What have I been up to here at Legion Events? Well, in addition to getting fired up for 2 Grand Prix in the coming months (OKC and Madison) I’ve been printing Hoodies, yo. lots of them. Magic flavored hoodies. It’s been a pretty interesting process and the learning curve is painful (expensive) but I think I’ve got the Direct To Garment Printer pretty well figured out. Let me back up a little…  Last year in talking with WotC and Sitelines (the show runner for the PT) in my capacity as the Retail Manager, we discussed making new hoodies.  We’ve had hoodies before, but they were only OK. plain grey with white colored mana symbols on them. Basic. Acceptable.  But we can do better.  Sitelines put together some designs and we got them through approval at Wotc and then it was a matter of finding someone to print them.

Printing the front of hoodies, especially going over the zipper is difficult. Lots of issues. Silk screeners don’t like to do it (results can be so varied) nor does anyone else really want to mess with it. When I started shopping the job around I must have talked to 20 different printers all who either quoted me insanely high prices (high enough that I would not be able to sell them for a profit) Or just straight out saying no (sometimes laughing while saying it). AHHHHhahahahhahahahahahaaaa. No.

So I bought a machine and did it myself. ‘Murica.

I know now why they all said Ahhhhhahahahahahahaa. No. Wow. it’s a pain in the butt. But wow. they look really cool. I’m so happy with them and so excited to see them go out into the world and it’s pretty cool knowing that there are only a few hundred total of these things and I made each one myself. So when you see someone at your local shop sporting one of these.. know first that they are incredibly rare (they will not be sold anywhere else except the pro tour, I’ve been told) and they were all printed by me in the Legion Events​/Legion Supplies​ warehouse in Minnesota. Literally with my 2 hands (well.. and a pretty fancy specialized printer and whoever made the ACTUAL hoodie we’re printing on)

But today… TODAY… all this stuff is getting thrown in boxes, tossed on a pallet, wrapped and sent to Seattle where they will join a truck load of stuff headed to Vancouver for the PT. The retail booth for the Pro Tours got some serious upgrading done at Brussels… it’s kicking up even harder for Vancouver. The space looks great. The merchandise is pretty sweet and I’m looking forward to showing off the PT playmat (which is straight up insane), the hoodies and a couple new shirt designs that are hitting the floor this show. All stuff that is PT specific and can’t be found anywhere else in the world! (so if you were thinking about popping by any of the PTs left this year Vancouver, Milwaukee or Barcelona). And keep an eye on the mother ship (wizards.com) for pics of the mats, shirts and other awesome stuff headed to the PT

Steve