VBS is one of the biggest and most predictable merch pushes of the year — which also means it's one of the easiest to plan for well in advance.
The key with VBS is designing around your curriculum theme rather than something generic. Whether your church runs curriculum from Lifeway, Group, Orange, or another publisher, we've built shirt idea guides tailored to specific themes each year — worth a search on our blog once your VBS theme is confirmed.
What tends to work best for VBS:
Start planning: 8–10 weeks before your VBS week.
Summer camp shirts have a way of sneaking up, since camp planning tends to compete with everything else on the calendar for attention. If you haven't already, our summer camp shirt guide and complete ordering guide walk through design ideas and a full ordering timeline.
What tends to work best for camp:
Start planning: 10–12 weeks before camp.
Back to school is a short window with a hard deadline — school start dates don't move. Our back to school shirt guide covers design and timing in detail.
What tends to work best:
Start planning: 4–6 weeks before the first day of school.
Kickoff season overlaps with back to school, but it's its own moment — the start of a new ministry year, not just a new school year. Our ministry kickoff shirt guide and Build Your Brand guide both dig into this in depth.
Start planning: 4–6 weeks before kickoff.
Fall is retreat season, and depending on your ministry, that might mean a traditional fall retreat, a DNOW weekend, or both. We've covered each separately: our fall retreat guide for camp directors and our DNOW shirt guide.
Many DNOW weekends are built around curriculum from publishers like Lifeway or The Gospel Project, so it's worth checking what your group is using before locking in a design direction.
Start planning: 6–8 weeks before the event.
Winter retreats bring their own set of design and product considerations — colder weather, indoor lodges, and often a more reflective tone than summer camp.
Start planning: 6–8 weeks before the retreat.
Christmas services, holiday outreach events, and end-of-year celebrations round out the calendar. These tend to be lower-volume but high-visibility moments — often the biggest attendance Sundays of the year.
Start planning: 6–8 weeks before your event, especially with holiday production schedules running tighter across the industry.
Unlike the seasonal pushes above, baptism shirts and other milestone merch tend to happen on their own schedule throughout the year. Our baptism shirt guide covers how to design something meaningful for these moments, including how churches are using Water Reveal Ink to visually reflect the moment itself.
The single biggest lesson across every season: work backward from your event date, not forward from "whenever we get around to it."
A simple rule of thumb across almost every event type on this list — start the design conversation 4–8 weeks out, depending on how custom your design needs to be. Sunday Cool's 72-hour turnaround after art approval is fast, but that clock only starts once your design is locked and your sizes are in.
If you're ever short on time, a Customizable Design Template is the fastest way to skip the blank-page problem and get to an approved design in days, not weeks.
What's the busiest season for church merch?Spring (VBS) and fall (kickoff, retreats, and DNOW) tend to be the two busiest windows, with back to school bridging the two in late summer.
How far in advance should we plan seasonal church merch?As a general rule, start the design conversation 4–8 weeks before your event, with more lead time for larger or more custom orders.
Do different seasons call for different products?Yes. Lighter apparel like the Super-Soft Tee tends to fit spring and summer events, while Super-Soft Hoodies, Crewnecks, and Long Sleeves are better suited for fall and winter.
Is there a way to keep our merch cohesive across the whole year?Sticking to one core color palette or design system — and leaning on bundles like Build Your Brand — helps keep your church's look consistent across every season.
No matter what season you're planning for, the same principle holds: start early, keep the design simple, and choose apparel people will actually want to wear again.
👉 Ready to Get Started?Start your custom order HERE
Discover how we can elevate your next T-shirt design.
Take the wheel and choose your own design from our library for us to customize
Submit your logo or design to add to your T-shirt/apparel or promo order
Tell us about the idea you have for a design that our superb artist can make come true
At Sunday Cool, it's about way more than t-shirts.
Sunday Cool Studios is our creative content hub. Come explore.
Passwords are so last year. Enter your email and we’ll send you a magic code to login. Easy-Peasy.
Redirecting… Continue to dashboard.
%201.avif)
