Story
Let us tell you a story; a story of striving youth; a story of unrelenting faith towards success…..the story of Tshirts.lk
The story of Tshirts.lk began in 2008, with four friends, leaving their paid jobs to purse a dream; a dream to start their own business and to become their own bosses.
The path was not easy; it was learning through ‘trail and error’; after many failed attempts and many hours of brain wracking, Co-Founder Mohan had a new idea bulb; ‘Let’s sell our T shirts on a worldwide platform!’ going behind this idea the team of four were able to earn a reasonable amount though the t-shirt designs and Asanka(retired member) put across funds from his personal savings; earned through his part-time insurance agent job; to purchase a ‘Heat-transfer machine’ amounting LKR 45,000/-, this was the stepping stone for Tshirts.lk where they initiated their first very own t shirt production line. This was also a breaking concept in Sri Lankan custom production as they were literally practicing ‘your demand; our command’ sales theory; which actually bread success.
The young boys of Tshirts.lk worked in truth to their catchy slogan; ‘Print your own T, in just 15 mins’. They were getting the help of wherever they could, Mohan goes to the extent of asking his new bride to write the content of the website and they create their very own online market portal www.t-shirts.lk. He doesn’t stop there, he with consent of his wife invest all the savings they had (nearly LKR 100,000) to rent a small place in town of Gampaha. With the handy interior work from Iresh&Dulik (retired partners) and some blank T-shirt lot brought from a wholesale vendor; their very first T-shirts.lk was ready for business.
The petite shop of Bak to Basics near Gampaha railway station, was a lucky star.
Youth from all walks of life; students, couples, young working professionals, newlyweds they all became regular customers of T-shirts.lk, they could get their customized T-shirts done in mere 15 minutes, the catch was the customized and unique designs. The T-shirts came in came in a customized packaging; all in all the concept was loved and well received. The business name became viral and orders and inquiries started to flood in. Asanka’s role shifted to delivery guy.
However, it was all not easy, there were times order cost became more expensive than the profit, and it was the time three founding partners decided, they needed to leave the business to help their families, and earn through better means.
Change
However, all was not lost, friend of Mohan (Malith) saw the potential of the business and joined hands with the remaining founding partner Mohan to take the business of Tshirts.lk to the next level. Thereby, the store went from being a physical store to a fully-fledged online store, the very first ‘Online total solutions provider for T-shirts in Sri Lanka’. Given the extensive online presence made the name ‘Tshirts.lk’ official among customers and the dear old Heat press machine was retired and New Screen Print facility in Colombo was brought on board.
Growth
Currently, ‘T-shirts.lk’ has entered its growth phase and the Number of inquiries has reached sky high.The youth of ‘T-shirts.lk’ has managed to earn trust among our customers. All this was done with a Zero advertising budget. The business depends solely on happy returning customers and organic search on internet.
‘T-shirts.lk’ product catalog is getting bigger every month with new t shirt patterns. Also they provide premium screen printing, Embroidery services as well.
Future
The team ‘T-shirts.lk’ believes strongly on customer satisfaction. As young group of Sri Lankan entrepreneurs ‘T-shirts.lk’ needs to expand the business with modern facilities. Branding plans for future includes launching a whole new “Tshirt Brand” to Sri Lankan consumer market. Opening an office premises in Colombo is the next on the to-do-list.
‘T-shirt.lk’ team is a patient bunch, and they have faith on achieving all their goals in the future not so far.
