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Tshirt Designs - Will they sell?

ExcelGuy

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I was inspired by @AgainstAllOdds 's process thread, although now in mid-August I'm not sure if he's still doing it, his site seems to be down.
It was about tshirt selling or creating a clothing line.

I've had an idea for creating shirts for a while now and took some time today to finally get something done.

  • Created 4 - 5 t-shirt mockups using the Threadless template
  • Set up a new Instagram account for the business
  • Set up a new Twitter account for the business
  • Can utilize my existing Twitter/IG accounts to help drive traffic. I have good quality followers and can sometimes gain a good amount of impressions for the target demographic, though we're talking dozens here, but 3K+ impressions from 350+followers.
TODO:
  • Get on-demand printing set up
  • Buy a domain
  • Possibly buy some ad-traffic
  • Future: find alternate hosting
Lessons Learned in 5 hours:
  • I've improved my Photoshop skills
  • I learned how to use the Threadless template
  • I created my own logo from scratch in 2 varieties
  • Learned more about Shopify and what it can do
My question is: How do I know these shirts will sell? Should I put a few designs out my IG accounts and see what people think?

Actually as soon I asked it I found out how silly that sounds. Of course I should!

Though so far: $0 spent.

I may have to spend a few days gathering followers before I direct any traffic to the site. Besides which I should probably have product to ship before getting any buyers.

My 14 day trial at Shopify starts today. We'll see what happens in the next two weeks.

Even if this fails, I've done something I've wanted to do for a long time, and I can potentially learn quite a bit, and maybe even get some good tips from you good people.
double_dagger_logo_instagram_profile.jpg
 
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LifeTransformer

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Best of luck to you! I Sold my first Tee the other day (think you liked my post), got this tweet tonight:

tees-tweets (660x657).jpg
Get something put out there and the buyers will follow for sure! I might even buy one of your's :)
 

AgainstAllOdds

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Great job starting @ExcelGuy. And I still have a couple sites up (that I won't post on this forum), that make ok passive income.

My advice: if you're going to sell t-shirts, then make sure you have time to scale it. If you don't have time, then hire a foreign virtual assistant to manage it all, and take a couple hundred in a week for sitting back.
 
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ExcelGuy

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Great job starting @ExcelGuy. And I still have a couple sites up (that I won't post on this forum), that make ok passive income.

My advice: if you're going to sell t-shirts, then make sure you have time to scale it. If you don't have time, then hire a foreign virtual assistant to manage it all, and take a couple hundred in a week for sitting back.

It's 3:30am and my 2yo has been up for over 2 hours. Finally got him calmed down to watch kids play with trucks on Youtube so I might as well make the best of it.

Thanks @AgainstAllOdds, it sounds like a good idea. But what do you mean by scale it? Do you mean find a different niche and different designs? Or selling from different shops?

Also, do you still work with Print Aura? They have a number of bad reviews including the shirts smelling when they arrive. I'm checking out Gooten because they'll give me $25 credit and will send me 3 free samples of my shirts if I run 5 shirts with them.

I'm in Canada and I'm trying to find the best option. Shopify has a webinar on starting a tshirt store and it pretty much was everything you explained.
 

Ika

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Great to hear that, I will follow your journey along! I have played with the thought of starting a clothing line as well, simply to learn the basics of business, take action and own clothes I really enjoy ;;)
Your ideas sound good so far! Your newest designs look interesting as well - I'm interested to where this is going!

How will you manage products? Are you printing at home and shipping to the customer? Or does the producer ships the products?
And will you have a little storage full of products or print as you have a sale?

Good luck!
 

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We get our line of Tees up hopefully next week. Will do preorders, then first print run. Used combo of fiverr and local printing shop and in house help for graphics. Have a local print shop doing the first batch. Picked nicer shirts, including women's cuts, and plan to list at higher prices. Will drive a little traffic, do a little instagram, and see what happens.
 
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LifeTransformer

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That T-shirt I posted above was done through Threadless. Just so everyone knows.

I've just shipped a Tank Top from a different manufacturer, will post the result of that when I can.
 

nradam123

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Just a doubt.

Are your designs generic or are they niche?
I know someone (not personal relationship) who runs a hoodie business and his niche was "college hoodies". Now he expanded the niche to a real big business with Tshirts, hoodies and what not.

Here is the website - http://www.almamaterstore.in/

I think niching down first and then scaling to other verticals later would be smart.
 

