Sweet! I'll crank up the G5 and get to work.

Hmmm... I'm thinking there may be a few ideas already available over at the Hammer of Truth site. I wouldn;t mind getting a shirt or two of some of those.

To All,

We already have t-shirts, bumper stickers, coffee mugs and more available at our online store for the LP of Oregon. Just go to our web site:

www.LPOregon.org

and click on the link that says "LPO Store".

I'm sure there are some professional graphic designers out there who could improve upon my designs. But if anyone wants a copy of the graphics files that I created, please send me an email. Thanks.

Phil Schmitt
Vice Chair
LP of Oregon
ViceChair@LPOregon.org

I forgot to add, I own a few domain names (web site names) that could be used as slogans on t-shirts or for campaigns. They include:

GotLiberty.org
WantLiberty.com
WantLiberty.org
Vote4Liberty.com
Vote4Liberty.org
VoteforLiberty.com
VoteforLibery.org

Right now all of these domain names are forwarding to our national web site "LP.org". At this point if anyone wants to put one of these domain names on a t-shirt, use it as a campaign slogan, etc. go right ahead. If anyone wants to inquire about buying one of these from me, please send me an email about it. Thanks.

Phil Schmitt
Vice Chair
LP of Oregon

Phil-

Thanks for posting the info about the LPO Store- I'd been looking for a source for shirts. Unfortunately, I have no great ideas for any designs.

If your afraid of FREEDOM...

this party is not for you!

Libertarian Party

I mean "you're"

TIRED OF BENDING OVER! VOTE LIBERTARIAN LP.ORG

I've seen this slogan on another website and I liked it.
It says "When are you going to say "No More"?"

More likely someone knows there is vast amounts of professional level untapped talent for free or very low cost within the LP if you ask for it. We have LP members from all walks of life that got SKILLZ and abilities to help.

Lets see what they can do. Nothing to lose. If the stuff sucks, it wont be used. If the stuff is great, more the better.

There's one thing I am convinced of: this party gots more brain power than Einstein, and less common sense than Mister Ed. Even the ratios out and we would rule.

Found this contest via ThirdPartyWatch.com, will be submitting an item very soon. Cudos to the LP for such a creative idea!! :-)

Greg, we are pursuing a "branding" study that should kick back up in a day or two.

However, I don't think we need to study the market before creating a few t-shirts. Let's move quickly and efficiently by tapping the talent that is out there. Given that this cost no money, we can always swap out the non-sellers and try other products.

Also, if you have any good ideas then please share them with us.

Shane:

If you are going to try creating a brand identity, then you want all the merchandise to help build that identity. In such a case, you do not want to have a large number of choices.

A member who buys branded merchandise today may not be willing to buy different branded merchandise tomorrow when you finally settle on a market strategy. Then you have missed the opportunity to build the brand.

I'll take the risk that 100 or so people will be walking around in "exclusive" or discontinued shirts produced by LP members.

Additionally, once we have our market analysis done, do we force the states to apply only our brand? (BTW Phil, thanks for the links, I didn't realize they were out there).

This is a small project that some LP members can take part in and everyone can benefit from their creativity. Why argue against it?

I argue against squandering our resources.
I argue against taking actions without plans.
I argue against sending our supporters off on meaningless tasks.

You are not harnessing the brain power of our volunteers, you are asking them to spend their cycles doing things that will have no effect.

Plan your work, then work your plan.

That's something the LP should have done with the database also -- and we all see the results of not doing it.

Perhaps the T Shirts should say something about people being sick of the Republicans and Democrats. Some people may not agree with our platform, but I bet over 90% of this country is sick of those two parties bickering and never getting anything useful done. Maybe we need an animal as a mascot like the Elephant and Donkey, only we'd have a cool animal like a bear or a lion. It sounds stupid needing a mascot but if we could have one symbol that everyone recognizes, then we could start to get some people remembering who we are.

