Merch by Amazon Print-on-demand T-shirts
Originally published Jun 2, 2022 — Mark Tilbury
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One of 3 ideas covered in this video
List t-shirt (and other apparel) designs for sale directly on Amazon through its Merch by Amazon program. There's no inventory to buy upfront: you upload a design, pick colors and a price, and Amazon prints, ships, and handles customer service, paying you a royalty per sale.
Tilbury frames this against the traditional route of pre-printing shirts in bulk (multiple colors and sizes) and hoping they sell, which risks money on stock that doesn't move. Merch by Amazon removes that risk entirely since nothing is printed until it's actually purchased, and it also gives you access to Amazon's existing customer base instead of needing to build your own audience or attend events to sell in person.
Someone with design skills (or comfortable directing AI tools to generate designs) who wants to test apparel ideas without tying up money in inventory that might not sell.
The illustration used, a friend who pre-printed thousands of shirts and could only capitalize on one design that took off, is a real anecdote but a single example, not a data set. Worth knowing separately: Amazon requires all designs to be either fully original or properly licensed, so using copyrighted characters or logos without permission isn't just against Merch by Amazon's rules, it's a real legal risk.