Pride In Print entrant, The Print Room, has used its lockdown time to raise funds for Women’s Refuge. The company placed Dr Ashley Bloomfield’s image on tote bags and t-shirts, selling them through its website and Facebook page.
The Director General of Health’s popularity has seen the Dunedin print company, fulfilling thousands of orders. It teamed up with Dunedin design and web development agency The Bold to produce the bags and shirts. The merchandise has flown out the door for the Pride In Print entrant.
The t-shirts and tote bags feature Dr Bloomfield’s image above the heading ‘The Curve Crusher’. So far, sales here, the UK, Australia and the US have raised more than $140,000 for Women’s Refuge.
The fundraiser came out of a campaign The Print Room initially set-up to offer printed garments at a discounted rate to businesses, creative studios and charities to help them generate funds over the lockdown period.
Chris Brun and Jon Thom run The Print Room. Thom says, “This is by far the biggest single run we have ever done. It began as a fundraiser for businesses affected by Covid-19 mid-April, where we offered a range of products at a discounted rate and helped them create their designs to sell.
“They could put their products on our website, and we would produce and despatch them and the business would get the profit. We initially emailed our customers and shared the campaign on our social media. We have about 70 businesses involved.”
The Print Room has provided its time, expertise and despatch capacity at a discounted rate. It pulled in family and friends to help shift orders of more than 9500 units. The t-shirts sell for $35 and tote bags for $20 and orders keep on coming.
In another fundraiser, The Print Room donated its expertise printing Dick Frizzell-designed Kia Kaha Christchurch t-shirts. This raised over $40,000 for the families of the Christchurch mosque victims. The company has entered that t-shirt in this year’s Pride In Print awards.
The Print Room has already achieved success at the Pride In Print Awards. Last year, from five entries, it won three golds and two highly commended awards. This year, it has doubled its entries.
Thom and Brun see Pride In Print as a vehicle to promote the importance of print in the world. years, Thom says, “We switched to water-based inks about three years ago. We had known about the awards for some years, but we wanted to get that expertise under our belt before entering the competition.
