Whenever I’m looking to get a good deal of new patches I start with Retaliation prods, but the website is gone, so is ebay account. I had the guy who ran it on Facebook but I deleted my account some time ago so have no way of messaging him. Any idea what happened to the site? Had some stuff I definitely wish I had ordered in time.
Oriol, the main guy behind Retaliation Prods knows about this post, not sure if he’s writing a response but he posted this on Instagram to sum up what happened
Reasonable decision and fully understandable. The wave that overcame the "patch market" in the last months and years is weird at best, especially seeing all those weird shapes popping up.
What i did not understand , is the statement that officially means crap automatically? Woven Hoof for example makes a lot of official patches and he is at the top of the movement currently. Same for nearly everything that Mr. Greylord does.
Other than that: Spot on.
"Official will never mean good". Finally someone points this out. I grew out of the patch frenzy aeons ago, but you can't be on a page like this and disregard and ever-growing patch market, so I'm somehow familiar with this trend... Thus being said, am I the only one who believes that 90-95% of modern day patches (mainly from Pull the plug) are absolutely dreadful????
I think he refers to the common mentality by which an "official" tag often determines whether a patch will be worthy of its namesake or not, when in many cases it's just the other way around; there are bootlegs which look stunning and there are official ones which can't hold a candle to the former in terms of quality and design, and vice versa.
I see, tanks for clearing that up. For me it sounded like official = automatically bad quality.
In that case i completely agree, there is a ton of official stuff, that looks like ass and especially designed without any passion.
The smaller patch/pin producers are kind of underappreciated. There's been quality releases that would take time to sell out. Example, I have and used 3 of the new Atrophy, Socialised Hate patches. How could these patches still be available?
Exactamente!! Exceso de colores, formas absurdas, no tienen ninguna gracia!
Bueno, una pena por Retaliation, realmente me gustaba su versión de Mark of the Beast, pero cuando intenté comprarlo durante la pandemia no podían enviar a Chile, y luego se me olvidó intentar nuevamente jajaja.
As long as they are perceived as treasure, nothing can be done about that. The fact there's brick and mortar stores now that sell vintage t shirts speaks volumes.
It's indeed absurd, patch prices has doubled in just a few years. Two thumbs up for producers who makes something unique/not just patches with the hottest bands and also keeps prices fair, such as Retaliation Prods, Woven Hoof, Iron and Ash and Blood Like Rain.
If I recall rigth, patches costs about $2-2.50 to produce, a lot of profit in this business/game/pokemon collecting/call it what you will. It seems to me that a large profit is a bigger interest than true love for music and nice merch to many patch producers. Lots of hype, exact release time and date, small runs etc...
2-2.5 is very accurate as a patch maker. There are some hidden costs such as shipping, shipping taxes, shipping to bands, simply cost of producing for band or buying a license along with paypal/evay fees are brutal and in small runs can easily make it upto 4 per patch, but selling them for 10 is ridicilous for any new design that isnt like a supersize.
Don't forget that it also takes time to think of designs and to actually make them / arrange the motifs on the respective program. Graphic design , if done well! , takes time, especially reducing the colours, as far as i can see that as an outsider.
So i do not condem anybody who wants to make a bit of money within the patch game. But 10 for a regular patch is just obnoxious and ridiculous (we all know the name here haha). Up to let's say around 5 (maybe ! 6) for a well made (!) patch is absolutely fair in my opinion. The stuff by WovenHoofe, Greylord and BLR are absolute high class.
Another level are the backpatches of the patchmaster of course, hahaha
Sad to hear they've closed up shop. They really were one of the best. Patch hunting has been a roller coaster since I dove into the pool a decade ago. But to be fair everything collectable community is going through the same upsets right now.
We've seen some incredible patches made by metal fanatics over the years, (sanctioned and unsanctioned lol) and it's sad that the oversaturation, back biting an sneakiness became so bad that it's pushing out an established and respected producer.
I am very late to the merch game but I certainly was wondering what happened to old fashioned patch design. So basically, merch has become commercialized more than ever. There's a lot of crazy stuff being produced these days. Iron Maiden action figures? $100+ plastic sculptures of musicians?
