Shirt.Woot

So I made a bold prediction about woot's pick last week and was wrong, but I'm happy to say I was right. Even I didn't think I...GOT...IT! would sell that poorly though. Who knows if R'lyeh Style would have done any better, but I think it would have done better than 900 and change.

I only really mention it because it seems like that was the kind of shirt aimed at people like me, but it's not something I would ever buy. It's just too generic and derivative of the same stuff that drove a lot of the diversity away. It seems like woot is kind of in a rut because they can't seem to decide if they want to move in a new direction or stay where they were and as such they aren't pleasing anyone very well (unless you're just here for pop culture and nerd jokes).

Anyway, on to this week. I was deciding between two or three, but it came down to this one because I'd actually buy it:

Recycled Robot by jasneko


This one is sort of a punt because I didn't see anything I really liked or truly impressed me this go around, but I'm still sad about missing out on the forgotten radio from the previous derby.

However, this design is good in its own right. I love the whimsy and uniqueness of the character. I also really like the colors. Not too many grass shirts out there and not too many that actually complement the color with the design. This one does it nicely.

Not much going on with the placement, but I don't think there needs to be. It's just a simple nice design. Cleanly executed with all the things it needs and nothing it doesn't.

edit:

I thought it would be interesting to go back and see who I had picked over the course of the last few months just to get a picture of who I thought was doing good work at the time. Overall fairly varied, but some repeats. I'll probably keep a running tally from here on out.

jasneko: 2
truffleshuffle: 2
Josephus: 2
odysseyroc/rglee: 1
Radscoolian: 1
plainyoghurt: 1
qetza: 1
wirdou: 1
daledreams:1
ste7venl: 1
Ike Motta/Tobe Fonseca: 1

most of the ones I like seem to be on yellow, and would make my dark circles more pronounced, so blue wins the G winds up looking like a snake and with one apple else where it is a bit distracting. But I think it is subtle enough, most just have the symbol and I don't like wearing statement shirts.

mrwednesday wrote:So I made a bold prediction about woot's pick last week and was wrong, but I'm happy to say I was right. Even I didn't think I...GOT...IT! would sell that poorly though. Who knows if R'lyeh Style would have done any better, but I think it would have done better than 900 and change.
I only really mention it because it seems like that was the kind of shirt aimed at people like me, but it's not something I would ever buy. It's just too generic and derivative of the same stuff that drove a lot of the diversity away.

I disagree. Woot picked what was #3 in vote counts. The problem is that for this, as with many Spens entries, people vote because it's so well executed, but in the end it's not really something with broad enough appeal to drive up sales numbers. As a contrast, Monster Cookie sold twice as many at 1880 and Pocket Monster (second in votes) sold 1229. I suspect R'lyeh style would have fared much much worse.

It seems like woot is kind of in a rut because they can't seem to decide if they want to move in a new direction or stay where they were and as such they aren't pleasing anyone very well (unless you're just here for pop culture and nerd jokes).

I agree, the Woot voter/buyer demographic is in flux. Most of the dedicated have left and the new folks don't know/don't care about the derby or anything really past "check the shirt of the day, buy or buy not"

On to my PotW:
I agree mostly with Mr. Wednesday and Blanked in that this is a punt, and I'm not a fan of message shirts. To that end, I would pick ApeLad's "Recycle What you Eat"

It's well drawn and tells a decent joke using the recycle symbol instead of text, cleverly avoiding the no-text rule as well as the "recycle" preachery.

Tough week. I too am not a fan of preachy message shirts, so that eliminates a lot of them right off.

I think kharmazero's recent offerings have been really nice--I'm not a fan of the huge, swirly designs, but this week's re-cyclist is clean and whimsical. I'd ADORE it without the rider, but as is, it's the only one that really elicited a positive response that wasn't crushed by some trivial association after a closer look.


My counts (I didn't participate in all weeks):
Artrocity 1
Artulo 2
benjaminleebates 1
cjleines 1
jasneko 1
Josephus 1
orabbit 1
WarholBot 2

Mavyn wrote:Tough week. I too am not a fan of preachy message shirts, so that eliminates a lot of them right off.

I think kharmazero's recent offerings have been really nice--I'm not a fan of the huge, swirly designs, but this week's re-cyclist is clean and whimsical. I'd ADORE it without the rider, but as is, it's the only one that really elicited a positive response that wasn't crushed by some trivial association after a closer look.
http://d3gqasl9vmjfd8.cloudfront.net/f32eb3f8-10e9-4a75-a19f-3c17d5d43219.jpg

Well said on all counts.

j5 wrote:I disagree. Woot picked what was #3 in vote counts. The problem is that for this, as with many Spens entries, people vote because it's so well executed, but in the end it's not really something with broad enough appeal to drive up sales numbers. As a contrast, Monster Cookie sold twice as many at 1880 and Pocket Monster (second in votes) sold 1229. I suspect R'lyeh style would have fared much much worse.

But I don't think you've said anything that supports your assertion. In fact quite the opposite and that was my original point. Speaking strictly of sales there was nothing in the fog other than The Cookie Monster that was going to sell. That's been bourne out by the sales so far. Trying to say anything with fewer votes would sell worse is just not logical. We already know votes don't really have much to do with sales and especially now with so few voters and many who are completely divested from the average buyer it's even more true.

