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About MTO123
What is MTO123?
How are you different from other customized goods companies?
What are the benefits of the "made to order" concept?
So, why have you started your business?
Manufacturing
How do you manufacture your products?
What is your returns policy?
I heard heat transfer garments tend to fade its colors. Is it true?
I noticed you have only white shirts in your gallery. Do you manufacture dark garments too?
Customer Service
How can I buy a product in MTO123.com?
What is the delivery time?
How much does this cost?
I have some blank shirt that I would like to add one of your designs (or even my own). How can you help me?
I have purchased one of your garments. How should I wash it in order to maximize its life?
Art
Where does the art from your products come from?
Which kind of art is welcome in mto123?
How should I submit my design to you?
I am an artist and I think I have nice designs and ideas. What should I do?
Which kind of compensation can we expect from submitting my designs to you?
What's in it for me in participating in mto123?
About MTO123
What is MTO123?
MTO123 is a company devoted to transform ideas into customized products by employing advanced manufacturing technology.
We are based in Shanghai and as of today we serve mostly the Shanghai market. We are expanding operations to other big cities too. If you are from outside Shanghai and you want one of our products, please get in touch with our Commercial team at com@mto123.com.
You can learn more about our mission, vision and values here.
How are you different from other customized goods companies?
We are different in many ways. Instead of focusing on the high volume, low personalization orders, we focus instead on shorter highly customized (and hence with high intrinsic value) runs. We are deep believers of uniqueness, and our company is structured to support the requirements of something unique.
Technology: we employ the most advanced printing technology, capable of running short runs (down to 1 single unit) while achieving the same quality of high volume industrial equipment. Technology enables us to give life to uniqueness without making the costs prohibitive. As you can see from our Gallery page, our costs are in line or below most apparel from regular brands.
Artists: artists are the main gear of our engine. They both create their own unique designs that will be produced in short runs and available for you or they will help you to create your own design. With our team of artists we can help you to transform a vague concept into concrete products. We are also happy to give opportunity for artists with talent to be rewarded for their products: the designers that contribute to our gallery are reward by unit sold. We want them to be part of the MTO123 concept, and they are. We help them to get out from behind their desks where they design nameless products to a multi billion dollar company and give them the opportunity of having their own line of products, with their own name on it. If you are an artist and want to contribute to MTO123, please send an email to com@mto123.com.
Sourcing: we source our products in China solely from factories that export their production according to the most stringent standards in the industry. We spend a lot of time sourcing the right products so we can get customized them for you, creating something durable, vivid and unique. We produce in China for the Chinese market, but our raw materials are international standard. Made to last, made for you.
What are the benefits of the "made to order" concept?
The benefits are numerous:
To individuals:
If you are reading this page you probably once in your life thought about this specific piece of garment with this great catchy phrase on it, or this little sticker that make people honk their horns to you in traffic, or this extra cool mouse pad that your colleagues want to have. Well, we enable you to create this. A single one of it if you want. And we make it economically viable. We make a single item if you so want. And it's affordable, more affordable than buying a branded, faceless no personality garment for a brand that you pay to advertise for.
We allow you to be yourself, and your own banner. Your own message, your own idea, your own self.
Also, our production process, differently from the ordinary production process widely used in the industry (silk screening), enables millions of colors to be printed on a garment, which makes photos to look great on garments.
In addition to all that, we can produce fast: our lead times are very short. As an example, our shirts in general are shipped out in 2 days, or, even if you prefer we can produce your product in it the same day (at a fee and for short runs only)
To companies:
Companies can benefit tremendously from customization, both internally (to their employees) or externally (to their customers and suppliers). Please click here to learn about how the MTO concept can help your company.
So, why have you started your business?
We have started this business because we are passionate about getting our message across in a creative way and enabling people to do it as well. We also are a bit tired of the sameness of the mass produced world we live in.
Innovation today is coming from companies, not individuals. That happens mostly because companies own the means of productions. We think it is time to let people decide what they want and how they want it.
Manufacturing
How do you manufacture your products?
It obviously depends on the product. Our main line (garments) is a combination of four things:
-Garment
-Design
-Inks
-Printer
As mentioned above, we only select the best garments available to imprint your ideas on. We want our products to last and hence our garments need to reflect this value. The design can come both from artists that are paid (and take a share of each shirt sold), or artist that are not paid: YOU.
As for the inks, we only use advanced, high quality long lasting inks. They are not the inks you will find in a computer store. We buy them directly from ink manufacturers.
The process we use to transfer the ink to the garment is called heat transfer. People generally think that heat transfer, as opposed to silk-screening, is not as good or does not last as long. We disagree with that and our products prove us right. With the right combination of ink, printer, and executing the heat transfer process properly; our garments easily outlast any silk screened shirt.
What is your returns policy?
If you are not satisfied with our garments, please feel free to return them to us and we will refund it to you. We of course will be very interested in learning what specifically we could improve in order to satisfy you next time, so, for every item returned we will ask for your feedback.
I heard heat transfer garments tend to fade its colors. Is it true?
No it is not true.
The heat transfer process has been used throughout the industry for generations. When inkjet printers became affordable the heat transfer paper manufacturers started producing low quality papers that could be used at home with an iron, at a low price.
This paper was suited for the inks that come with inkjet printers (called dye based inks). These inks are great for paper but they are not well suited for garments, tending to fade quickly over time and bleed the design.
So, customized heat transfer got the reputation of fading, bleeding and losing its magic. Well, if done properly, with a professional heat press (not an iron!) and the right inks, heat transferred garments can look as good or better as any other technology. It just takes the right process to make it right, and that cannot be done at home.