We need to be doing some long-term branding for those of you with marketing experience. Everyone knows about the elephant and donkey, we need something that symbolizes us that will stick in people's head. As I said, it sound kind of stupid needing a mascot but almost every successful organization in this country has a recognizable symbol that people remember. Once people recognize whom we are, and remember us, then we can start to convince them to vote for us.

"Why argue against it?"

Because nobody's listening about how the ES is nasty evil mean? *shrugs*

That said, I think it's a fantastic idea. I'm emailing one of my pics in, and I'll post a link to it here as well:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v15/PrincepsAugustus/LibContest.png

I have a full line of shirts, etc at www.cafepress.com/libertyline that are pro-libertarian

I've also got a few libertarian items at my cafepress shop:
http://www.libertyrocks.net

I'm actually in the middle of creating my own store (not cafepress) at http://www.TheLibertySource.com - which will include libertarian gear and campaign packages.

Hope you don't mind the shameless plug, but we're all capitalists here - right :)

I have good slogan for the LP T-shirts
Are you feed up of High Taxes and Government Intrusion in everyday life?. Vote Libertarian

How about "Prostitutes and Weed-We're the Party Party!"

Okay, maybe not... :p

I'm desperately trying to find the George W. Bush quote where he basically is implying that things would be better (for him) if third parties didn't exist. I can't find it, though. Can anyone help me locate this one, or know of the quote to which I'm referring?

Greg, you argue against quite a bit don't you?

Why do we have to use cafe express? They overcharge.

Here's my anti anti-smoking idea:

http://iliketocomplain.blogspot.com/2005/06/my-idea-for-libertarian-billboard.html

(It has been entered in the Hammer of Truth billboard competition, too).

Greg, the LP members are, as I see it, an untapped resource. Letting them suggest designs can't hurt. :)

Cafe Press already has some cool Libertarian products:
http://www.cafepress.com/cp/browse/Ntt-libertarian_Nao-1_Ntk-All_N-0_No-1_D-libertarian

All right! I made one tonight / this morning. Here's my first draft:

http://www.wccta.net/gallery/ajnice/politics/lpshirt.jpg

It's probably not the correct size, so I'll have to fix it later. I sorta forgot to read that part first...oops.

Jnice,

Constructive crit - It's too wordy. The key to a successful t shirt is simple direct forceful text maybe 3 lines max with a good graphic.

I would suggest "NOT (big letters) the Freedom President! or LEADER, Fed. Dept. Of FORECLOSURE & BANKRUPTCY.... something along those lines with a comic looking font to go with the Bush head.

I'm still thinking of mine.

Shane, would you be willing to accept donations of hardware? Sometimes I get awesome deals on up to date hardware, and I can see me donating some of these to the LP for online use as gifts.

The membership drive fuse took a big jump today.

I'd love to see those animals get blown up. :D

My Cafe Press store is here:

http://www.cafepress.com/alibertarian

Just remember you can't fit an essay on the shirt unless you write real small!

John Sophocleus, who was the Libertarian candidate for governor of Alabama in 2002 had a very good slogan he came up recently in a speech to the Von Mises institute. It would work great on a T-Shirt.

"Two wrongs make a Right... and a Left."

Take that and below it "Vote Libertarian"

And on the back "http://www.lp.org"

I would love a shirt like that.

Tim: Yeah, I know mine has a lot of information, but I've seen some t-shirts that basically invite you to read the fine print before. You're right, though, that few would stop to actually read the whole thing.

Maybe I'll take someone's snappy one-liner here and use it.

We should make something that catches peoples' eyes without being flagrantly political or profound. I already have an LP shirt, but I would love something that said on the front "L-PA" (libertarian from pennsylvania) and the URL on the back, with a series for each state. If that isn't too expensive to produce, I think it would get a lot of people talking.

Anyone who doesn't get it is bound to ask. Anyone who does is bound to love it.

I like "Free Trade is Fair Trade" on the back an LP on the front.

