Tour Merch Guidelines for Full Service Clients*

An introduction to terrible* tour merch

Tour merch is a logistical and operational puzzle that must be solved before the tour merch can be successfully delivered on time. Please read and share this guide with your teams and creatives as soon as your tour is booked.

The contents of this page may already be second nature to most teams, but as every one has a different way of working, we think its an important set of guidelines for working together successfully. When followed, artist's retail businesses, really do perform at their very best on tour.

Requirements and deadlines

The following requirements and deadlines that must be met ahead of tour, as well as our design and production guidelines. Our production guidelines also include all our current leadtimes which will help your creative teams set and meet their deadlines responsibly.

DEADLINE: 6 weeks out from first tour date

We aim to complete this stage within 1 week

1. All artwork, art files and briefs should be with us 6 weeks ahead of tour starting, if these are not being created and managed in-house by terrible*
2. All of the above must be submitted in the correct formats. You can find those specs here
3. Please advise terrible* on any preferences for blanks or styles if you have these. Please identify by the official product name, official product colour and SKU code from the manufacturer (please ask us if this is confusing, we are here to help)
4. Any amends and changes to the above may slow processes down, so please be timely with communication and amends
5. Its worth noting that if you require samples, we require more time!

DEADLINE: 5 weeks out from first tour date

We aim to complete this stage within 2 weeks

This deadline is for tours without Merchandise Managers that require terrible* to advance the merchandise.

1. Tour logistics plan that includes whether you are flying in, driving or travelling by other means
2. Ticket sales and venue capacities (please update us weekly)
3. "Space to carry merchandise" estimates for your tour transport
4. Tour Manager contact details and an introduction to our team
5. Promoter contacts
6. Venue contacts and delivery instructions
7. To know whether you require sellers or merch assistants at shows and for you to agree to seller and assistant rates

DEADLINE: 4 weeks out from first tour date

We aim to complete this stage within 1-2 weeks

This deadline is for tours with Merchandise Managers

1. Tour logistics plan that includes whether you are flying in, driving or travelling by other means
2. Ticket sales and venue capacities (please update us weekly)
3. "Space to carry merchandise" estimates for your tour transport
4. Tour Manager contact details and an introduction to our team
5. Merch Manager contact details and an introduction to our team
6. Promoter contacts
7. Venue contacts and delivery instructions

Once the deadlines are met, we will

1. Run tour merch projections for approval
2. Quote and invoice merchandise goods for approval, advise of inventory shortages and suggest alternatives
3. Plan any necessary merchandise splits
4. Plan deliveries and collections
5. Suggest ideal restock dates
6. Begin the advance process for each show

DEADLINE : 3 weeks before first tour date

1. Projection approvals, quote/invoice approvals and artwork approvals for soft merch and posters must all happen no later than 3 weeks before the first tour date, but more time is always better
2. Please be timely with approvals once you have them, but please also review all details with great care before approving
3. Logistical plans and agreed restock dates must be agreed as soon as possible, but within maximum of 48 hours of receipt

Although we do our very best to always deliver and our supply chain usually goes above and beyond for terrible* artists, any missed deadlines may mean you miss having merch for first tour dates.

Supply chains are complex network and do experience hiccups. One late delivery to a factory or one late delivery to a venue from the factory, can impact impact an entire tour if it doesn’t have the time frames we have outlined to successfully deliver a tour.

We often pull off small miracles, but small miracles are risky and costly for artists

On the road

Restocks

1. Ahead of tour, we will plan ideal restock days which will require you to be ‘on call’ and available to approve if a restock is needed
2. If you are happy for us to restock your tour merch as needed and without approval, please advise us before tour
3. Restocks are treated differently to initial orders and we will always be as transparent as possible with any additional costs or variations to costs or products

Retail pricing

1. Please download and use our RRP calculator here to ensure you have considered all costs associated with selling merchandise on tour so you’re able to reach profitability. 'Cost per Unit' should also include things like logistics, we advise adding $2/£1/€1.50 for this, if you don't know those costs
2. We will happily advise on average pricing in each region upon request, we are here to help!
3. We will also check and re-confirm pricing if we believe venue cuts or concessions at venues will mean you lose money

Missed deliveries

You will be sent tracking from terrible* logistics for all deliveries. To avoid missing deliveries, please save and monitor via the links. If something does go wrong...

1. Make contact with the logistics provider immediately, as the receiver you have the most authority to request a redelivery or to authorise a delivery to a new location or to a pick up point or arrange a collection from a local depot
2. Make contact with the terrible* logistics via email and notify us as soon as possible so we can assist too. Please also provide us with venue contacts of missed delivery and next date venue contacts when doing so. This will save us much needed time
3. In some instances, we can and will use same day couriers to collect and travel to next venues, but this is costly and will require approval

Point of sale

If you require a POS, please advise of this at the start of the tour merch process. We can provide POS and reporting for the UK, Euro and US. Our fees for POS are here. We collect and pay taxes on all retail sales at shows which can read more about here

In advance of tour please submit the following to us:

1. Any music products or additional merch we haven’t made must he submitted to us in advance. To successfully submit products for sale, we require you to send a description, a packshot, your RRPs and inventory numbers 
2. For any key people who require access to reporting via portal* please send us full names and email addresses for each person

Concessions and ‘Venue Sells’ 

1. We collect revenue and provide all relevant legal and administrative documents to concessions and venues, please advise us if you would prefer to do this yourself and send us your legal and administrative documents to share with venues and concessions

Adhoc tour merch guidance

Additional fees and costs to consider on tour

1. Logistics costs are an artist cost and billed separately from merchandise invoices. The more time we have to ship, the less logistics will cost the artist
2. In the US and CAN Merch Seller fees start at $150 a show and Merch manager fees are set at a baseline of $1500 a week or $200 a show, this can be as high as $450 a show. PD’s are expected for all touring party members including merchandise managers 
3. In the UK/EU Merch Seller fees start at £85/€100 per show but can and go as high as £150/€200 a show depending on where you are touring. Merch manager fees start at £150/€200 per show. Travel days are paid, but at a lower rate than show days. PD’s are expected for all touring party members including merchandise managers 
4. In all regions, Merchandise Managers on the road are members of the touring party and unless merchandise has its own ground transport and crew, Merchandise Managers travel with the touring party
5. If a tour or date is cancelled, please let your team know as soon as possible. The difference of a day means we may be be able to halt production or logistics movements to save you on merchandise costs

US - Seller tips on tour for Europeans

1. To ensure we are able to get the best sellers and managers on the road in the US, tips are turned on, on your POS. Most sellers will not work without this option
2. 100% of all tips go directly to your seller, in many states this is a legal requirement, but tipping culture in the US is for the benefit the person who is serving the customer/fan and it is not intended for the artist or the crew
3. Tips are not considered revenue for the artist or crew, your merch manager is fan facing and they are the only member of your touring party who can generate more revenue for the tour after fees/budgets are set

EU/UK - Seller tips on tour for North Americans

1. There is no tipping culture in Europe and The UK and having the option to tip on POS is often frowned upon outside of ‘sit-down restaurant’ settings. However, we are happy for you to activate tips on POS, but it’s unlikely it will be used by customers/fans

Other helpdocs for tour

1. Tours - Best Practice
2. Touring with terrible* US
3. Touring with terrible* UK/EU
4. Getting to know portal*