What's the Deal With Sum It Up T-Shirts?
Self-portrait of boy wearing Sum It Up shirt.
Poster Children
Everyone knows that kids are always trying to fit in. T-shirts, like a team uniform, allow children to feel like they’re part of something bigger than themselves and gives others a glimpse of their identity and individual style. At Sum It Up Lacrosse, we’ve always invested a lot of our marketing resources into designing unique, eye-grabbing t-shirts for every season. Why? Simply because we know the kids adore them and, from experience, we know they'll end up wearing the shirts around town, in school and at sporting practices and events. The children literally become walking "poster girls and boys" for our organization.
A Shirt for Every Season
Lacrosse Boy Wearing Tie-Dye Shirt
Our brilliant graphic designer, Deb Trisler of Trisler Design, always comes up with clever ways to incorporate a lacrosse theme into the artwork she produces. Using bold colors and vivid designs that speak to the K-8th grade set, she never fails to generate smiles. It’s no easy task to come up with three or four creative designs per year, especially for someone who, until she started partnering with us six years ago, had never laid eyes on a real lacrosse stick. (Deb used to refer to the sticks as “racquets!")
Not for Sale
Lacrosse Girl Tie-Dye Shirt
The t-shirts we produce are not for sale. Instead, kids can only receive a complimentary shirt for attending a specific camp or clinic. This gives the shirts a certain cache, especially since their friends won't be able go out and buy one themselves. In fact, veteran Sum It Up participants often collect the t-shirts despite the fact they sometimes outgrow them before they outgrow the program. A tight-fitting shirt doesn't stop the kids from sporting their favorite designs from a previous camp or clinic as a badge of their longevity with Sum It Up.
Here's proof: a good friend of mine from Summit runs a quilt-making business, ML Tees, that creates keepsake quilts using a child’s favorite t-shirts. Apparently, well-worn, well-loved Sum It Up shirts are among the most common image incorporated into her quilt designs!So back to our original question: "What’s the deal with Sum It Up's t-shirts?" We think the answer lies in the fact that t-shirts are one colorful piece of the puzzle that kids create to show the world who they are and what they love.