It's a long story,let's say that they were forced to close and I can't say more,so sad to be honest because their designs was one of the best I have ever seen,with a old school style that I haven't seen in others
No worries, I fully understand! But it's a pity with all the hush-hush surrounding this, says a lot about those who hammer down the small producers into the ground.
retaliation-prods have his own style patches ,if you see it ,you know where it came from.I think the patche maker should do more like this .do not make mordern patches all.I also do not like weired shape.But i have to say PTPP made it more fashionable than before .I also like the old style patch .the style like 90' and around 2000.in normal shape .old should keep old .
It's a damn shame that they closed... I have bought loads of patches from them and I liked the fact that the prices were reasonable amd the designs fair as well...
We all should support small producers who make quality merch 🤘🏼
Damn that sucks, especially if they had problems with someone's fucking lawyers. Those were the glory days few years ago, when they started making patches. I'm lucky I have a fair amount that they made. I don't buy patches anymore since I finished my vest, but I still follow some groups and I agree that there is a big decrese in quality of deisgns
I am (or better, I was) the co-founder and main designer of Retaliation Prods. As I explain on my farewell Instagram post (for those who missed the link above: https://www.instagram.com/p/CWRZvCIogP3/?utm_medium=copy_link thanks Mute for bringing it up) the oversaturarion on the merchandise/patch market was giving us a hard time and the back biting and sneakiness of other producers was too much. There are well known stablished labels who love to crush other competitors by sending their lawyers or band managers. Very metalhead of them. They are simple capitalist money mongers.
One of these sent a manager after us. And my long-time partner had enough of all this bullshit. So we closed. Retaliation Prods is out of the game. What I noticed is that a lot of people supported us with heart, even though we were never bragging on social medias, releasing "sneak peak" posts or talking about modern words like "drops", this or that. I can even confirm that most of our customer base was old-school minded and a lot of them were the same guys that bought stuff from us since the beggining. I'm still very angry and saddened about it, but there's nothing I can do. The other producers have won, they can keep releasing their absolute official bullshit everywhere. There's a less competitor to worry about.
That other producer who sent us a manager also did the same to others and he was the only visible link between us and such manager. So much of a coincidence. Well, these guys can keep releasing their 10€ official patches.
PS: As a former patch producer I can guarantee that 10€ is an unjustifiable over-inflated price. Our old supplier charged us around 1$ per patch, so make your numbers.
Sad story that makes you furious while reading it. I actually planned to do a patch here and there too for a long time already, mainly for bands i personally worship that have no (good looking!) patches yet and that often are underground enough, not having too big of an audience.
but that manager/lawyer thing scares me off a bit to be honest. Sounds like Joey deMaio even.
I suggest you to make a very small run of embroidered patches, cause these can be made without minimum order. Just make a few for you and close friends and do not advertise/sell them online to avoid possible trouble. Just like some of these "HMFC" guys here on TSS do sometimes.
Thank you alot for those hints. Initially i wanted to do everything online, with advertisements but in small quanitites. But i might go for a complete offline/oral approach.
Appreciate it!
It's a shame, the patches from Retaliation Prods were well made and captured the essence of the artwork really well.
But it is true, the sheer amount of new patches coming to the market is just ridiculous. Everyday there is something new, it all got kind of boring if you ask me. I'm glad i got nearly everything i wanted.
The hunt for rare and unique patches is what is the greatest fun for me, but it seems like less and less people are willing to search for something unique which results in rip-offs and countless bootlegs, some of them don't even change anything and just copy it 1:1.
And from my experience this attitude comes from those who cry about patch prices most of the times.
Don't get me wrong here, i don't say that one has to pay hundreds of euros for a patch, just go on the hunt. I had to search some patches for years to get them for a reasonable price, but it was fun in the end and the experience was just great, a rewarding feeling.
Sometimes you have to be creative, i got a lot of my most wanted ones for example from a few people i met on festivals, mainly people that are over 40 years old and don't really have a use for them anymore cause they grew out of the shirt etc. What i want to say is that there are plenty of ways to obtain patches, and rare patches are surely not only in the hands of collectors, there is always a chance to make a bargain, you just have to search like a maniac.
And for those who don't want to take those efforts, it is okay too, for that purpose there are sites like retaliationprods who have great designs.
It just gets boring when more and more people are jumping on that train and bringing patches out every fucking day or week.
And often times, quantity outweighs quality in those cases.
