Bandana Blog #2: Back to Business Basics

In spring 2025 it was time to make a change. I had nearly 20 bandana designs, but was still struggling with the "Print on Demand" production model with high manufacturing costs. Plus, the new US President was threatening North American supply chains with unnecessary tariffs. 

I quickly pivoted to taking my top designs to a Canadian "Print on Demand" manufacturer, but the costs went even higher and I still was printing on synthetic fabrics. It was time to go back to business basics with some good ol' fashioned market research. 

Survey Says...

I joined a business mentorship group through KORE Outdoors to get some specific help on the bandana line of business. One of the first recommendations was to do a customer survey. Nearly 200 people answered my survey in the summer of 2025. Of the responses:

• 96% did hiking and backpacking as summer activities
• 85% packed bandanas on their adventures (always or sometimes)
• And the top 3 bandana uses on the trail were: cooling cloth (80%), sun protection (68%) and hair tie (61%)

The three most important bandana features were:

• Fabric is a natural material such as cotton (78% agreed)
• Fabric is light weight (84% agreed)
• Bandanas are made in North America (78% agreed)

So now I knew what customers were looking for, it was time to see what I could do!

Manufacturing & Competitor Research

Next I dove into research to get quotes from different manufacturers as well as look into what competing options were on the market. I looked at fabric types, ink types, production methods, production locations, and gathered lots of information on pricing.

At this point, I was leaning strongly to moving to screen printing on cotton fabric which involves a bulk production model. Silk screens have to be made for each ink colour used in the design and the more colours, the higher the cost! But the more bandanas printed, the lower the cost! It's a balance. 

Can it be made in North America?

A common limitation I ran into with North American manufacturing is that most screen print shops use Plastisol ink. This is a plastic-based ink that sits on top of the fabric - it's not breathable and it eventually wears down into plastic crumblies. You may have had this happen to a few of your favourite t-shirts as the fabric will outlast the plastisol print with repeated washing and wearing.

Screen size was another limitation as most printers in North America focus on t-shirts and tote bags. Many weren't set up to offer a wider screen size that could accommodate a big beautiful bandana square.

The few printers that I found that could do water-based screen printing on bandanas were all in the US and had a very high cost per item, especially when converted to Canadian dollars and adding tariffs on top. I wasn't able to find any printers in Canada that could do this specialized printing at an affordable cost (and believe me, I tried dozens and dozens)! Working with the US was expensive and working in Canada wasn't possible, it was time look elsewhere...

Moving Overseas

Many competing bandana brands do their manufacturing in India where there is a specialized textile industry. I was a little overwhelmed by the prospect of finding an overseas manufacturer, but with some tips from my mentorship group last summer, I found the confidence to start narrowing down suppliers and gathering quotes. And guess what? I found an amazing manufacturer that is Fair Trade certified, does high quality printing and sewing, and was incredibly easy to work with. 

I redesigned 5 new bandanas to be screen-printing ready, carefully choosing colours and adding more intricate details instead of having an infinite range of colours to work with. Then I went down the sampling process with my new manufacturer, adjusted some final screen colours and... ta-da! Here we are! 

Stay tuned for blog post #3...