Category: News

Spring & INFLCR are empowering NCAA athletes to monetize their audience by creating and selling digital and physical products.

San Francisco, August 2021:  Spring (formerly Teespring), the leading creator commerce platform, has just announced a first-of-its-kind partnership with INFLCR , the leading platform for athlete brand building. The innovative partnership gives collegiate athletes easy, compliant access to Spring’s direct-to-consumer sales platform where they can establish their own digital storefront. They will be able to design and sell both digital and physical merchandise, allowing the next generation of sports stars to become creators in their own right, harnessing their direct relationship with fans and nurturing an entrepreneurial spirit.  

Under new NIL laws, the NCAA now allows student-athletes to earn an income from the use of their name, image and likeness. This is the first time student athletes will be able to legally monetize their fan base. This new full-scale ecommerce partnership will equip Teamworks’ and INFLCR’s 100,000+ athlete user base with the most innovative, efficient technologies as well as design support to maximize their brand potential by monetizing via social commerce. 

NCAA athletes can now launch their own branded Spring storefront, filled with physical merchandise, NFTs and digital products, and seamlessly connect their stores via Spring’s industry leading social integrations with the likes of Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. This will reach fans where they interact most with their favourite athletes,  on social media, optimizing their brand potential and helping them to earn an income. Through this partnership athletes will receive a $1.90 discount on core apparel products. 

College World Series Softball Player, Kiersten Landers at Florida State, is among one of the first to launch her Spring store. She says: “It is beyond exciting to be able to engage with my fans in a way I haven’t been able to before, with the support from industry leading partners. I never thought during my time as an NCAA athlete we would be able to monetize under the new NIL laws, and what better way to start this journey than with merchandise?”.

By starting their social commerce venture on Spring, INFLCR’s athletes will receive resources to set them up for success. This includes:  

In-App Education

Spring will provide education on best practices that will live in INFLCR’s Storyteller Playbook, which students can access on-demand via desktop or via the INFLCR app using their mobile device. 

In-App Reporting

All athlete transactions generated with Spring will be reported to the INFLCR Verified Ledger, to cover all required reporting for collegiate athletes. This activity will be updated in real time to ensure athletes do not jeopardize eligibility through their NIL opportunities.

VP of Marketing at Spring, Les Green says: “We are truly excited to be working with INFLCR to empower athletes to create their own merchandise. At Spring we put the creator first and through our industry-leading design capabilities, we look forward to supporting athletes in the creation of both digital and physical merchandise. This partnership will help athletes to harness their relationship with their fans as they step into the creator realm and finally have the opportunity to create additional revenue streams.”

CEO and Founder at INFLCR, Jim Cavale says: “As athletes build their brands and gain rights to monetize their name, image and likeness, we see e-commerce as a natural opportunity for them. Partnering with Spring, the leader in their industry, will put education and opportunity at the fingertips of athletes so they can navigate this new landscape compliantly, to create and sell their own merchandise in a way that content-creators and social influencers have made extremely popular and lucrative.”

As the bridge between creators and commerce, Spring supports, elevates and propels creators forward, not thinking about the new normal, but instead, the ‘new possible’. The introduction of NFTs and digital products to the platform, demonstrates the innovation of Spring’s tools and capabilities, expanding far beyond traditional merchandise. Spring has seen more than 30 creators become millionaires as a result of selling on the platform.

The success of platform social integrations resulted in explosive growth for Spring, with more than 1.3 million verified creators signing up to the platform to build their socially integrated e-commerce stores as of June 2021. New creator growth has exploded by 160%, alongside a 93% growth in the number of creators who are actively selling their products through the platform. 

Important news: Quality overhaul and price update. Here’s what it means for your store and fans moving forward.

We’ll get right to it—we’ve had to increase prices on some products. 

You’ve been forthright in asking us to improve product quality, and that became a major priority for us. So we went heavy on those areas. We’ve tried to hold off on increasing costs as long as possible, but it’s no longer feasible. So after lots of deliberation, we knew it was time to bump up our prices. We’ll explain why.

