A new range of licensed Phantom apparel was launched earlier this week, available immediately and posting out of the United Kingdom via an online store.
Pod66 is a clothing label that, according to their website, "specialises in officially licensed graphics based merchandise ranging from niche interest groups through to celebrities, music, photography and everything in between."
Certainly the company seems to have all fanbases catered for, with over 60 different clothing ranges covering a huge and eclectic range of franchises from Coca-Cola and Star Wars through to The Simpsons, Dirty Dancing, Tetris and Master of the Universe.
Importantly for us that includes the Comics Kingdom (King Features) portfolio, including Hagar, Flash Gordon, Popeye and ... The Phantom!
Pod66 boasts 18 different Phantom designs, which can be featured on t-shirts (short or long sleeved), vests [singlets], sweatshirts, hoodies or jackets. These are each available in children's, women's and men's styles/sizes.
The Phantom images are obviously sourced from the KFS licensed images collection, and many will be familiar to long-term phans. Pleasingly, however, there are also several that have not commonly appeared often before. Unsurprisingly, they are almost exclusively derived from Sy Barry artwork.
By way of due diligence regarding Pod66, we can report that the UK clothing company has been around for almost a decade, albeit under a few different names. They initially traded as BG Shirts (2010-2012), then as Wantashirt (2012-2017), selling simple tees with brief unlicensed slogans/sayings (eg "Done", "meh", trashed", "stop staring, you can't afford me").
The 2017 rebranding as Pod66 seems to mark a dramatic change in direction for the company, as they now boast an incredibly professional looking website and a huge range of licensed images. That said, they do still appear to be a relatively small operation with a very limited number of employees and no physical store front.
It would seem that items are printed on demand, although this does promise to be a quick process. Delivery estimates from time of order are 3-5 working days in the UK, 5-8 working days to Europe, and 12-15 working days to the rest of the world.
Postage is free worldwide for orders over £40 (about $75AUD or $50US at time of writing). With the cheapest singlets priced at £18 ($33AUD / $22US) through to the most expensive jackets at £45 ($82AUD / $56US), it will not take buyers too many items to hit this free postage mark.
You can check out the full range of their Phantom apparel at their website here. For more updates from the company, follow them on Facebook, Instagram or twitter.
