MEET MIKE - MEET EXCELLENCE

Mike Fadem is the President and CEO of Sunburst Logo, Inc., a St. Louis based supplier of custom screenprinted and embroidered T-shirts and apparel for the Midwest region. Approachable and forthright, Mike?s philosophy of business is simple: communicate with your customer to identify objectives. Through clear communication, Mike forged solid customer relationships, and fostered the growth of Sunburst Logo, now serving the St. Louis, Kansas City and Springfield areas. Here, Mike outlines his business philosophy: to achieve excellence in customer relationships and product quality and value.

I founded Sunburst Logo 14 years ago because I saw a need for screenprinted and embroidered apparel. I believed that if I could communicate with my potential customer and identify their objective, I could develop a viable market. It worked.

Our typical customer will request a bid on custom screenprinted tees or embroidered hats, golf shirts or jackets that would range any where from one dozen to one thousand pieces. We do not have a set way of doing things, because our customer base is so diverse. We pride our selves in the ability to be flexible. We treat the small tee shirt orders with the same respect and attention to detail as the large tee shirt orders. We realize that the customer who only needs twelve to twenty four embroidered shirts is typically on a very limited budget. Their expenditure is just as important to him or her as a major corporation's massive tee shirt order is to them. We give it the same respect and attention to detail because we know that it's all relative. I believe that this sensitivity to our customers is what distinguishes Sunburst Logo from most other custom screen printing and custom embroidery companies.

We get the bulk of our work two ways. The first way is repeat business. The same customer who orders now will call us back in four months when the season changes. In other words, they will go from custom screen printed short sleeve tees to custom screen printed long sleeve tees, or they will go from custom embroidered short sleeve polos to custom embroidered long sleeve denim shirts?maybe even embroidered winter hats to screen printed summer hats. We find that a repeat custom screen printing customer is usually easier to deal with than a first time custom screen printing customer. Why?

The first time you meet a customer, you not only have to sell him his custom embroidery or custom screen printing, you have to sell him your integrity. The repeat customer is already confident in your ability to deliver on your promises, so all he wants to do is either repeat his last order or just change the style shirt or hat or jacket.

Sunburst Logo has combination of over two thousand hats, shirts and jackets. These range from what those in the screen printing industry refer to as a disposable carnival tees to extremely high-end designer brand polo shirts such as Bill Blass, Izod, Outerbanks, etc. worthy of the highest quality embroidery. No choice is right or wrong. It simply relates to customer goals and objectives.

There are many reasons why you would prefer to work with Sunburst Logo on your Custom embroidery and Custom screenprinting projects. One of the more important ones is that we provide new custom embroidery customers with a finished sew out of their digitized embroidery before we actually apply it to the shirts hats or jackets. That way there is never a surprise when you open up your box. If there is an adjustment, we can simply edit the logo and provide another embroidered sew out for approval. Then and only then, do we start the embroidery production process. Surprisingly, this is not common industry standard.

Another reason is value. At Sunburst Logo, we encourage you to compare our bid to at least two other competitors, to be sure that you are getting the best possible value. We do this with confidence. When dealing with a new embroidery or screen printing customer, we will provide your bid as requested, AND we usually try to bring some thing to the table in addition to that bid to create a perceived overall value that our competitors never even thought to volunteer. This is very conducive to establishing a first time customer. Once we complete that first order, the repeat orders usually take care of themselves, as well as the referrals. No matter the size of your custom screen printing or custom embroidery order you can be assured that it will be given respect. It will be produced by professionals who have over a million logos of experience under their belt.

Our custom embroidery staff has well over one million embroidered sew outs under its belt. We also realize that the finished embroidery is only as good as the artist who digitized it. A digitizer produces unique work. A good digitizer has the ability to throw the stitches in different directions in order to create the illusion of depth. This allows the image to become almost three dimensional, while remaining clean, sharp and crisp. For example, when establishing embroidery for a hat, a good digitizer will recognize that a hat is a round and will embroider differently then flat goods like shirts or jackets. A hat logo will always work on a shirt but a shirt logo won?t always work on a hat. A superior digitizer can often create an embroidery logo that will work on both, thus saving money towards future orders. We can also do specialty embroidery applications such as puff and even specialty embroidery threads such as neon, metallic, and glow in the dark threads.

Our custom screen printing staff also has well over 1 million screen printed applications under its belt. They are accustomed to using the finest screen printing equipment that our industry offers. We are capable of handling twelve shirts or twelve thousand shirts. We can offer spot color screen printing as well as ten color simulation screenprinting. We use manual as well as automated press, capable ofprinting as many as four hundred shirts an hour, ten colors at a time. We offer a variety of specialty custom screenprinting effects such as glow in the dark, metallic, puff and high density screenprinting applications.

Although much of our business is corporate, we recognize that every piece of artwork is unique. Custom orders are our specialty.

We welcome your bids. It couldn?t be easier! Visit our website, go to free bid request, and tell us how many and what style shirt you would like from the online catalog. Simply email us the logo with placement instructions and preference on the manner in which you would like it applied (screen printed or embroidered). Fast, friendly responses are guaranteed via email or by phone, (please leave your phone number.)

REMEMBER: We are FLEXIBLE. Some of our customers buy in the thousands, and others need one dozen. The size of your order does not influence the level of our service or customer respect and attention to detail. Your order, no matter what the size, is just as important to us as it is toYOU. COUNT ON IT.

SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS--LISTEN TO THIS!

Sunburst Logo is committed to networking. We cater to almost every vocation imaginable. We become friends with many of our customers and often run cross promotions with them. Even though we are in totally different industries, we often have mutual customers. Sunburst Logo believes that if we work together in the right direction, we can go places that we can?t reach on our own. If you are a business owner and have a way that we can integrate your services, we might consider a discount in exchange for partial trade or barter, or a link on your site. Thank you, and I hope to hear from you soon.

Sincerely,

Mike Fadem, Owner