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Team England tracksuits for dance world cup 2018

Designs Alike create the UK Teams kit for the Dance World Cup 2018

Early 2018, for the third year running, I designed the kit for Teams England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland competing in the Dance World Cup…the largest dance competition in the world. DWC 2018 took place in Sitges, Spain. In just 3 years we have seen the number of participating countries increase from 33 to 46 and the number of dancers rocket from 3037 to 5841. The UK teams have grown year on year so that’s an awful lot of tracksuits!

Team England tracksuits for dance world cup

Dancers from Jelli Studios proudly showing off their new England kit

Each year I meet with Jo, the Team Manager and, over a cup of tea and a piece of cake in the John Lewis café, we discuss colours and ideas, before I go back to the office to come up with some bespoke designs for the Teams. Jo likes all of the dancers to have the same style of tracksuit but it’s important that each country can be distinguished so the relevant flag is always on the jacket somewhere! Last year we wanted the flags to really stand out so I designed the garments around them and ended up with these stunning tracksuits, crop tops and shorts.

Team Wales dancers in their team tracksuits

Some of the dancers from Team Wales flying the Dragon

Dance World Cup tracksuits

The tracksuits designs were created around the country’s flag

Team Scotland tracksuit Dance world cup

Each dancer is so proud to be representing their country

All dancers who qualify for the Dance World Cup work so hard to achieve their dream and so there is no wonder that they are proud to wear the team tracksuit bearing their country’s flag.

Christmas Greetings!

Our festive Christmas window

Our festive Christmas window

It’s been a very busy year for us here at Designs Alike. It started with another great success exhibiting at Move It Dance Extravaganza at London Olympia where we had loads of new enquiries for our made to order dance clothing. We booked again straight away for 2016 and are looking forward to another fantastic show.

Our swimming T-bag tops are still very popular and we picked up loads of new swimming clubs this year and are now proud suppliers to several large clubs such as Stanway Swimming Club and Wolverhampton  Swimming Club for whom we designed a complete new club kit. We’ve been selling our made to order onesies to lots of swimming clubs this year too so many early morning swimmers will be arriving at the pool warm and cosy ready for training!

One of our regular customers, Sparkle Dance & Fitness asked us to help with designing costumes for their show and subsequently put in a huge order for sequin skirts, Irish dance dresses and cheerleading tops. Their show went well and hopefully we’ll be able to supply their costumes for next year!!

We’re very excited about Dance World Cup 2016 as we’ve been chosen to manufacture the tracksuits for Teams England, Scotland and Wales. Designs are done and we’ll be gearing up in January to start the 500 or so tracksuits ready for April…it’s going to be a busy start to the year!

Well, we only have a couple of days left before we close for Christmas festivities. The Designs Alike team have worked extremely hard all year, and particularly over the last few weeks when we had over 200 onesies to make so they are all looking forward to a well deserved rest! We would like to thank all of our customers for their orders and support throughout 2015 and wish everyone a Very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Are you HOLIDAY ready?

Do you want to be the only group of holiday makers on the continent this summer not sporting some super witty custom t-shirts? You can already picture it. Kicking yourselves at the airport because you forgot to get in touch with us over at Designs A Like and now you are the blandest group in the departures lounge. It is not a good start to the holiday is it? And the really sad thing is that it is so avoidable.

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In all seriousness though, custom t-shirts are a necessity for your summer holiday. Somebody will get lost at some point; whether it’s at the airport or on the beach, it’s much easier to spot your group if they are all wearing the same printed t-shirts. For this reason we recommend printing on to bright t-shirts, preferably pink or orange as both of these colours will accentuate your glowing tan. It is also pretty much a given to print the name of the t-shirt wearer on the back so that the locals will know how to approach you and ask for your number!

GUESS WHAT!

It’s that time again.. get your orders in for your Official Football Merchandise!

10% off for the rest of the month!

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The Power of the Promo Shirt

Here at Designs Alike we are lucky enough to meet lots of inspiring, successful entrepreneurs everyday. And one thing that is consistent with all of them: they know the power of the Promotional T-shirt!

Whether you notice it or not, Promo Tees are everywhere you go – at that cool music festival you were at last weekend, at the gym, when you’re out to eat… you get the point. But I bet you’ve never actually taken the time to sit and think about the impact they truly have. You may think by investing you’re just making your workplace look more professionally coordinated, but you’re also gaining endless free advertising!

Having staff members strutting their stuff in branded t-shirts is a great way to improve business awareness. Many businesses even choose to give away promotional items as freebies. This might sound like an expensive plan but actually, with us, you’ll be able to get your hands on top brands like Fruit of the Loom, Gildan and Kustom Kit and have your garments branded with your company name and logo all for a fraction of the price you’d find elsewhere. There’s really no question, it’s a great way to keep your business and pocket happy.

Still not sure? Just think, a billboard is a great marketing choice but it costs hundreds of pounds and never moves. Spend half the dosh on promotional t-shirts, and essentially what you get is dozens of walking billboards, spreading your brand name far and wide!

Here’s some brands you might recognise who were some of the first to benefit from the Promo Shirt magic..

Coca-Cola

Coke could easily have been one of the first companies to turn their brand into t-shirts and people into walking billboards. Their t-shirts are some of the most widespread t-shirts in the world.

cocacola

Jack Daniels

Coca-cola may have been the first but Jack Daniels definitely helped keep it cool.

jackdan

I <3 NY

Possibly the highest selling promotional T-shirt of all time – and other cities are finally ready to catch on!

iheart

A Merry Christmas to All!!

Well Christmas is almost upon us and all of us here at Designs Alike will soon be able to enjoy a well earned break. We have been making loads of tracksuits, dance stuff and hoodies but by far the most popular garment this year has been the onesies…we’ve made hundreds in the last few weeks!! In fact, the onesie has really taken off for us and we now supply them to dance schools, gym clubs and swimming clubs (yes, apparently the onesies arreboing worn to and from the pool by those swimmers who have to go out early in the morning to train!)

We experienced huge numbers of orders prior to our cut off for Christmas deadline and the team have been working amazingly hard to get them completed. Despite problems with sickness due to a bug going round and also some of our printing machinery breaking down we’ve managed to get nearly all of the orders out on time. Fortunately a couple of customers were very understanding and have agreed to take their delivery in early January so a big thank you to them!

My biggest thank you goes out to my team who have worked extra hours, taken work home, come in despite feeling rotten and throughout all this have remained up beat and positive.  I really appreciate all of their hard work and support…Designs Alike wouldn’t be the same without them!!

So, to all of our customers and to my amazing team I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!

 

                                                       christmas window

Christmas Jumpers

Get the Christmas spirit off to a fun start! We love our range of festive jumpers, all available at £20.00 each. Available in sizes S-2XL.

Stocks are limited so call us now to order your favourite jumper!

Grab yourselves a bargain!!

As the weather is getting better we thought it would be a good idea to offer some bargain prices for T-shirts and other lightweight garments in preparation for the heat-wave we are supposedly going to have!! Here’s some great prices on our most popular garments.

special offer polo shirts and workwear