Getting paid to wear shirts

Jason Sadler isn't anyone special. (His words, not mine.) But his new project, I Wear Your Shirt, is something out of the ordinary.

The premise is simple: Companies pay him to wear their T-shirts. Sadler, 26, will don a different shirt every day next year, promoting a variety of companies, from Web start-ups to online clothing stores. (Friends and family have also purchased a few days, so who knows what kinds of get-ups they'll spring on him.)

The price for New Year's Day is $1. Each day after that is a dollar more, ending on December 31 at $365. At the end of the year, providing he finds takers for every day (he's already sold about 40%), he'll have racked up $66,795. "Not bad for just wearing shirts all year," Sadler said.

Of course, there's more to it than that. Sadler, co-owner of a Web design company, will blog, take photos and shoot video of himself on the beach, around his city of Jacksonville, Fla., and traveling the world. He'll spend the rest of his time leveraging a variety of social media tools, like Twitter and YouTube, to get the word out.

"The number [$66,795] is definitely big when you first think about it," Sadler says. "But I'm working on this thing all day long."

He estimates he's putting in anywhere from 10 to 12 hours per day on the website. Factor in zero vacation days and all the flack he's going to get from his girlfriend -- ever tried showing up to a nice restaurant in a T-shirt? -- and it might not be that sweet of a deal.

But the idea was attractive enough to spur a competitor. Jenae Plymale and her father, George, launched Girl in Your Shirt last month, and have already begun releasing episodes.

Plymale, 20, records herself, wearing ...

... branded shirts and discussing the products, five days per week. Like Sadler, she wears the shirt all day long, although right now, she doesn't plan to travel much.

The website launched to much fanfare, thanks to a blog post by TechCrunch's Michael Arrington. Since then, Girl in Your Shirt has upped its prices, from a $75 introductory rate to $199. The Plymales are now in the process of building an online video network based around the concept at inYourShirt.tv. Next up is In Your Band Shirt, a similar website but for musicians.

The "Wear your T-shirt" craze is one of those "Why didn't I think of that?" ideas that's taking off faster than a sweatshirt in the summertime.

-- Mark Milian

Photo: Jason Sadler. Credit: I Wear Your Shirt

Comments

[Kevin Scotch]

I feel the need to point out a few facts to make this article more objective.

I had seen I Wear Your Shirt when it first came out, and it had no prices, only bidding, and no calendar. All he was proposing to do was wear the shirt, take pictures, and blog. He never proposed to shoot video, or leverage via social network.

It wasn't until after Girl In Your Shirt vastly improved upon his business model, that he followed suit in adding video, and ustream.

Video, which makes the model so interesting was not conceived by Sadler.

I feel that these details give a much more accurate picture of this story.

As for the network, I can't wait to see what new things they come up with.

[Aaron Claytor]

now that i've red kevins post, i think i agree

[John Montgomery]

I think both ideas are pretty creative and made me say "why didn't I think of that?"

Just for reference, I checked out the guy's blog and if you read his first blog post he mentions a calendar and video way before her site was ever up: http://iwearyourshirt.com/blog/2008/10/20/hello-world/

However, it does seem she got her calendar up and running first, but the calendars tell the story of who has had more initial success - 140+ days to the guy versus 40+ days for the girl

Kudos and good luck to both of them!

[Ronald Humphries]

There's also http://guyinyourpants.com, which is more of a parody site, but does the same thing.

[Abe Namers]

I have been following both of these sites since it became a competition and considering using one if not both of them to advertise with. A few things I would like to point out though. Iwearyourshirt.com was hardly a blip on twitter or the web until girlinyourshirt.com came around, with very few followers after Girl launched he rode the wave and got his followers up on twitter as she became more popular and being featured on Techcrunch her first day of launch. Second if you check compete.com and Alexa.com you can plainly see she is getting more visits per day since her launch. Iwear mimics Girls growth along the same timeline as her but with trailing visits. I also noticed that many people are buying several days each on Iwear which goes to bolster his sales. I think as his price continues to increase he will see a decline in sales. Iwearyourshirt came first and I may buy a day on his but girlinyourshirt gets more visits and is a more attractive and designed site, so most of my purchases will be driven towards her service.

[mark]

If he's putting 10-12 hours a day on his website then he isn't really wearing the shirt out and about unless he is parked at Starbucks which I doubt. Sounds like a ripoff to me.

[Peter Sniddler]

My entire office was laughing when we found http://www.guyinyourpants.com
It's hilarious!
Why doesn't that guy do more videos. Their funnier than the original sites.

[Michael]

Before you know it everybody will be wearing shirts (yes ... this was meant to sound dumb; just like the underlying concept).

[Geno Prussakov]

I personally like Jason's model better (especially the arithmetic progression of prices, which makes the cheaper slots sell better/faster, yet every sale of the cheaper slot bumps the next slot's price up). It would be interesting to follow how the competition with Jenae's site unfolds in the course of 2009.

Reading about ideas like Jason's is always encouraging. The first thing that I recalled when learning about iWearYourShirt.com was the Million Dollar Homepage. While the T-shirts project is not as ambitious, it certainly deserves credit for creativity.

[Adbust]

I never figured why so many people run around as living billboards WITHOUT getting paid....
...by Nike, Puma or whatever big logo-Shirt they choose to wear. Most people actually EVEN PAY those slavedrivers for the "privilege"....stupid!

[Jonathan Patterson]

Even though Sadler didn't come up with the video idea first, Girl in Your Shirt would have never gotten the idea anyway! I think it's much easier to expand on an already good idea, which is what GIYS did.

Pretty cool concept thought.

[salmiler]

I think its an overall great marketing idea and have decided to not limit myself by one or the other. Instead, I have decided to use both to promote my startup Salmiler lifestyle and apparel co. We'll have to see how many hits they can pull in for me.... on the run, R U?

salmiler.com