Who decides what your team uniform will loook like?

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Aug 29, 2018
83
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I’m curious how other travel ball orgs. design team uniforms? Is every team in the org required to wear the same uniform? Can individual teams design their own? Are players allowed to wear any pants, cleats, helmets, and socks they want?

Does your org conduct focus groups, surveys and opinion poll with parents and players during the design process? Has a team ever uniformly refused to wear the uniform pants because they would rather wear their own?

I see so many teams wearing a compete uniform and I wonder how they were ever able to agree upon it across multiple teams, ages, etc. our org is trying to establish a uniform and none of the teams seem to really want a single choice option...I think it’s important to note our travel ball teamis part of a rec league so they are used to wearing their own pants and not a complete uniform
 
Apr 28, 2014
2,316
113
We are part of an org with 9 teams. Two of the coaches Male and Female decide on the uniforms for the year
They stay pretty consistent year after year.
If they would open it up for feedback it would be a tire fire.
Our HS is is trying to decide on new uniforms. Coach gave the girls some choices and its become a mess.
Keep it simple I'm my opinon.
 
Last edited:
Apr 30, 2018
349
43
I'm going to speak up to the head of our organization next time we have to order uniforms about the brand they selected. The uniforms we have are cheap and were coming unstiched right out of the box. Within two washes the shirt material is getting little balls on it. Cheap doesn't work for travel ball teams that are playing tournaments every other weekend and practicing twice as week.

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Apr 12, 2016
316
28
Minnesota
At the rec/travel level it can be interesting. I am coaching at our local level now that my girls are done playing. Our local association board specifies the uniform and all teams 10U and up wear the same thing. They do that primarily so girls don't have to buy all new gear every year. They kept the pants a basic solid color and girls get a pair as part of their fee. Jerseys, socks, and belts are also part of the fee. If girls want to wear a different brand that looks the same, nobody cares. Cleats and helmets are pretty much whatever the girls want but again most girls wear navy helmets and black cleats. Teams can get special jerseys made if they stay within color requirements. We did that last year for state/nationals.

Is there a board for your org? It sounds like your org is trying to get some standardization. I know that most orgs my girls played for were particular about branding. Our girls wanted to get alternate color pants one year and the org said no. A different white jersey was OK.

In my experience, if the girls are ever going to try out for and play for higher level TB teams, parents and girls will need to get used to wearing what you are told to wear without much input.

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Jul 14, 2018
982
93
Luckily, DD's travel, rec, and MS teams all allow the girls to supply their own pants. I have no idea how teams make it work with the matching pants. DD has a closet full of pants, all the same 'size' from different manufacturers and they all fit differently. All of her teams have a standard jersey for each team -- there are differences at each age level. Some parents (me included) don't like the black belt/black pants/black socks combo that our travel team wears, but it's a minor issue.
 

CoreSoftball20

Wilson = Evil Empire
DFP Vendor
Dec 27, 2012
6,215
113
Kunkletown, PA
If you allow everybodys input, you will never get an agreement and be able to get the uni done :)


Also, have seen this happen many times as well. Seen orgs/teams with "friends" of the org (parent of a player or spouse/family of a coach or whatever) completely rip off the parents
for uniform prices/quality only because people are friends/family. So uniforms never get shopped around and you get worse quality or pay way too much. My wife helped coach
for multiple teams and I sat back and looked at some of this stuff happen and just shook my head.
 

marriard

Not lost - just no idea where I am
Oct 2, 2011
4,312
113
Florida
Our org has a uniform committee who goes out to get quotes and makes decisions on the choices that will be made for teams. The individual teams choose from the options available. Only jerseys are mandatory.

Mandatory jerseys:
For game jerseys there is 2 price level choices (expensive and not-as-expensive) and 3 colors - so they have a choice of up to 6 designs. Most teams go for 1 expensive, 1 not-as-expensive in different colors
Practice jerseys are 2 colors, standard dri-fit. There is also the option to put numbers on these if you want a really cheap set of uniforms. Our HS age teams generally decide to save money on uniforms and do this exclusively because they have extensive travel costs.

Our jersey provider also provides 3-4 designs in all org colors on pants which are not mandatory but are really cost-effective for teams if they place orders at the same time we do our uniform order. I would say 1/3 of our teams buy softball pants (generally the younger teams) - the others will offer it to their players and order a few for those that want them. Our older teams don't have 'team' pants - most just choose a solid color and tell the parents to get what fits their kid best.

We have a spiritwear provider (who is actually different to our uniform provider) who can provide anything else an individual team may decide to do (hats, socks, jackets, bows, etc, etc) and also provides supporter gear (they can put our logo on almost anything).
 
Feb 15, 2016
273
18
We are part of an org with 9 teams. Two of the coaches Male and Female decide on the uniforms for the year
They stay pretty consistent year after year.
If they would open it up for feedback it would be a tire fire.
Our HS is is trying to decide on new uniforms. Coach gave the girls some choices and its become a mess.
Keep it simple I'm my opinon.

I have been through the tire fire before and learned from it. The key to pants is having samples for the girls to try on. Weather Mizuno, Boombah, Allison whatever, you have to have one pair of each size on hand so the girls can all try them on before ordering. I have also found that having a common brand and a non-custom color makes it really easy for girls who want extra pants, rip their pants, etc... to just go online and order another pair. The custom sublimated everything looks good but is a pain in the butt to replace.
 

marriard

Not lost - just no idea where I am
Oct 2, 2011
4,312
113
Florida
I have been through the tire fire before and learned from it. The key to pants is having samples for the girls to try on. Weather Mizuno, Boombah, Allison whatever, you have to have one pair of each size on hand so the girls can all try them on before ordering. I have also found that having a common brand and a non-custom color makes it really easy for girls who want extra pants, rip their pants, etc... to just go online and order another pair. The custom sublimated everything looks good but is a pain in the butt to replace.

Totally agree on pant colors - we don't even care about brand since if you stick to solid black, white and red (with no piping) they are pretty much the same unless you are looking REALLY closely.

Last year there was an online sale of Rawlings white softball pants for $6 one of our parents found - I believe our team bought whatever they had in stock.
 
Jul 16, 2013
4,659
113
Pennsylvania
Both orgs I have been involved with had standard uniform colors. Each team was permitted to make some changes as long as they worked within the same color scheme. To keep things transparent, we would always show any modifications to the board before we purchased something.

Last year we played 23u so things were a bit different. We requested input from the players who decided to go with t-shirts. We ordered t-shirts with the orgs color scheme and permitted all the players to wear any softball pants they wanted, as long as they were black. This was a team that consisted of 16 college players. They all owned black pants, so it was an easy sell.
 

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