Merch Fulfillment Test: What I Looked For (And What Actually Mattered IMO)

First impression (Let’s rip off the bandaid):

The packaging came in very standard. No branding, no custom polymailer. At first, that felt like a red flag. It looked a little cheap compared to more personalized packaging I’ve used before.

Then I noticed they ship through stamps.com, which told me something important. They’re likely optimizing for commercially viable shipping at scale instead of aesthetics. Less romantic, more realistic.

Personally, I do prefer branded packaging. MyMerchGuy nailed that part and it felt more personal. Might not be a big deal to you or your customers but that’s just my little pet peeve.

However, the shirt itself changed the entire perception.

Print quality was clean and accurate. Colors matched the design closely, which is always a concern when customers are ordering something they’ve only seen on a screen. I’ve had it happen, shit sucks.
Front and back prints were equally sharp. No mismatch, no fading, no weird texture differences.
I did a stretch test. This is something I always check because poorly treated prints crack or split early. Nine times out of ten, that shows up after a few washes and turns into a customer service nightmare. This one held up, thank the holiday gods.

Because of that, the initial packaging concern ended up being not as detrimental and more of a personal taste thing.

Next step:

I’m placing another small order, one shirt and one hoodie, before making any full promotional push or switching fulfillment services completely. No rushing. No assumptions, ya know?

I wanted to post this here because at least how discipline for dreamers at least for me, looks like:

Testing before scaling
Separating emotional reactions from actual product performance
Making decisions based on repeatable results, not first impressions
Coming to terms with your own mistakes and making the steps to grow from them.

Hope this helps someone who’s building in a similar lane and trying to avoid learning expensive lessons the hard way.

3:15

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