Travel club kits

[Anonymous]

A friend of mine owns a soccer uniform supply company, and a couple of my kids have worked for him as summer jobs pressing/making up uniforms.

Basically the uniform supplier gets the backpacks, uniforms and socks in blank. Everything that is on the uniform other than a stripe is something they press on. So, that's numbers, league insignia, and team insignia typically. You could get a name pressed on if the jersey was big enough -- and some are not really big enough for a number when you are talking u8s and u9s -- but it would cost you -- probably in the ballpark of an extra $50. Why so much? Because if you screw it up -- they have to toss the whole jersey. There's no repair possible. If they are into the jersey for say $40, then throwing away a messed up jersey with team and league insignia means they would be throwing out about $80. They probably end up scrapping 5% of the jerseys anyway and they use pretty sophisticated pressing processes. But, if something gets a wrinkle -- out it goes.

[Anonymous]

Some parents get weirded out about their kids name on jerseys and backpacks. I personally think its cool and ups the kids swag level some.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Other than the manufacturer, I don't recall seeing any.

But while we are in the subject, I can bitch about soccer kits? What a freakin' scam. I am so over it. Based on my experience, every club "requires" new kits every two years. When kids are younger, I guess it makes sense because the kids probably outgrow the uniforms. The absolute worst, though, is when your kid joins a club in the second year of uniform rotation (as mine did last year), and then has to buy all new uniforms the next year. I wish that clubs would give families a choice this year. I don't feel like spending hundreds of dollars for kids my kids won't wear for the second year in a row!

Another huge annoyance is when a club changes sponsors altogether. So you know those extra Adidas socks you bought so that your kid would always have a new pair? Now your kid isn't even allowed to wear them to practice.

And don't even get me started on the "required" backpacks. I look in our garage and feel ill when I think about the food and necessities for families in need I could have purchased instead of so many $65 backpacks.

OK. Thanks for letting me vent.

No club I have ever known ever enforced the backpack. Just get one that is the same color.

I've been doing this for a while. Some, but not all, have the online ordering system prepopulated with "mandatory items" so you can't get past it.

Even when there is a list of mandatory items you're not forced to order everything on the list.

soccer.com makes you actually put the items in your cart- try to check out with a partial and you get an error. You can delete items from the cart though - it's just not obvious

I think that may be a setting between your club and soccer.com. Ours has all the required items listed but you can certainly check out without buying them all. Never received an error message.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some parents get weirded out about their kids name on jerseys and backpacks. I personally think its cool and ups the kids swag level some.

The best one of these that I ever saw though was a little kid baseball team -- the Pirates, and the kids had Pirate names on their jerseys, i.e. "Blackbeard" etc. . . It was great.