A few years back, we had a customer in Seattle who needed 80 dozen organic cotton t-shirts printed for a trade show. The order was placed on a Tuesday, and needed to be at the event in Seattle on Friday. Rush orders are nothing new for us, but we knew we had to act quickly in order to meet their deadline.

We sprung into action immediately. The t-shirts were purchased locally and received in our print facility the following morning.Luckily, we had a space in our production schedule to accommodate the order. As soon as the shirts arrived we put them into production. The order was printed, packed and ready for shipment within hours. We shipped 15 boxes to Seattle via UPS 2-day service for on time delivery at the event. Another happy customer. Another success!

Or was it?

At the end of the business day, I was in my office having a conversation with our production manager to go over the schedule for the rest of the week. When we finished our business he said to me, "there has to be a better way".

"A better way to do what"? I said.

He continued, "do you realize how much it cost to ship that order to Seattle via 2-day service? It was a small fortune! All the boxes. All the jet fuel. The carbon footprint for 500 lbs. traveling 2,500 miles on a jet must be enormous! What if there was a way to eliminate the 2,500 mile t-shirt"?

"Go on", I said.

"We'll, I've been thinking. What if we ordered the blank shirts from a warehouse in Seattle, had them printed in Seattle and delivered to the event in Seattle. Imagine what could be saved by keeping it local all the way through. It saves time. It saves jet fuel. Simple".

"What about quality control", I said? "How can we keep an eye on the order if we're here in Atlanta and it's being produced in Seattle"?

"That's not so simple", he said. "It's going to take some time, but what we need to do is develop a trusted network of print and embroidery contractors. One by one, city by city, we'll reach out and find the best contractors in each city to ensure the highest product quality while maintaining our production standards andenvironmental integrity".

I knew it wouldn't be easy, but we were motivated to make a change and lead the industry in a new direction.

The following morning when we got to the office, we went to work. One by one, we did our research to find the best of the best in each city. It's taken a lot of time and effort, but now we're pleased to offer the most comprehensive network of print and embroidery contractors in the industry. We have partners in every major and mid-size market in the United States who are specially trained in eco-friendly screen print and embroidery techniques and practices. Chances are, there's one in your neighborhood too.

Through our efforts we've been able to cut our delivery times on average by more than 50%. Even more impressively, we've cut our carbon footprint by a factor of 40, and completely eliminated the 2,500 mile t-shirt.