ExcelGuy

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I've posted more on my Instagram and I've opened the store and posted links to my Facebook page last night. Site has had 24 visitors today. I have lots of design friends so I'm going to see if any want to do designs/commissions. My friend does personal training and wants to buy a tee with my logo but I'll be also giving her one with her logo on it from my set of 3 samples.

Customers buy from the site and order is processed by Shopify and fulfilled and drop shipped by Gooten.

I'll never hold inventory, and I'll never be stuck with with shirts I can't sell.

I know most of the current designs are shite and will never sell. Solution: get better designs.

Other income revenues: friends who own businesses who want custom products. Vendor has over 100 different products.

Sales goal: break even with hosting costs within 3 months to get my wife from worrying about money. Though she likes the idea and wants a custom tote bag!

Starting niche.

Check out Cleveland Clothing for a guy that sells on shopify doing the same thing and scaled up. Different niche but I like his idea. 44K followers on Instagram for that guy!

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RahKnee

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In my admittedly limited experience with the t-shirt industry, I've noticed one thing:

You will never go broke appealing to stupid people.

Yeah, a cool design or clever shirt will sell. But the ones that turn into real money makers tend to have one thing in common.

Only a moron would wear them.

Far too many words on them, and universally a theme that a normal, thinking person wouldn't ever consider wearing on a shirt. Think rap lyrics with an image of a joint covering the back of the shirt and a dollar sign on the front. I wouldn't wear anything like that unless I was being paid, but I know someone who sells boat loads of them.

Condensed version of my ramblings? In t shirts, appeal to the lowest common denominator.
 

ExcelGuy

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In my admittedly limited experience with the t-shirt industry, I've noticed one thing:

You will never go broke appealing to stupid people.

Yeah, a cool design or clever shirt will sell. But the ones that turn into real money makers tend to have one thing in common.

Only a moron would wear them.

Far too many words on them, and universally a theme that a normal, thinking person wouldn't ever consider wearing on a shirt. Think rap lyrics with an image of a joint covering the back of the shirt and a dollar sign on the front. I wouldn't wear anything like that unless I was being paid, but I know someone who sells boat loads of them.

Condensed version of my ramblings? In t shirts, appeal to the lowest common denominator.
I was going to post about something along these lines. Have a cash cow or bread and butter product to pay the bills so you can afford to do riskier design/endeavors. [emoji106] [emoji111]

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Jeremy Groover

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Let me start by saying, fantastic job at taking a step! On demand printing is a great thing because it allows you to test the market on your design. One thing to remember. Unless you have a large following, don't discredit a design. Take it off the market for a little and test it later.

As for instagram, I strongly suggest one of those companies that get you followers. I used to have one on one of my pages and it was really worth every penny. Make sure you select a reputable one. They allow you to pick certain pages that your targeted market follows and works on converting them to your page. I paid $30.00 a month and gained almost 3000 followers the first month and didn't change any of my techniques. I could have done more if I posted more and hashtagged more, but it was more of a test then anything. I only post about 5 times a week and the big pages post 5 times a day.

Once you get to a certain level, I think you should get some stock and travel to different events where your target market is at. Even if your just passing out stickers, it would help get your name out there. Don't forget to add your Instagram and Twitter handle on the stickers!
 
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ExcelGuy

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I'm now up to 46 followers on Instagram organically but I may look in to Jeremy Groovers idea. I paid $7 USD to boost a Facebook post and it reached 23 people and gained 13 interactions in one day. Target was people aged 18-65 in Canada but if I do it again it will be more targeted to a single product though this one was as well.

Also not sure if it was Google optimizing for my location and history, but searching for my brand name puts my site and Instagram feed in positions 1 and 3 respectively. Position 2 was a cafepress account who is probably using an Algorithm to appear for a range of generic keywords.

I don't want to risk being seen as spamming this post so someone PM me and I'll tell you my keywords. Not sure if I can place my URL in my signature yet or not.

VERY happy with the Spotify option. They have so much information available!

Also found a different POD supplier thru shopify who can get me shirts $0.80 USD than the first one I chose. Even responded to my emails quickly personally!

Almost 2 weeks. Total sales: 0. Local friends want samples to see and I'm arranging to give one away free and a couple to a buddy (he is a designer / artist) but decided on a total profit of $1.40 CDN. Hey he's a starving artist and I'm going for the sale! Besides if I order it myself I can bundle orders together for cheap I hope.

