[petra]

Great analysis. Altough i'm not sure that about the shopper side - since t-shirts are a self-expressive medium and not just a commodity like wine, probably there's value in offering a large selection.

And if we'd change the old model to something like this:

No prize. N designers competing. Top 1/3 win, and take all of the royalties of all the shirts in the competition, forever.

How would you analyze that ? would it be a good model ?

[strebler]

Yes, having a store with selection is good for shopping. The contest is part merchandising and part marketing to show the "top hot new" SKU.

For any contest to work, you need good entries. The prize is the payout that motivates those entries.

I think a hybrid approach could likely work, where everyone's entry is buyable by default (and they get royalties). I'm not sure people would like if the winner(s) get royalties of other entries, but it might work.

One factor I'm realizing (which may have motivated the change) is that contests are a more of a "novelty" from a marketing perspective, so it may have sustainability issues. People easily get bored, especially if it's the same experience repeated over and over.