And another result of this bootleg culture is the fact that less people are posting pictures of some originals here (including me) since the chance is big that it just gets ripped off and reproduced with a good picture. And it happened a few times which is just sad.
Plenty of distros and bands bandcamps worth supporting, after all. Hope money doesn't trump here. If money is the MO.... Beats the MO that drove metal into existence.
395,903 items in the gallery, 812,705 comments, and 244 items have changed hands in the last month.
Guess this TShirt!
Can you guess which metal TShirt this is from? Click here for all previous tshirt guesses
One of the finest Snakes around, and there are some gems, great score mate!
it is light blue actually, its pretty cool indeed :)
reserved!!!!!
Nice one...
I actually just put it down to $4 since it's a reprinted design.
Yooo how did you get this in green. I’ve only seen it in the red.
1A Lappen!
oh yes!
Destruction gone
iknow, i just lost one on a ebay auction :(
I found this on the battlefields nearby
(5568)
Mute on
Oriol, the main guy behind Retaliation Prods knows about this post, not sure if he’s writing a response but he posted this on Instagram to sum up what happened
https://www.instagram.com/p/CWRZvCIogP3/?utm_medium=copy_link
Into Glory Ride on
Reasonable decision and fully understandable. The wave that overcame the "patch market" in the last months and years is weird at best, especially seeing all those weird shapes popping up.
What i did not understand , is the statement that officially means crap automatically? Woven Hoof for example makes a lot of official patches and he is at the top of the movement currently. Same for nearly everything that Mr. Greylord does.
Other than that: Spot on.
AbysmalWind on
"Official will never mean good". Finally someone points this out. I grew out of the patch frenzy aeons ago, but you can't be on a page like this and disregard and ever-growing patch market, so I'm somehow familiar with this trend... Thus being said, am I the only one who believes that 90-95% of modern day patches (mainly from Pull the plug) are absolutely dreadful????
Into Glory Ride on
Didn't wanna mention any names but not you are not
As stated before i do think there are great newer ones aswell though
So why "official will never mean good" ?
AbysmalWind on
I think he refers to the common mentality by which an "official" tag often determines whether a patch will be worthy of its namesake or not, when in many cases it's just the other way around; there are bootlegs which look stunning and there are official ones which can't hold a candle to the former in terms of quality and design, and vice versa.
Into Glory Ride on
I see, tanks for clearing that up. For me it sounded like official = automatically bad quality.
In that case i completely agree, there is a ton of official stuff, that looks like ass and especially designed without any passion.
AbysmalWind on
Nailed it, buddy!
MortalFate on
The smaller patch/pin producers are kind of underappreciated. There's been quality releases that would take time to sell out. Example, I have and used 3 of the new Atrophy, Socialised Hate patches. How could these patches still be available?
Demolition_hell... on
Esos en especial son una puta basura , no sé que ve la gente en esos ''parches''
AbysmalWind on
Es que es increíble, con formas rarísimas y colores chillones, y por lo visto tienen una demanda muy alta. Inexplicable
Demolition_hell... on
Bueno, creo que es porque pone ''official'' y ya la peña se vuelve loca jajaja
Hárbarðr on
Exactamente!! Exceso de colores, formas absurdas, no tienen ninguna gracia!
Bueno, una pena por Retaliation, realmente me gustaba su versión de Mark of the Beast, pero cuando intenté comprarlo durante la pandemia no podían enviar a Chile, y luego se me olvidó intentar nuevamente jajaja.
Into Glory Ride on
Plus, what also needs to be said: The pricing of today's patches is beyond ridiculous.
Pull the Pizza on
Yea, I wanna see more discussion on this. a lot of patches are turning into collectors items, I don't really understand it
MortalFate on
As long as they are perceived as treasure, nothing can be done about that. The fact there's brick and mortar stores now that sell vintage t shirts speaks volumes.
Into Glory Ride on
I was more referring to the fact that certain sellers ask for $9,99 for a new patch, that is plain absurd
Pull the Pizza on
Oh my bad, I agree
Doomgarlic on
It's indeed absurd, patch prices has doubled in just a few years. Two thumbs up for producers who makes something unique/not just patches with the hottest bands and also keeps prices fair, such as Retaliation Prods, Woven Hoof, Iron and Ash and Blood Like Rain.