It's a little surprising the extent to which the woot's and Travis' picks didn't sell, but it's completely unsurprising that they didn't. If they continue to only pick out of the fog (for anything but pop culture) they are going to get low performers unless they take appeal into account, and right now there's no appeal to the style patrick has been using unless it's a simpler design with an anthropomorphic animal in it.

mrwednesday wrote:But I don't think you've said anything that supports your assertion. In fact quite the opposite and that was my original point. Speaking strictly of sales there was nothing in the fog other than The Cookie Monster that was going to sell. That's been bourne out by the sales so far. Trying to say anything with fewer votes would sell worse is just not logical. We already know votes don't really have much to do with sales and especially now with so few voters and many who are completely divested from the average buyer it's even more true.

It's a little surprising the extent to which the woot's and Travis' picks didn't sell, but it's completely unsurprising that they didn't. If they continue to only pick out of the fog (for anything but pop culture) they are going to get low performers unless they take appeal into account, and right now there's no appeal to the style patrick has been using unless it's a simpler design with an anthropomorphic animal in it.

With all due respect to helgram, I think 900+ sales of R'lyeh Style would have been tough.

You're banking on a purchaser who likes BOTH Cthulhu and Gangnam Style, and likes them both enough to buy a shirt featuring the two combined. And then that purchaser needs to be comfortable wearing an image of a winged dude dancing (for those viewers who don't get the references). That's a pretty narrow demographic.

And at the end of the day, there's no real hook or pun tying the character to the meme. They've simply been combined.

mrwednesday wrote:But I don't think you've said anything that supports your assertion. In fact quite the opposite and that was my original point. Speaking strictly of sales there was nothing in the fog other than The Cookie Monster that was going to sell. That's been bourne out by the sales so far. Trying to say anything with fewer votes would sell worse is just not logical. We already know votes don't really have much to do with sales and especially now with so few voters and many who are completely divested from the average buyer it's even more true.

Saying votes don't have anything to do with sales is a bit disingenuous. We've established that votes don't guarantee sales rank, but at a certain threshold, they absolutely predict sales performance. In this example, Spens' entry,with a vote count of 356, was 144 votes from second and 235 votes from first . I'd say it did quite well to get 900 sales.

kevlar51 wrote:With all due respect to helgram, I think 900+ sales of R'lyeh Style would have been tough.

You're banking on a purchaser who likes BOTH Cthulhu and Gangnam Style, and likes them both enough to buy a shirt featuring the two combined. And then that purchaser needs to be comfortable wearing an image of a winged dude dancing (for those viewers who don't get the references). That's a pretty narrow demographic.

And at the end of the day, there's no real hook or pun tying the character to the meme. They've simply been combined.

I'm not saying it's a guarantee, but sales wouldn't have been worse than 900 either. Also, I don't really think it needs fans of both. Ript and Teefury exist almost entirely on mashups at this point so they can hit as many fan bases as possible with a single shirt. You're more likely to target both fanbases (though I agree the Cthulhu fans would be a bit more snobbish). I think we had more than enough data to know that patrick's robot wouldn't sell well. I don't think it follows that everything would automatically sell worse.

I'm fully aware that I could be completely wrong, but like I said there's no way to test that unless it manages to get a EC. What I'm saying is that nothing brought up so far is actually legitimate evidence that I would be, and I think it would behoove woot and the editors to break out of this idea that the votes somehow mean anything, especially now.

What happened to posting "guest editor" pics?

Frankly I'm disappointed at how many entries this week shoehorned in the recycle arrows. Yes, it's a requirement of the Derby that they're in the design, but so many entries simply slapped it on because they were required to do so and not because it made any sense. I'm not talking just unknown or inexperienced artists, either. Jasneko's robot, which I adore, would not be impacted at all if the arrows were removed. Same with Radscoolian's critters and their iPod. I'm also not a big fan of the "make the arrows the focus of the design" approach either, as seen in Patrick's and Ramy's fogged entries (although Paxdomino's effort works pretty well).

So for a message derby, there are only a handful of entries I really like. My favorite is a surprising late entry from Spiritgreen, After the Party. It's funny, well-drawn, and the arrows are a big part of the joke. My only gripe is the shirt color, of which I have so many examples already.

citizencoyote wrote:So for a message derby, there are only a handful of entries I really like. My favorite is a surprising late entry from Spiritgreen, After the Party. It's funny, well-drawn, and the arrows are a big part of the joke. My only gripe is the shirt color, of which I have so many examples already.

Yeah, that came in after I posted. There is no need to pick it however, because it will likely take first place. If it does, it should usurp tJost as the latest entry to print.

j5 wrote:Yeah, that came in after I posted. There is no need to pick it however, because it will likely take first place. If it does, it should usurp tJost as the latest entry to print.

I was not surprised that you were right. But sub 350 votes for the winner? Ouch.

blanked wrote:I was not surprised that you were right. But sub 350 votes for the winner? Ouch.

It would have had far more had it come in earlier. The derby theme was quite weak this go. People don't like "message/preachy" and Spirit got around that brilliantly.

j5 wrote:It would have had far more had it come in earlier. The derby theme was quite weak this go. People don't like "message/preachy" and Spirit got around that brilliantly.

Thanks j5!

When I read your post yesterday that you thought it'd place first, I thought you were crazy. I'm still a little flabbergasted that it actually happened. Honestly, at best, I was hoping for an HM.