cut, size or hue. I’ve never used American Apparel to I have no frame of reference.
seibei said 9 months ago
I’m not a fan. a friend of mine did her line on alternative one season and is never doing it again - she sent me some samples and I wasn’t too psyched on them.
that said, they do some neat stuff like rainbow stripes and argyle and destroyed houndstooth but I’m an AA man til end of days (despite the occasional inconsistency and other woes).
dcastle8183 said about 1 month ago
I’m looking to do some designs on Alternative apparel but looks liek some negative reviews. Are there any other options out there for their destroyed tees? I really like this vintage concept and want to use something like this.
http://www.alternativeapparel.com/Shop/ItemDetails.aspx?ProductID=377&CategoryID=15&Overstock=False&Section=&SectionUrl=&Consumer=Y#
Also do any of you know the pricing for these wholesale, just round about. They are wicked expensive retail at $35 so are the wholesale tees for like 50 quantity $15-$20 per unit?
kyleisez said about 1 month ago
i used the destroyed tee for the armageddon shirt... its a little short, I wish it was longer, not really into the sleeves. too short as well.
but the feel and the look is amazing
mcastens said about 1 month ago
I have used the black and the white. like kyle said they are a little short in length and sleeves, and the white was a little yellow, like it was dirty, I guess thats the vintage part haha. It is really soft and thin though and I do like the rips. I would use them again.
dcastle8183 said about 1 month ago
Thanks guys, so do you recall the wholesale price per shirt? If its going to be $10-$15 per shirt its gonna be out of the question... I’ve seen a lot of the new tee’s out having shorter sleeves.. I actually kind of like them, it shows off tattoos better.
kyleisez said about 1 month ago
i dont think its that much lemme look real quick... email me you know the drill!
kyleisez said about 1 month ago
just emailed you d money
levi! said about 1 month ago
they offered me free shirts if i would advertise them
a rep called me
not sure why they would do that but they did
but i only use American APparel
quakerninja said about 1 month ago
I love the hats. And the models.
levi! said about 1 month ago
i asked for the models
they hung up
Cole said about 1 month ago
i hate them. i ordered a bunch of samples back when i first heard about them. all the shirts are way too thin, very boxy, and disproportionate it seems. the only shirt that fit like i felt like it should was the argyle shirt. but argyle isn’t really in style anymore. so fuck alt. apparel.
cajun metal said about 1 month ago
We’ve used them a lot at my work. They’re a bit pricier but in my opinion they have a lot more variety then AA and they feel better.
We use a LOT of different brands though and have gotten it down to the point where we can use different brands for different garments.
Budget, audience, season, and fit seem to be the order of priority for us a lot of the time.
And not everybody wants a shirt that fits the way You like it. I’ve got plenty of shirts that feel great to me but my girlfriend thinks they don’t look right on me. That being said a lot of people here actually wear these shirts and are in touch with what fits sell whereas the reps and mgt could give a shit.
Another company you might try is SunApparrel, also known as Sun Dog, they’re comparable to both AA and AltApp
Michael Phipps said about 1 month ago
It took me a while to decide between Alternative and American. After three bad experiences with American’s customer service I went with Alternative. I’m glad I did, too. The collars don’t choke the neck like American and they don’t shrink as much, either. I’m happy I went with them.
The wholesale prices are a little above $4.00 on the basic tees and a little more for others.
Michael Phipps said about 1 month ago
You just need to order 12 of a particular style to get the wholesale price (no matter the colors or sizes).