Going with flat rate shipping. Free shipping on orders over $75 seems pretty common and a markup if 30% is recommended.

Also posted a couple of designs on tee shirt voting sites. Got that from seeing Transhumantees in action :)

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LifeTransformer

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Thought I'd give your thread a bump and post a little update on my own progress:

Good NEWS! Sold my second shirt. BAD NEWS: No idea where from though. This is the problem I currently have with doing it through someone else's site.

Violating the "C" is just to get me started though. I don't feel comfortable enough to start paying for shopify yet. I may have also found a way to get more products and shopify for cheaper too, so need to look into that also.

I've now got 12 designs published. People seem to be liking them, but small followers at the moment on both Twitter (heading toward 300) and Instagram (up to about 70 atm).
 

ExcelGuy

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New update. My Instagram account is at 106 followers and only 56 posts. I compared Redbubble.com and Shopify (via Gooten shipping from California) and since I'm in Canada, it's still cheaper for me to sell through shopify based on a per shirt basis. RB may have a wider product line though if your looking to move outside of shirts.

Food for thought: the custom tshirt market is saturated unless you have a specific style.

Serving a need: I'm starting to partner with local artists to bring their art to market.

Diversifying: I came out with another product line serving authors or mystery writers and or the pen and paper geeks. Then again I think everything I come up with can be it's own line.

Looking at affiliates with Under Armour and Old Navy since graphic tees are popular with people who shop at old Navy. Target audience for FB ads.

Side note: my 5yo son and I have 42 million studs in Lego Marvel Super Heroes.

I walked down the block in the sun in my tshirt and jeans carrying a sample kit. Waited at the wrong Williams on the same street for an old buddy and made my first pre order with cash in hand! My first order is now in Canada but with yesterday being a holiday it didn't get delivered today

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Kabylfx

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Congrats on your progress! Looking forward for your next posts. I also started selling my own T-Shirts and it's been a great experience so far!
 
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ExcelGuy

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I found a great artist last night willing to sell me 3 vector images for $30 in Canada, and today I met this 10 yo girl who seems to be a pretty good artist and I spoke with her folks about getting he art out there and on products.

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ExcelGuy

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Also looking for a Print on Demand service in Canada. I'm worried that when my first orders get to ontario from California I'll have to pay duties...or that my customers will!

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ExcelGuy

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Wow have things been crazy. My first POD supplier was Gooten because they offered 3 free samples when I had 5 items in the store.

It took almost 18 days to deliver them. Thanks USPS. Also, there have been no charges for duties on the product I've received so far. Shirts from Gooten are essentially stuffed in a plastic shipping bag and dropped in the mail. The problem I have is one USPS sends it across the border it is much harder to track.

The thing is the prices are REALLY affordable.
Gooten - AA2001 Men's Medium - No Underbase - $8.78 USD
Printful - AA2001 Men's Medium - No Underbase - $14.87 USD

Printed 2 mugs for a buddy with Gooten, standard shipping, and they arrived in 4 days! Still waiting on an order from Gooten to ship directly to my sister in law that was placed on Sept 6. Still not delivered.

I ordered two of my own shirts from RedBubble when they had a 20% off sale and they arrived in 10 days but cost me quite a bit more. But it came in a cool bag with stickers :)

So I have to figure out a shipping process for expedited and tracked shipping and / or find a new vendor. I contacted a few guys in Toronto but I'm waiting to hear back to see if they do one-off orders.

Given the shipping delays, my wife has actually suggested I buy a heat press. That way I'd be able to get shirts and other products to locals very quickly, and hey, buying shirts wholesale from Wordan's for $4 each is a great deal when you've got two young boys who love tshirts :) She seems pretty keen on owning a heat press.

Still growing my main instagram account organically, but I have 2 other accounts for alternate product lines and possible brands. I have way too many ideas. Below is a chart of growth of my number of followers.
haJkgAI.png


I've now received about 9 shirts from either Gooten or Redbubble, with some from Printful on the way I think. I now know what tamk tops from Bella+Canvas, and shirts from American Apparel are like.