The best t-shirts are simply ones that say:

www.LP.org
The Libertarian Party

www.LPTN.org
The Libertarian Party of Tennessee

www.HCLP.org
The Hamilton County Libertarian Party

Slogans are sometimes nice, but often just give too much to read.

One effective slogan from the people over at Think Libertarian: 2 Parties = 0 Choice

Golly day I just wish I still had photoshop on my computer. Finally a contest I'd love to play with. Can't wait to see all the ideas that spring up from this.

I made the suggestion at the last meeting of the Baltimore county Libertarians that we have a t-shirt design contest for collage art students with a cash prize and the offer to pay for all designs we use. One requirement of entering is that you must be a registered voter. This would get lots of students checking out libertarian web-sites and some would register as libertarians. The cost of having the contest would be small and would be recovered by the sales of the shirts. Buzz Tavik

Mat, if you download Macromedia Fireworks MX, you can get it free for the first 30 days. That will give you plenty of time to create, and without a penny out of your pocket.

Buzz, Baltimore Country rocks! :D

Also may I recommend the GIMP(GNU Image Manipulation Program), and open source image editor that can do basically everything Photoshop does, a litle more in some areas, and just a little less in other areas. Very good, free image manipulation software for designers.

I agree with those that say that t-shirt designs should be short, simple, and easy to read. But most importantly, there needs to be a very simple, easy to remember way for people to get more information if they are curious. That's what I had in mind when I designed t-shirts for our online store at the LP of Oregon.

http://www.LPoregon.org (then click "LPO Store")

Take Care,
Phil Schmitt

jnice,

I remember the quote. I don't have much time but I know that it was on the badnarik forum late last year or early this year. If you use the wayback machine you will probably find it.

The wayback machine is located at this url.
http://www.archive.org/web/web.php
Just type badnarik's website address and you can search the archived pages.

I submitted my first effort. I'll post it on LFS.

A cool shirt to have would be one with "I'm Pro-Choice...on Everything" on it. I know they have that in bumper-sticker form, but I'm not sure if it's on shirts.

I created a couple myself for the "Libertarian Billboard Contest" Stephen Van Dyke started up a while back.

http://thatsridonkulous.blogspot.com/2005/06/libertarian-billboard-contest.html

Also, here's a pic that could be used with some Photoshop work.
http://i8.photobucket.com/albums/a12/ridonkulous/WeighedDown.gif

(Benefits, Human Resources, Payroll)…could be changed to (Taxes, BIG GOVERNMENT, Regulations) respectively.

I found the image using “Google Images”, but it actually resides on this site. I’m not sure if it’s copyrighted or not. If you modify a picture enough, does copyright status still apply?
http://www.employersplus.com/

I think this party needs to advertise like hell to become mainstream. We have a platform, unlike the republicrats, and everyone knows the democrat that became a republican when they got a job at 23 and saw the government eating that chunk out of their paycheck. We have a huge target audience-- we need to get out there. I think all T-Shirt revenue should be spent to televise the party.

Are we all listening to DAN????

He's right of course, but advertising something no one wants to buy wont make it sell any faster.

If you see a ad on TV about something that has no relevence to your life in any way, like a artificial leg marketed to people with 2 perfectly good legs that work, is a really snappy ad going to make you want to buy that artificial leg more?

No,becuase you dont need a artificial leg.

Trying to sell anarchy, no government, drivers licenses not needed, etc. to people who you have not yet sold on the idea that THEY ARE EVEN UNFREE, is a recipe for failure.

You must first convince them that your leg is 100X better than the leg they have now. Maybe it's a bionic super leg. They look at the leg, and consider it's usefullness over the leg they have.

When you can make liberty ( your super leg ) so appealing, one step at a time, that they will gladly saw off their own leg and replace it with yours, see that it is better than the one they had, then you can sell them other body parts. As you do, they will be more apt to replace more than one part at a time. ( or consider more radical steps )

By the time you can sell them on replacing their MIND.....he he.....they are libertarians themselves.