If I recall rigth, patches costs about $2-2.50 to produce, a lot of profit in this business/game/pokemon collecting/call it what you will. It seems to me that a large profit is a bigger interest than true love for music and nice merch to many patch producers. Lots of hype, exact release time and date, small runs etc...
Whispers of Death on
2-2.5 is very accurate as a patch maker. There are some hidden costs such as shipping, shipping taxes, shipping to bands, simply cost of producing for band or buying a license along with paypal/evay fees are brutal and in small runs can easily make it upto 4 per patch, but selling them for 10 is ridicilous for any new design that isnt like a supersize.
Into Glory Ride on
Don't forget that it also takes time to think of designs and to actually make them / arrange the motifs on the respective program. Graphic design , if done well! , takes time, especially reducing the colours, as far as i can see that as an outsider.
So i do not condem anybody who wants to make a bit of money within the patch game. But 10 for a regular patch is just obnoxious and ridiculous (we all know the name here haha). Up to let's say around 5 (maybe ! 6) for a well made (!) patch is absolutely fair in my opinion. The stuff by WovenHoofe, Greylord and BLR are absolute high class.
Another level are the backpatches of the patchmaster of course, hahaha
Speed or Bleed on
When i see a patch sold for like 10 bucks, new release and probably shitty design, i wish i could rip his god damn head off. Fucking Cunts!
Into Glory Ride on
Yeah, totally pathetic and off the charts. Can just hope they will go down with the trend sooner or later. Leches
bad_american1992 on
Sad to hear they've closed up shop. They really were one of the best. Patch hunting has been a roller coaster since I dove into the pool a decade ago. But to be fair everything collectable community is going through the same upsets right now.
We've seen some incredible patches made by metal fanatics over the years, (sanctioned and unsanctioned lol) and it's sad that the oversaturation, back biting an sneakiness became so bad that it's pushing out an established and respected producer.
solaris11 on
fuck that back biting ,but i know it happened several times ,i think it is another reason that retaliation prods closed.
Overactive Imag... on
We gettin' old brotha LOL!
bad_american1992 on
We are turning into vintage metal items ourselves hahaha.
MortalFate on
I am very late to the merch game but I certainly was wondering what happened to old fashioned patch design. So basically, merch has become commercialized more than ever. There's a lot of crazy stuff being produced these days. Iron Maiden action figures? $100+ plastic sculptures of musicians?
Demolition_hell... on
It's a long story,let's say that they were forced to close and I can't say more,so sad to be honest because their designs was one of the best I have ever seen,with a old school style that I haven't seen in others
Doomgarlic on
Who forced them to close? Bands or agressive patch producers? Would be good to know who to avoid in the future.
Whispers of Death on
In their words the explosion of patch makers, aswell as the complete witchhunt on bootleggers, or probably more accurate to say competitors.
Demolition_hell... on
I prefer don't say it to be honest, for something they must to stop
Doomgarlic on
No worries, I fully understand! But it's a pity with all the hush-hush surrounding this, says a lot about those who hammer down the small producers into the ground.
kissman on
I was asking myself the same thing... other than the old schhol patches from back in the day.... they were the next best thing IMO.
solaris11 on
retaliation-prods have his own style patches ,if you see it ,you know where it came from.I think the patche maker should do more like this .do not make mordern patches all.I also do not like weired shape.But i have to say PTPP made it more fashionable than before .I also like the old style patch .the style like 90' and around 2000.in normal shape .old should keep old .
"Official will never mean good"
David Dynamite on
It's a damn shame that they closed... I have bought loads of patches from them and I liked the fact that the prices were reasonable amd the designs fair as well...
We all should support small producers who make quality merch 🤘🏼
satanachist on
Damn that sucks, especially if they had problems with someone's fucking lawyers. Those were the glory days few years ago, when they started making patches. I'm lucky I have a fair amount that they made. I don't buy patches anymore since I finished my vest, but I still follow some groups and I agree that there is a big decrese in quality of deisgns
Overactive Imag... on
Bloodlikerain is gone now as well too.
Doomgarlic on
Their store is still up as far as I can see.
Overactive Imag... on
His Instagram is gone though
Overactive Imag... on
I believe whoever was threatening Corrosive graphics had Bloodlikerain's Instagram page shut down. I could be wrong though.