Just heard back from Gooten support (which is pretty good actually) that their international orders can take up to 21 days. I have a friend in San Francisco that I'll try sending a shirt to and see how long it takes to ship. Hopefully, it doesn't take 21 days to get from Santa Ana, CA to SF :)

But having customers in my own country wait so long seems to be a stumbling block, other than switching vendors and losing some profit margin or consider raising the price. But people will only pay so much for tshirts and at the moment I don't think a $29 US tshirt is a possibility. Then again I shouldn't need to focus on selling shirts to people in Canada, unless that was part of my main business idea, which it isn't.
 
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ExcelGuy

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I've now received about 9 shirts from either Gooten or Redbubble, with some from Printful on the way I think. I now know what tamk tops from Bella+Canvas, and shirts from American Apparel are like.

Oh and I'm wearing a large AA2001 now and it's not bad, even though I liked the Medium as well. Nice soft shirt. It is the only one I've received where the print seems off-center but that's probably my fault. I got lazy on a few of them.
 

ExcelGuy

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Hi
Let me start by saying, fantastic job at taking a step! On demand printing is a great thing because it allows you to test the market on your design. One thing to remember. Unless you have a large following, don't discredit a design. Take it off the market for a little and test it later.

As for instagram, I strongly suggest one of those companies that get you followers. I used to have one on one of my pages and it was really worth every penny. Make sure you select a reputable one. They allow you to pick certain pages that your targeted market follows and works on converting them to your page. I paid $30.00 a month and gained almost 3000 followers the first month and didn't change any of my techniques. I could have done more if I posted more and hashtagged more, but it was more of a test then anything. I only post about 5 times a week and the big pages post 5 times a day.

Once you get to a certain level, I think you should get some stock and travel to different events where your target market is at. Even if your just passing out stickers, it would help get your name out there. Don't forget to add your Instagram and Twitter handle on the stickers!

This totally reminds that I still don't have stickers, and I still don't have a shirt with my company name on it except the very first one, which I should put on a few more sites. Thanks @Jeremy Groover !

And here I was about to work on a new design :)
 

ExcelGuy

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Another update:

I got my copy of @MJ DeMarco 's book and started reading it and flipping through it. A lot of other articles lately about the custom tshirt business have also all pointed in the same direction and I posted a blog article on my site about taking a step backward before being able to take a step forward.

I made about $118 in product profit in September but still in the hole (by about $520+) due to start up costs and Facebook advertising. Will work on how to calculate ROI on FB ads etc.

Oh and I have $300 order in the works with my chiropractor but I quoted the prices mostly seat of my pants and underestimated. While I won't lose money, I'll probably make only about $12-$20 instead of the $150 I was expecting. So sales for October look good, net income not as much :) But at least I pretty much don't have any more samples I need to buy.

Also got a set of cool colour swatches: the DTG colour palette on black (underbased) on a AA 2001 Medium and a white colour palette on an AA Women's organic tee. I bought them from Printful so paid over $40CAD for them, but my supplier doesn't do the organic tee which I may try and focus on using. I posted a photo on my personal instagram.

However, I have decided to cancel my Shopify account and start mainly by selling designs on printables on sites like Redbubble, CafePress, and I just opened a Spreadshirt store yesterday. I only have 2 or 3 shirts on Redbubble, but a few days ago I had my first sale to someone I didn't know to a woman in Germany via Redbubble! Raw $5.38 CAD profit for essentially just uploading a design that was already done.

I learned years ago that one's purpose in life is to serve others, which is a lot like meeting a need, though I don't always live that message but I'm sure I'll see other parallels when I get to that part in the book :)

