Heavier weight T-shirts, muted tones, and an innovation that redefines softness and comfort are the talking points in tees in 2025, reports Jonny Thomson, Gildan‘s marketing director for Europe
What are the key T-shirt trends for 2025?
Overall, I think there’s an underlying trend across the whole printwear industry of an general uplift in product design and quality, and also on-trend colourways. The line between “retail” and “printwear” is increasingly blurring. Personally, I thought the standard of product presentation across garments and accessories at the recent European trade shows was really impressive.
On T-shirts, there are a few clear trends continuing into 2025, one of which is the demand for heavier weight lines, such as our Gildan Hammer shirt. We’re also seeing a continued cycle through muted, earthy colour tones. This began a few years back with sand, but has carried through browns, olives and other earthy hues. But black and white still top the sales numbers….
And of course, softness has always been on-trend. This is why Gildan has introduced our Soft Cotton Technology innovation that redefines softness and comfort.
And what about fabric choice, what is popular this year?
Cotton continues to dominate, with end-users becoming increasingly keen to understand where the cotton comes from, how it was grown, etc.
Consumers are beginning to push further on the topic of sustainability as they begin to understand that the topic encompasses many aspects including not just the materials used, but also who made the garments, their environments, the energy used and impact on the planet, circularity, and overall transparency of supply chains.
Gildan has always taken a pro-active approach to sustainability, or ESG (environmental, social and governance) as it’s now more commonly known. We make all of our products in our own WRAP-certified facilities and have been publishing annual ESG reports since 2005 as part of our longstanding commitment to sustainability.
Gildan‘s global bestseller, the Heavy Cotton tee, is now even softer thanks to the new Soft Cotton Technology
The new Light Cotton range is seeing great uptake by printers
What was the bestselling T-shirt from Gildan in 2024?
Globally, our bestselling shirt is the Gildan Heavy Cotton (5000). It’s an icon in the printwear industry. We’ve made tweaks along the way to ensure that it remains relevant and contemporary, such as amending the neck stitching and labels. And now we have made it even softer with our new Soft Cotton Technology. It’s a go-to shirt for printers that can be trusted for its quality, consistency and sustainability credentials. It also represents amazing value for money.
Is there another style shaping up to be a bestseller this year?
Gildan makes a range of tees across the basic weights – 150gsm, 180gsm, 200gsm – and in both regular and ringspun cotton, so we naturally cover all options.
This year we’ve introduced our new Light Cotton range in order to have a 150gsm T-shirt at the lower end of the pricing scale. So far we’ve seen great uptake on this style as printers and end-users recognise the benefit of a lighter weight shirt at a keen price point without compromising any of the elements you’d expect from a Gildan product.
How do you see T-shirt product development progressing over the next few years?
Trends, by nature, come and go, but making quality products in an ethical and sustainable way will continue to be the key factors.
What‘s the single best piece of advice you can give to Images readers to help them sell more T-shirts?
Cho0se a shirt from a brand that you believe in, find out where and how it was made, its certifications, etc, and be ready to answer every question that you will be asked about it by your customers. And make sure that it’s always going to be in stock at your distributor, otherwise you’ll end up having to track down stock or switch between brands…