I noticed you have only white shirts in your gallery. Do you manufacture dark garments too?
Yes we also manufacture darks.
The technology to manufacture darks is slightly different than manufacturing light colored garments.
The printed area of our dark garments tends to have a heavier hand, with a glossy finish that looks great for pictures and complex designs.
Truth is the imprinted part of the garment is not as breathable as a clear garment would be. That doesn't prevent it from being a top notch, vivid, great garment tough.
Darks look good with pictures and big, full page graphics or one liners. Most of our designs can be also produced with dark shirts. This is an example of how one of our super cool one liners look in a black background:
Customer Service
How can I buy a product in MTO123.com?
It is pretty easy. Just click on the gallery link or click here for instruction on how to submit your design.
Once we receive your order we will confirm all its details and provide you with a time estimation of when your product will be delivered, together with all details for payment.
What is the delivery time?
The delivery time depends on a number of factors:
1-If we have the garment model and size that you ordered
2-Where you are located
3-If your order is urgent or not.
If all items are in stock we will deliver your product within 2 business days for small orders (up to five shirts). If you need an urgent order we can re-schedule our production and prioritize your order, however that will lead to increased delivery costs and an additional fee so we can coup rearrange our orders.
As soon as you place your order we will confirm the delivery date and all your details.
We collect cash on delivery (yes, we are developing credit card payment and Pay Pal too).
How much does this cost?
The prices on our shirt depend on the base garment that the design will be imprinted on and also on the size of the design and number of design items.
We produce every single garment, one by one. That's what adds the possibility of customizing each one of them. This also comes with added labor cost that directly impacts our products.
You can get an idea of our prices by browsing our gallery.
Before you move on to the next question, let me add this: the garment that you are purchasing in China is as good as any garment that you would purchase abroad in Europe or the US. The difference of purchasing it here, with your design is that 1) you don't have to pay for the profit of a retailer abroad, 2) you don't have to pay the transportation costs from China to the US and 3) you can add whatever YOU want on it.
That is what makes us believe that MTO123.COM delivers a ton of value to you and your company.
I have some blank shirt that I would like to add one of your designs (or even my own). How can you help me?
Yes, you can submit your favorite garment to us. We internally call this "t-shirt ressuscitation". A number of our staff once we started our company brought their old, comfy shirts so you could add some uniqueness in them.
For this kind of order we will deduct the price of your garment in the design that you create or choose and ship your shirt back to you.
You need however to be very descriptive about what you need in each garment.
Please contact our Operations department at ops@mto123.com for further details.
I have purchased one of your garments. How should I wash it in order to maximize its life?
Our garments use advanced manufacture techniques that assure design details will be incorporated in a great piece of garment. Not only with our garments but also with any other shirt with something imprinted on it you should:
-Wash the garment on the reverse side: this way the friction between the design and the washing machine is minimized
-Do not use bleach: bleach attacks the ink and potentially destroys the design of your garment.
-Let it dry naturally: this is the best way to minimize excessive heat in the design.
-Do not iron on top of the design: iron on the reverse side of the garment.
If you follow these guidelines your shirt should last for a long time with a solid, vivid looking design.
Art
Where does the art from your products come from?
Our art comes from different sources: photographers, calligraphists, web artists, quotes from famous people, kids drawing, and so forth.
Generally speaking ANYTHING that can be digitized and printed by a computer can be imprinted on a garment.
For professional design artists we have a strong policy of rewarding them for each shirt sold. So, we want people with talent to have access to share their talent trough garments with other people. Most of these artists are faceless heroes in big brand companies that want their own brands in each shirt. We give these heroes the opportunities of selling directly to consumers, signed with their own names.
If you have a digital camera, a funny line, quotes from your favorite author. It doesn't matter: you can put it on a garment.
We are stringent however in one aspect: we only produce goods that either we or you have the copyrights. So, it is implicit that for any design that you ask us to manufacture you have the copyrights for it.
Which kind of art is welcome in mto123?
Any. Really. Seriously. Your kids crayon drawings, your dogs footprint, digital pictures from a trip, the employee of the month name and picture, it doesn't matter.
It's up to you, really.
How should I submit my design to you?
We prefer to receive your graphics in vectorial format (Corel Draw or Adobe Illustrator) so we can manipulate them freely. You should convert all text to curves so we don't need to hunt for the font you used to manufacture your garment.
Photos should be submitted in the highest resolution and size possible. A JPG, PNG or TIFF normally does the trick.
This guarantees that the garment that you get has the quality that you expect.
Sometimes the quality of images downloaded from the net are sufficient to produce a high quality garment, so, keep that in mind too.
You can use the following shirt model as a background for your design in your vectorial program.
In case you have a photo and you would like us to add text, effects or details to it, we would be glad to do so. However, as this might be a time intensive process we will need to charge you a small hourly fee to finalize your design.
This is a template with all information we need to receive.
I am an artist and I think I have nice designs and ideas. What should I do?
Excellent. We want you to help us and we want to help you making this world less dull. Please submit some design samples to com@mto123.com
Which kind of compensation can we expect from submitting my designs to you?
We will negotiate a per garment royalty that we will pay you every month depending on how many garments were sold. This royalty will depend on our perception of the quality of your design. Please contact com@mto123.com so we can evaluate your work.
What's in it for me in participating in mto123?
Well. Sincerely speaking you are making the world a more fun, interesting and unique place to be. You are also allowing other people to know a bit more about you by being your own walking banner. You might also be supporting an artist to keep afloat and pumping whatever is in his mind out. And that is good.
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