Corrosive on
I am (or better, I was) the co-founder and main designer of Retaliation Prods. As I explain on my farewell Instagram post (for those who missed the link above: https://www.instagram.com/p/CWRZvCIogP3/?utm_medium=copy_link thanks Mute for bringing it up) the oversaturarion on the merchandise/patch market was giving us a hard time and the back biting and sneakiness of other producers was too much. There are well known stablished labels who love to crush other competitors by sending their lawyers or band managers. Very metalhead of them. They are simple capitalist money mongers.
One of these sent a manager after us. And my long-time partner had enough of all this bullshit. So we closed. Retaliation Prods is out of the game. What I noticed is that a lot of people supported us with heart, even though we were never bragging on social medias, releasing "sneak peak" posts or talking about modern words like "drops", this or that. I can even confirm that most of our customer base was old-school minded and a lot of them were the same guys that bought stuff from us since the beggining. I'm still very angry and saddened about it, but there's nothing I can do. The other producers have won, they can keep releasing their absolute official bullshit everywhere. There's a less competitor to worry about.
That other producer who sent us a manager also did the same to others and he was the only visible link between us and such manager. So much of a coincidence. Well, these guys can keep releasing their 10€ official patches.
PS: As a former patch producer I can guarantee that 10€ is an unjustifiable over-inflated price. Our old supplier charged us around 1$ per patch, so make your numbers.
Into Glory Ride on
Sad story that makes you furious while reading it. I actually planned to do a patch here and there too for a long time already, mainly for bands i personally worship that have no (good looking!) patches yet and that often are underground enough, not having too big of an audience.
but that manager/lawyer thing scares me off a bit to be honest. Sounds like Joey deMaio even.
Corrosive on
I suggest you to make a very small run of embroidered patches, cause these can be made without minimum order. Just make a few for you and close friends and do not advertise/sell them online to avoid possible trouble. Just like some of these "HMFC" guys here on TSS do sometimes.
Into Glory Ride on
Thank you alot for those hints. Initially i wanted to do everything online, with advertisements but in small quanitites. But i might go for a complete offline/oral approach.
Appreciate it!
MortalFate on
If you make any Sabbat (UK) patches, please let me know. ;)
Miteux on
All Hail to Retaliation Prods!
Have a lot of their patches, love the designs approach, and top quality.
Metal merch is going insane recently, too bad they need to stop...
Super sad to hear that other patch maker needs to send lawyers to small non benefit label just to erase the "competition".
SodomaniacGermany on
It's a shame, the patches from Retaliation Prods were well made and captured the essence of the artwork really well.
But it is true, the sheer amount of new patches coming to the market is just ridiculous. Everyday there is something new, it all got kind of boring if you ask me. I'm glad i got nearly everything i wanted.
The hunt for rare and unique patches is what is the greatest fun for me, but it seems like less and less people are willing to search for something unique which results in rip-offs and countless bootlegs, some of them don't even change anything and just copy it 1:1.
And from my experience this attitude comes from those who cry about patch prices most of the times.
Don't get me wrong here, i don't say that one has to pay hundreds of euros for a patch, just go on the hunt. I had to search some patches for years to get them for a reasonable price, but it was fun in the end and the experience was just great, a rewarding feeling.
Sometimes you have to be creative, i got a lot of my most wanted ones for example from a few people i met on festivals, mainly people that are over 40 years old and don't really have a use for them anymore cause they grew out of the shirt etc. What i want to say is that there are plenty of ways to obtain patches, and rare patches are surely not only in the hands of collectors, there is always a chance to make a bargain, you just have to search like a maniac.
And for those who don't want to take those efforts, it is okay too, for that purpose there are sites like retaliationprods who have great designs.
It just gets boring when more and more people are jumping on that train and bringing patches out every fucking day or week.
And often times, quantity outweighs quality in those cases.
And another result of this bootleg culture is the fact that less people are posting pictures of some originals here (including me) since the chance is big that it just gets ripped off and reproduced with a good picture. And it happened a few times which is just sad.
Into Glory Ride on
https://innerpaths.bigcartel.com/
And a new one in the game. "Official", retarded shapes and i will not start talking about the prices...
Morbid_pizza_eater53 on
total ignore for greedy-ass patchers like him
MortalFate on
Plenty of distros and bands bandcamps worth supporting, after all. Hope money doesn't trump here. If money is the MO.... Beats the MO that drove metal into existence.