Have you ever had that sudden realization that, looking around, everyone you see is a walking billboard? Your co-worker is wearing a shirt with a large “American Eagle” logo on the front, a North Face jacket isn’t the same without the logo on the shoulder, and the kids lining up for the rails in the park have huge Burton, Rome, and Oakley logos on anything and everything. Somehow, being fashionable and wearing a huge version of a some clothing company’s logo are synonymous. That same company pays $50,000 to advertise to put their mark on magazine pages but they charges the magazine readers $50 each to put that same image on their chest.

The point that I am trying to get at is all those people that are wearing your shirts, hoodies, coats, etc. are advertising for your resort. If your shirt is well designed, that mark can become is a cool thing to wear. Over the holiday a few ideas and observations kept coming back to me about this phenomenon and perhaps a few crossovers into resort marketing. Nothing groundbreaking, but a few ideas to start the week.

Your Logo is Cool
I see a lot of “cutesy” resort shirts and merchandise out there. It takes you a second to sort through the clever patterns and fonts to realize what the shirt is even for. That is great and all, but check out Burton’s hoodie selection. See a pattern? All but 1 or 2 are simply a stylized version of a 10″ x 10″ Burton logo. Their best selling t-shirts follow the same pattern. Don’t be afraid to use your logo as the design for your merch.

The Discount Shirt
What if you could drive merchandise sales, branding, and skier visits simultaneously? Why not sell a line of 4-5 shirts (so not everyone is wearing the same thing) that have your logo stylishly over-sized thereon, and designate them as “discount shirts”. Wear this shirt to the ticket window and get a X% off lift ticket on randomly chosen days. Schedule the alerts (email or text) to encourage wearing the shirt the rest of the day too.

T Shirts Are Valuable
In the never ending search for cool, Social Media giveaways, don’t overlook the lowly t-shirt. There is a reason fans at sporting events go crazy to catch shirts thrown by cheerleaders into the stands. Shirts are fun to win. So, whether you need an extra item to bundle with your season pass sales, a giveaway for a contest, or a reward for completing a series of ski lessons, don’t forget about the influencing power of our friend the t-shirt.

And while you aren’t forgetting about him, don’t forget about tall t’s. These ginormous versions of normal shirts may look like they belong on Shaq’s back, but to the thug-influenced box/rail riding crew, tall t’s are a must for their wardrobe.

In my searching, I didn’t really find any resorts that made merchanidise sales an active part of their marketing strategy. If you know of any that do, or if your’s does, let me know, I’d love to see how it’s being done.

About Gregg & SlopeFillers
I've had more first-time visitors lately, so adding a quick "about" section. I started SlopeFillers in 2010 with the simple goal of sharing great resort marketing strategies. Today I run marketing for resort ecommerce and CRM provider Inntopia, my home mountain is the lovely Nordic Valley, and my favorite marketing campaign remains the Ski Utah TV show that sold me on skiing as a kid in the 90s.