DIY: How to Design and Sell Your Own T-Shirt Designs Online

Ever seen a t-shirt and thought ‘Wow, I could totally design something better than that!’ I have too, and I looked into designing my own t-shirts, and selling them. Of course, I was not looking into doing this full time, and going all out and ordering tons of t-shirts to print the images on myself. After all, this was just for more of a hobby, and not for some sort of huge business I wanted to start. I looked around, and found several good website that would not only allow me to sell my designs through them, but would also take care of printing and shipping for me, for a small cut they took of the t-shirt price. Awesome! So, I did some more research, and found one site that stood out about the rest, called GoodStorm.Com. I have since started selling t-shirts through them, and I’d like to show you how you can too!

First, you will need a way to draw and design using your computer, for best results. I use a Waccom Digital drawing tablet, and Adobe Photoshop Elements, a skimmed down version of the popular Photoshop. You can find good drawing tablets for a decent price on eBay, and may try the trial version of Photoshop from the Adobe website.

Next, download the templates available for free from the GoodStorm website for t-shirt designs. These are found under Main-FAQ-Design Specs, and are located at the bottom of the web page. Save these to your computer, and then open them up in Adobe Photoshop, or whatever image editing program you use.

You’ll see the GoodStorm logo, along with a bunch of transparent background. What you want to do is design your image separately, then create another layer on the template above the first, GoodStorm logo, layer. Copy and paste your new design onto this layer. What you should then see if your design layered over the GoodStorm.Com t-shirt template logo. Where ever your design is, this is where it will be on a t-shirt from GoodStorm. Feel free to move it or resize, or redraw it to work better in this size constraints. Finally, once you are happy with the image placement, go to the original, GoodStorm logo layer, delete it (leaving just your original design), make sure the background is transparent, and save the entire template file (minus the GoodStorm logo) as a .PNG, under the ‘Save for Web’ option.

Upload this design to your GoodStorm.Com account, and select it to be used for a new product. Choose what t-shirt types you would like to sell it on, what colors, and what sizes, and also upload any ‘closeup’ images you would like to use as display images for your item (usually just one). Finally, set the price you would like to mark it up by, keeping in mind that the website takes 30% of the markup for themselves. Then, complete your product information, and list it for sale! Make a catchy banner for your GoodStorm store, and start telling all your friends about it. Start making more t-shirt designs, and start selling more and more! Go for it!