One step at a time, in bite sized chunks, is the only way any of us will get what we want.

I made a dog shirt design that could work

http://img292.imageshack.us/img292/2913/doglp6vl.gif

and yes, I am a loser.

I do want to add though, we are not marketable right now, especially with the idea of open borders that people do not want, (especially do not want). We are at serious risk for a major WMD EVENT in this country due to open borders.

You know how the Democrats and Republicans both put out a weekly (or is it daily?) radio address? The Libertarian Party should definitely do this, too.

As for commercials, that's a great idea, too. I know that DownsizeDC puts out radio commercials every once in a while. Televsision commercials would make a bigger impact, though.

In election 2004, I only saw one Badnarik commercial on TV. In it, a couple questions why they're still supporting the Republicans, and decide to vote Libertarian. I only saw this commercial once on TV, and it was on CNN. I didn't think it was a highly effective commercial, though, because it didn't seem very convincing.

When everyone in the media started taking about Social Security reform, some commercials were released. Some Democratic organisation released a commercial about how "horrible" privatisation is, and how Bush's plan was to "privatise" Social Security which would 'pull the rug out from under the elderly'. Republican groups were saying that Social Security "needs to be saved", and how "great" Roosevelt was.

I would have LOVED to see a Libertarian commercial. One that, in a quick thirty seconds, explained how SS is screwing Americans, how Bush's plan would be chuck full of destructive government regulations (far from privatisation), and to quickly and seccinctly explain why we would be far better off with the Libertarian solution of allowing citizens to control their own retirements, free of government regulation.

I know this is only one issue, but you don't need to sell them on every issue at once. The more they hear of the LP, the more they'll think, "You know, these Libertarians have a point. Why SHOULD government get to decide how I live my life?"

To sell Liberty, we must show people the benefits we could reap from a free society.

QUOTE: "I do want to add though, we are not marketable right now, especially with the idea of open borders that people do not want, (especially do not want). We are at serious risk for a major WMD EVENT in this country due to open borders."

Open borders isn't what's putting this country at risk. Interventionism is. The LP's border policy was one of the initial things that attracted me to supporting it.

Alex,

Just know than in the average American's mind, open borders after 9/11 is a huge loser. It's another one of those ideals we are going to have to work TOWARDS instead of demanding now.

Technology is your best buddy. We have the means to allow a quick check at the border against international police records, while at the same time hopefully electing enough libs to offce so we can get rid of the stupid foreign policy that causes terrorism in the first place.

Every libertarian is going to have to give up the RIGHT NOWS and ABOLISH THIS AND THAT for goals to be set when they make sense to try to sell the public on them. And going from where we are now to there will never, ever, work. May as well just fold the tent.

I agree with Alex Peak on his commerical strategy. The LP news always says transformation to liberty won't just come overnight. I agree with that statement. our country did not become a big government society overnight it took years, so the transition of our country to Libertarian Principles will take years. If we are going to make commericals more effective we don't need to cram all the issues into one commerical we need to make commericals based one issues and over time we make more commericals and people will come to the LP. If the Squyares Zero Dues proposal is passed then that will help with the membership.

Again I stress,
1. When you log on the computer. What commercial do you see? Some car advertising. Why not Libertarian?
2. Remember the old smiley faces, everyone remembers that. Well the same should work for Libertarian. So when voting time comes, they remember who we are and what we stand for at the polls, if our votes still count and the goverment did put a fix on it..
3. How about posting sign on street buses.
4. The lazy way and cheap, HEY EVERYONE POST WANT FREEDOM, VOTE LIBERTARIAN and post it on the WINDOWS OF OUR CARS. lp.org DUHHHHH.
5. The donkey ass and Elephant that belongs to the other parties. We should have a strong firery logo for our party. So the seed is planted and remembered for upcomming election.
Maybe if we have enough money, how about sky writing over the coast.
So people if we are serious let prove it to other people by doing. Especially if we want to build volume to vote Libertarian.

our market strategy of making t-shirts is great, but we do not need people freaking out over the market strategy. I am not getting riled up over this t-shirt contest because the LP has other ways of getting more members and making more money even if this t-shirt contest flops and I am not implying the t-shirt contest will flop. I like that one t-shirt idea which is a statement with a picture of Bush after reading it 100% of that statement is true and it is a great idea for other LP advirtisements also.