Businessy:
  • By dropping Shopify, I reduce my operating expenses by $43 CAD a month, almost $600 a year. My wife's anxiety and current stress level were definitely factors in that decision, but the numbers do speak for themselves.
  • I should start a simple log of every transaction I make, because going through my bank statements, credit card statements, store order log, and supplier order logs to get all the info I need is more than a small hassle.
  • Also found out that my web host (Go-D) not only has a $9.99/m CAD but also free ecommerce tools. Since my backround is in computer science, I might play with the free options for a bit to see if I can get my own store front working. In the meantime there is Redbubble, Cafepress, etc.
  • Checking the shirt sites like Redbubble, Cafepress etc. regularly leads to finding out when they have discounts, so you can get product and samples cheaper at certain times.
  • I was going to buy a 15x15 heat transfer press next week, but I don't really think the quality of the prints will compare to a professional DTG printer and I don't want to be printing shirts in my basement anyway, that wasn't the point of starting this thing.
  • I did however buy a mini-button (1") button press last week from BC, and it gets here next week. I also did an ROI analysis on the press: If I can sell 183 buttons at $1ea, then I break even. Press comes with 500 buttons, which leaves the > 300 buttons available as promotional items. Then I can figure out how to calculate ROI on promotional items.
  • Basics: If you try starting your own "brand" then you have to try and help clients find you and convince them to buy. Posting on shirt / imprintable sites gives you a platform where you have "qualified leads" - meaning it's people who buy that stuff and are more likely to buy your stuff.
  • Give your designs time. I just read a great article that discusses the 80/20 rule. If you make 10 designs and only 2 of the sell, you need to make 10 more designs to hopefully get another 2 that sell. Don't expect it to come fast.
  • I'm overly attached to Gooten as my fulfillment vendor but they have their API available and it's free to use, so I may still stick with them. And their mugs are WAYYY cheaper to get made than Cafepress, and shipped to Canada in 4 days. So that's good for friends and family that don't buy through a site.
  • Still can't find an POD DTG in Canada except for sites like TShirtGuys in Toronto but they are selling at a bit of a higher price too, though they are worth looking into.
  • My webhosts is offering a discount on business cards via VistaPrint so that might be worth it to get 100 cards for $1.99 instead of getting 500 for $10.
Philosophy:
  • Starting a brand / design company because you want to or it seems cool only meets your needs, not someone elses.
  • Designing t-shirts for people does solve a need... you just have to decide for yourself what that is and what it is you are providing. Is it the need to wear funny/inspiring/popular designs?
  • Designing shirts "and things" helps my mental health a great deal I think so sometimes meeting the needs of others has to take a back seat to taking care of yourself. Other people here may not agree with that. If so, move to another thread.
My instagram is now at 140 followers, though I was at 155 earlier this week.

I forgot what else I was going to say.

I placed part of the order for my Chirpractor and had to redo the graphics for a second design. Now I've misplaced the list of the sizes he wants for the other design but I think I left it at home. I just want to get it ordered and have it done with. I will NOT be doing that much custom work for friends and locals. It's too much work. My business model for them will simply be "I'll put the design in my store. Buy it if you want it."

- Cheers,
Rick - still waiting, can I put my website in my signature yet? :)
 
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ExcelGuy

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Totally forgot: For those new tshirt people here is the first set of must read tshirt articles I found today: http://bit.ly/2dBAYFb I'm sharing from my Dropbox account, I just added bitly to see how many people download it. Though maybe Dropbox tracks it already.
Really, its just a pdf, there is no sales-y things or affilate stuff in it. It's like a proof of concept, or it's the alpha version of what may become an ebook.

Let me know and if you prefer, I can just upload the file.
 

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Hey just a quick question! You mentioned your start up costs have been high, $500 +

Any reason you wouldn't use a site like teespring and advertise it through FB and Insta? All you have to do is design the shirts and make profit of course if you meet the quota.

I'm interested in t-shirt design myself and do quite a bit of work for some urban clothing stores/businesses (I'm a graphic designer)... but if I were to start out, I'd go the teespring road first.
 
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This is a really awesome thread! Glad you are still plugging along. The t-shirt game is hard but it can be done. I have been running a line for a bit now and have learned so much!

I am about to start another more focused brand to run along side with the gig I got going now. I love to see the progress in the clothing industry and can't wait for more updates!

Also as a fellow Canadian it's pretty awesome to make American money!

PS. If you have any questions about screen-printing let me know I've been doing it for 6 years now.
 

ExcelGuy

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Hey just a quick question! You mentioned your start up costs have been high, $500 +

Any reason you wouldn't use a site like teespring and advertise it through FB and Insta? All you have to do is design the shirts and make profit of course if you meet the quota.

I'm interested in t-shirt design myself and do quite a bit of work for some urban clothing stores/businesses (I'm a graphic designer)... but if I were to start out, I'd go the teespring road first.
Mostly because I had never heard of teespring and started this venture without doing enough research :)

My startup expenses were mostly the Shopify store but I cancelled this month. Other expenses include buying sample shirts and some bad decisions but not really losing more than $200 or so. Lessons learned.

The stress is getting to.me and affecting my family so I'm easing back a bit.

Just delivered 13 shirts for my chiro and made $150 profit so I'm mostly out.od the whole. But I want to buy design assets and fonts etc.

Oops gotta go to work will add more later.

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