You gotta be kidding! The Colorado Rockies had to win, like, 20 out of 21 games to even get a one-game playoff to try and qualify for the MLB’s National League Wild Card position. But wouldn’t you know it? They were the hottest team in baseball and won that game, then blew through the division series in three games and were in the National League Championship Series before we Denverites could even blink. All the Rocks had to do was win four more games to make it to the 2007 fall classic known as the World Series. . . .

Hot-market battle cry

Wow! What an exciting time. Sounded like hot-market time to us. And it was. We received the call from one of the MLB license holders just as did everyone else in Denver with an automatic press: “If the Rockies win we need you to print like crazy for as long as you can!”

That’s the hot-market battle cry. It’s absolute chaos, usually. And when the license holder leaves with his shirts it sometimes feels like you didn’t even get a goodbye kiss. Still, it’s a quick couple of bucks and the excitement is worth every bit of blood, sweat and tears poured out. Because we are more of an R&D-type operation these days, in support of outside consulting, we declined the hot-market call this time around. We were probably the only automatic shop in Colorado who did not sign the contract . . . but that didn’t mean we weren’t going to participate! We always have and probably always will. In a sports town such as Denver, with all the pro sports teams, we’ve been printing the hot-market scene for the last 20-something years from the Broncos’ Super Bowl appearances to the Avalanche’s Stanley Cup wins and everything in between.

This time around, though, we’d help out our industry brother—Goodbye Blue Monday—up in Boulder. They too have been here for all the hot-market opportunities over the years, being about the largest screen printer in the region now. In fact, we’ve done consulting work for them in years past and Don is now the “art mechanic” there. Bob Haney owns the place and is great people, so the relationship was solid.

Pre-press concerns

We generally receive a set of films and samples of the shirts a few days before the event for hot-market printing. We’ve learned to ask for a digital file of the separations for obvious reasons of security and backup, but also to enable us to make a few subtle changes to the art and seps for our own production purposes. In this case, we choked the white printer just a touch and added some gutters between the colors that would sit on that underbase. We also removed the white printer from under the metallic silver. The changes did not affect the look of the image but would enable us to run faster without needing to wipe screens quite as much. The final print would also be much cleaner and sharper. We output our film and went to screen and ink.

The ink was fairly straightforward. Only one specialty mix—Rockies Purple. We had to match an exact PMS color. We first mixed a quart, then a gallon and, finally, fives at a time; we started small just in case we couldn’t get the color match exactly right. The other colors were the underbase white printer and a highlight white in which we used a nice, smooth, short, “cotton” white, then a metallic silver to round out the four-color image on black.

The white printer was exposed on 156-tpi for maximum coverage without compromising the hand. The purple and highlight white we put on 230s for minimum ink deposit on the underbase, and the silver we burned on a 110 to allow the metallic flakes to travel through the screen mesh openings, and for a good ink deposit.

Into production

Set-up was straightforward as this image was vector-based and quite graphic, to be printed on black 100 percent cotton T-shirts. We started with our white printer and flashed it, followed by an empty cool station. We printed the purple followed by the highlight white and flashed again to keep the white very white. Finally, after another cool station, we printed the metallic silver.

Because of the urgency of the project we went with 60/90/60 triple-ply sharpened squeegees—soft edges with a stiff backing—for maximum ink coverage and speed. Floods were standard and quick as well. By Friday night the garments had arrived and the presses had been set up and test printed. All was ready to go. It’s up to the Rockies now. . . .

They quickly went up two games to none and the MLB license holder asked for a commitment from the good folks at Goodbye Blue Monday for approximately 20,000 shirts in about 15 hours. This would put product into stores just in time for the morning rush after the fourth win in the Series. With the plant’s four presses, this would be slightly more that 300 an hour so should be no sweat. When the Rockies went up three games to none the license holder asked for at least 25,000 in those same 15 hours and took a calculated risk by asking us to begin production Monday morning—before game four. We could make that happen too.

Hot-market printing has a bit of a circus atmosphere all its own. Without the adrenaline this atmosphere gets pumping, workers usually cannot go as long or as hard as necessary to pull off this type of operation. The folks at Goodbye came in Monday fired up, which was perfect. We got the presses up and running right out of the gate while the supporting cast prepped additional shirts, built back-up sets of screens and mixed additional ink. It took additional staff to do the fulfillment part of the project, though this is sometimes overlooked. Not here. We had staff ready to catch, apply the official World Series hologram sticker, stack, prepack in a 2-2-4-4 (S-M-L-XL), two dozen per box, and fulfill individual orders.

Not a bad run

All seemed to be going well as the dryer belts were full of black Ts. We did have one press go down for a couple of hours, but were able to get it up and going after some troubleshooting and manufacturer phone support. The Rockies went on to win game four that Monday night and retailers were able to hit the market immediately, which drove sales even higher than is typical or expected. The Rockies were in the World Series for the first time in franchise history.

In the end, Goodbye Blue Monday was able to get somewhere around 35,000 shirts into the marketplace and did not stop printing for 24 straight hours. But that was only a fraction of the total hot-market Rockies shirts printed in the region. (A word of caution: While such a hot market only lasts a few days, during that time you must be careful not to compromise your existing customer base.)

As everybody knows by now, turned out to be a Rox and Sox World Series. Nearly all of the automatics in Denver prepared for round-two . . . but were disappointed as the Cinderella Colorado Rockies met the mighty Red Sox and fell themselves in four straight. Oh, well, no