I saw only one Michael Badnarik commerical during the 2004 election it was a couple sitting around a table with a newspaper. In 2008 the LP needs to go back to the drawing board with the commericals. I have seen better campaign commericals on the internet that did not get on TV. The LP radio and TV commericals addressing issues also needs to be on during non-election years to get more members. The candidates should have their own commericals to attract voters during the election year. We need commericals for the sole purpose to attract more members to the LP. during election years we need commericals for candidates. Radio commericals are less in cost, but effective so is internet advirtising that will be very effective.

Been contributing ideas to bumperstatements.com (I believe it is a subsidiary of Cafepress)for a couple of months. You don't make any money for your submissions but you earn points if your sticker does well in the contest.

I've seen this design a few times, but it's never been attributed to one party.

http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/2986/front1pe.jpg

http://img293.imageshack.us/img293/3366/back9ps.jpg

I HAVE A GOOD COMMERCIAL.
Person bending over, Goverment doing an enema.
at the end of commerical we say
TIRED OF BENDING OVER! VOTE LIBERTARIAN.

short and sweet and right to the point!

In Las Vegas Nevada, I saw one Badnarik commercial during the 2004 election cycle. I saw it maybe two or three times (I don't watch a lot of TV). It was pretty sucky.

The concept was good ... that in many ways Bush and Kerry are alike, vote for someone different.

The implementation was poor. It was Aaron Russo's talking head. He was less than dynamic.

He also was a very poor choice for ads in Nevada after his abortive attempt at the Nevada governorship.

I heard this quote recently from our county LP chair and thought it was pretty good...

http://www.thebrainspur.com/images/lp_shirt.jpg

I've always wanted an LP shirt with my moniker on it. Something like:

Libertarianarkid votes to-
-Keep his .45 ACP
-Protect his retirement money
-Stay out of jail
-Get bigger paychecks from work
-Healthcare reform
-Get all of his constitutional rights back from the thieves of D.C.

Other ideas: "Go vote Libertarian, Hmmmmmkay."

"You should be old enough to fire your nanny; save your money-stop voting for them."

"Driver carries no cash, Your Republicans and Democrats took it all."

How about this: Elephants and Donkeys carry the burden of big government on their backs while Liberty keeps holding her torch up high.

I NOTICE the Torch keep getting brought up. I am wondering CAN A LIT TORCH be our Trademark?

The Statue of Liberty should be our trademark and I have seen The Republicans copycat the LP logo for their convention last year on the internet. I think the statue of liberty should be the permanent trademark.

I think Lady Liberty is the official mascot. (Correct me if I'm wrong.)

There are some that believe the "Liberty Penguin" should be the mascot, though.

I would like to know if there's a party colour. Let's say the LP wins a state in 2008, what colour will it be on the map?

THE OBVIOUS answer, RED, Strength, Vibrant, since this is already being use here on the Web site.
I think we could add to the lady liberty if is our offical mascot. Can this Web site be updated to make the fire buring in the torch with java?

I think the flame actually burning might remain in people's mind as a symbol for Libertarians.

How about, "I voted Libertarian and all I got was this lousy t-shirt." Unfortunately, that's the reality.

I realize this is late and all, but maybe someone will see it and it can still help.

T-shirt design:

Two Problems:
(pic. of Donkey and elephant)
One Solution:
(pic. of Statue of Liberty)

LP.org