Weekly Feature – Chop Shop

Our Weekly feature is Chop Shop

I normally don’t start a feature with a comment, but I think that Chop Shop has something unique that I have not seen at any other site in the Shirt-o-Sphere and just had to point out. They have their own theme song and it was written and recorded by the grammy winning group, They Might Be Giants.

Check out the song and the cool flash animations on the header for the Chop Shop front page.

As for the rest of the feature, we sent them a few questions about the site and here is what they had to say.

Describe your site and the concept behind it.

Well, the Chop Shop is an offshoot of The Chopping Block; a 12 year old design studio located in New York City. So the basic design of the site takes many of it’s cues from the history of the studio. Over the years the studio site had us portrayed as Nascar drivers, astronauts, monsters and boy-scouts. This is why the header space features a few of us with those identities. We also have a 12 year old penchant for woodgrain.

As for the products, we originally had this idea that we would sell tshirt designs specifically for the design community and the site was born with 14 designs that in retrospect, were not our best foot forward. Although, the germ of what would one day be much more successful was present in items like Master Control (Tron guy with a dog and a beer) which has seen reprints and still sells copies to this day. We officially changed direction and cast a much wider net to target all “nerdy” types who love things like internet jokes, robots and pop-culture references in general rather than just focusing on the design-nerd demographic.

What is unique about your site?

The flash header animation gets us lots of compliments and often finds us added to various best of e-commerce lists which is a nice and unexpected place to get traffic from.

robotRock

$22 + shipping at Chop Shop

What factors motivated you to start your site?

We always intended to have a Chop Shop part of our company where we could make and sell products. The problem was that it took 8 years to take seriously and 2 more years developing the site and products in our off-hours. Being in the service industry for over 10 years at that point with The Chopping Block, we all had the desire to make things that we wanted to make without having to deal with clients. Tshirts are today’s art canvas. It is the best way to make something great and have it bought and seen around the world. There is something elementally excellent about someone buying something you made simply because they liked it enough to shell out $20 for it versus someone paying you to create something according to what their company needs. They are both businesses, but one has more to do with you as an artist personally whereas the other is creating art with a specific purpose in mind.

Do you just offer T-shirts?

No longer… we now have some of our tee designs printed Letter Press prints and 2 large silk screens which display all 300 icons of Science Fiction, Horror and Fantasy on a simple grid. The 300 icons are taken from our best-selling series of 6 different iconic tshirt designs featuring robots, aliens, vehicles, monsters, vampires and the undead. There are also a few older Chopping Block posters in there that we did with They Might Be Giants and other self-promo events.

We have a tentative plan for a line of vinyl toys, but oh the time! I make an official motion to expand the Earth day to a 36 hour cycle. All who agree say “aye!”.

Science Fiction Screened Poster Print

$50 + shipping at Chop Shop

How often should we see new designs?

It’s irregular. I plan a series of 3 iconic based tees about every 9 months. We started with Science Fiction in mid 08, followed by a series of rock in 08/09 and the last set was the Horror/Fantasy collection in the latter part of 09. A new set is in the works for 2010, but for now we are going to knock out a few traditional illustrative designs until the spring. We have introduced more featured artists to help pick up the pace of releases because I just can’t do it all! With the new artists we still try and keep the subject matter something that you would expect to see at Chop Shop. This usually means that the art must have some kind of relationship with robots; which is a joke… but not really.

Where are you located and do your shirts ship from the same area?

In New York City. I have this room where the walls are filled with tshirts. It is where the magic happens.

My Heart is Divided shirt

$20 + shipping at Chop Shop

Do you offer international shipping?

Sure do. Not sure why people don’t. About 1/5 of our sales are international. People like us in Australia.

Going forward, what can we expect from your site?

More illustrated work, new artists, more icons and something new is working with charities to help raise funds. We just released an iconic
tee that helps raise funds and increase awareness of water access issues in the developing world for a group called Well Done. The next non-profit work will be with the awesome show Radio Lab on NPR. We are actually planning a Radio Lab section on the site this spring/summer to carry at least 4 different designs. The first two will be with new artists but we will follow that with two of our own.

weRobot Glow-in-the-Dark

$20 + shipping at Chop Shop

Open round. Say anything you want.

Sleep is for the weak.

++++++++++

Final Thoughts from PCT

I like the quirkiness of Chop Shop. The site is entertaining and the designs that they produce are unique. If you’ve never visited their site, give them a look and poke around for a bit. Toss the astronaut around for a little while. You can also check these Chop Shop links:

SITES
chopshopstore.com
choppingblock.com
blog.choppingblock.com

ICONIC collection tees
weRobot (51 celebrity robot icons): http://bit.ly/aIWT
alienWe (50 celebrity alien icons): http://bit.ly/6Z4xlL
weGo (55 celebrated vehicle icons): http://bit.ly/uWIRU
weScare (58 celebrity Monster Icons): http://bit.ly/6gGL4T
weBite (35 celebrity Vampire Icons): http://bit.ly/8Forn5
undeadWe (51 icons of the undead): http://bit.ly/8SuyvZ
The Rock Collection of Tees: http://bit.ly/7Wz22l
Womens section: http://bit.ly/JzhKY

CHARITY
wellDone Tee: http://bit.ly/d0CpZ4
http://www.welldone.org/
http://www.wnyc.org/shows/radiolab/

PRINT
Science Fiction Collection Screen Print: http://bit.ly/7SgaVy
Silk Screen section: http://bit.ly/8ubyDI
Letter Press section: http://bit.ly/7sEWuA

ILLUSTRATED
Master Control (tron guy): http://bit.ly/58juWI
robotRock (robotic clash tribute): http://bit.ly/4ZL8HS
My Heart is Divided: http://bit.ly/5ZaF00

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