Shipping and process policies
Before you send anything to me, I will supply you with an estimate and detailed “next step” instructions. When you send your jerseys to me, please include a printout of your estimate inside the box, make and additions or corrections in pen on that form, and make sure you add your return mailing address if not on the form already. I will bill you after I have looked over the jersey(s), send your proof and before I begin work. Payment on custom work is expected before I begin to stitch.
I recommend that you ship your packages insured.
My mailing address is:
Bill Henderson
The Dream Shop
PO Box 39
Gradyville PA. 19039
Note: If you are shipping UPS or Federal Express and cannot mail to a PO Box, you can send to our street address at your risk. ALWAYS insure your package and require a signature on delivery. We are in a rural area, and things are generally safe left on the front porch, but these carriers do not always follow the rules, even when a signature is requested.
1080 Forest Lane
Glen Mills PA 19342
When I ship back to you, I also ship insured, and if the value is over $350 or so, the Post Office may ask for a signature upon delivery. Keep this in mind, especially if the postman delivers mail to your home when you are not there.
Please send me clean jerseys to letter. I use heat in my process, and sweaty jerseys placed in the heat-press will seal in dirt and smells forever. If I have to launder your jersey before lettering I charge an additional $10.
Why I don’t sew on lettering that other people cut
I am getting more and more of these requests— “I bought lettering from an internet vendor and I wonder if you will sew it on?”
I like to try to help people, I really do… but my first observation is I have yet to ever see lettering sold online that is team-year correct. It is always the wrong size, the wrong fonts, the wrong colors, with outlines too thick or too narrow. It is often of substandard quality. Buyers misjudge that it will be easy to find someone locally to sew it on, then learn that no professional where they live wants to do it, or even knows how.
For me, if I may say so with all kindness intended, this is the equivalent of bringing food into a restaurant and asking them to cook it for you. I want to be helpful, but sewing someone else’s incorrect lettering on their expensive shirt is not something I want to be a part of.
Consider: I have the right patterns, the right fabrics, and can do the whole job with quality from start to finish. I ask: please avoid the temptation to buy pre-cut lettering, unless you have a sewing machine and can do it yourself, and are probably willing to settle for results that are less than on-field spec.
You might wonder: In all of the cases that people have sent me lettering to sew— we have cut new lettering and started over. It turned out to be the smartest thing to do. A single example of this is shown here. There absolutely is a difference!
What We Don't Do
Two things fall outside our scope by choice. Sublimated fabrics — where color is printed directly onto the material, sometimes blending or fading across a design — require an entirely different production process. Many City Connect uniforms use this technique, but it isn't what we do. Vinyl and silk-screened lettering are also not services we offer.
Special Cases — Direct Embroidery
For direct embroidery work we contract with trusted outside vendors. This includes memorial sleeve patches of the type the Mets used following 9/11, tributes to players and personnel, and
chain stitching — a nearly lost art once common from the early twentieth century through the 1960s. Contracted embroidery involves additional cost and two-way shipping time, but if it's what your project requires, it's almost certainly something we can arrange.
Our commitment to fraud protection
My reputation is very important to me. I am keenly aware that the accuracy of my work could make it very easy for someone to represent my recreations as original and team issued. To ensure that my work is never misrepresented, I have a very simple set of rules I follow without exception:
I will not alter manufacturer labels, nor will I alter or recreate team tagging. I surely understand that many of my projects are intended to be kept by their owners forever and proudly displayed. But the opportunity to become an unwitting part of fraud should the jersey be misrepresented and sold in a future transaction as something that it is not, causes me to draw the line here.
When performing a player name or number change on a team-issued jersey (or one that could easily be mistaken for team issued by a knowledgeable buyer) I do three things:
I sew my shop’s label inside the jersey, into the back of the player name or numbers. It cannot be seen from the outside, but will be obvious on close inspection, and cannot be removed without disturbing the stitching (see photo below.)
I invisibly mark every such garment for potential future identification.
I maintain a database of all such work for later reference.
For further information on this subject, view our Safe Harbor Agreement.
Risks and limitations of liability
When restoring jerseys, there is always the slight risk of causing damage that cannot be repaired invisibly.
You must assume this risk. While I am skilled at this task, please understand this possibility before we begin. This is why your valuable items should always be insured.
When removing lettering, I can generally tell early if it is going to come off without leaving marks or holes, but sometimes, especially on newer, CoolBase or color-sublimated fabric, we don’t know until the after damage has occurred.
Removing glue and stains always has risks. I have experience with the chemicals I use, and test first on an inconspicuous area but it is possible that fabric may be discolored or old stains may remain.
If I suspect the project may fail, I will stop at once and ask your advice. The remedy is generally to re-sew the old lettering back, or recreate lettering that covers the old marks. There is a charge for this.
I always ship my packages insured and recommend that you do the same. Yes, it is more expensive but nothing is worse than expecting an expensive package that never arrives.
For a deeper dive on this topic view this document.
Here, an example of hidden damage on a minor-league repurposed jersey that required extra skill to repair. While the results here were near perfect, not all damage can be invisibly repaired