For one, costs have gone up significantly worldwide for things like raw materials and transportation, especially in the last two years. On top of that, we’ve invested heavily into improving product quality and production. Last year alone, we spent $1.6 million to enhance quality, both internal and external: We’ve upgraded fabric quality on core products, procured more advanced production equipment, made multiple hires to support quality checks, and more. And for those two reasons, we’ve had to increase prices on some of our products. Below you can see just a few of the upgrades we’ve made, and there’s still many more to come. We’ll keep you posted on all that, of course. So expect good things. 

Ultimately, it’s all about providing the best possible product quality for your fans, improving their shopping experience, and ensuring you can maintain great profit margins. 

In the meantime, we’d like to thank you for your support, for your hustle, and for continuing to inspire us. 

Updated price chart

As you’ll notice, prices have changed for many products. Again, this is not only due to the quality upgrades we’ve mentioned, but a direct result of worldwide cost increases in raw materials and product transport. We’ve adjusted the recommended retail price to account for this new update and to help you maintain the profit margins you’re used to seeing.

Digital product pricing

With this update, digital product pricing will also be impacted—our processing fee will change from 10% to 20%. Despite these changes, we’re still keeping prices super competitive. Check out this blog post on why we’re still the top platform to sell digital products.

How to adjust selling prices

We recommend updating your selling prices before the update takes effect on August 31, 2021. This way you’ll be able to set the exact profit margin you want. Please keep in mind any promo codes you’ve created—you’ll want to ensure you’ve got enough margin to support the discount you’re offering.  You can edit prices instantly within the “Listings” section of your Spring account at any time. 

Important note: Once the new pricing updates go live on August 31st, promo codes will not be redeemable on listings that are not profitable. Also, any listings that are not profitable will become inactive once orders are processed—you will need to increase the profit margin of the products in the listing before reactivating it. Learn more here.

Need help with setting prices? First, check out our new recommended retail prices (RRP) for each product type in the table above. To adjust pricing, head to the Listings section of your Spring dashboard. Go into “Listing Details” next to the listings you want to edit, then edit the prices. Be sure to save your changes before you exit the page.

Introducing an exciting new chapter in the Spring and Instagram partnership. Now it’s easier than ever to create and sell your products from the Instagram app and earn more.  

What does this mean for me?

In the coming weeks, many of you will be able to connect the products you create on Spring directly to your profiles through a Shops on Instagram. Yeah, it’s a game-changer. We will be rolling this out in phases. So as we first launch, only a select number of creators will have access. By the end of the year, this will be available for all US-based creators. 

With this new integration, you’ll also be able to promote your products by tagging them in your Instagram posts, stories, and reels. Your fans can browse and purchase straight from your profile. You’ll be able to track insights and habits to better understand your business. And that’s just a few of the benefits. 

How much profit can I make?

We’re also teaming with Instagram to give creators the ability to earn 100% profit selling through Spring and Instagram. So through December 31st, you’ll earn 100% profit on every product sold (up to $50,000 per creator). Additionally, for a limited time, US fans can enjoy free shipping (up to $15), which is automatically applied at checkout on Instagram. This is really an effort to help jumpstart a commerce business for those creators without one and to accelerate it for those who already do.

How do I get started?

This will start to roll out in the next several weeks, so look for the “Add Shop” button on your Instagram profile to see if you’re eligible for access. From there, if you’re already selling products with Spring, you can link your account through your Instagram profile. If not, set up an account with Spring within the Instagram app, create some products, and start selling immediately through your shop on Instagram. Watch this video for step-by-step instructions on how to set up and use your shop.

If you aren’t yet able to access the integration, don’t sweat it. You’ll be able to soon. In the meantime, get your Spring store ready and create some products. Or check our FAQ page if you have any other questions.

Now, you can embed your Spring store within your Linktree account—connecting your entire audience to your products.

We’ve got some big news. We just partnered with Linktree, the leading link-in-bio platform. With this, fans can browse your top products or head to your full Spring store—all from your Linktree in your social media bio. Seamless shopping for them, tons of new traffic for you. And it’s super simple to set up.

Setting up your Linktree store experience

1. Set up a Linktree account (if you haven’t already).
2. Add a new link in your Linktree account
3. Paste your Spring store URL into the links tab
4. Click “Show me more,” then select “Show my shop on Linktree” 

Note: If you already have your Spring store on Linktree, simply edit the link by recopying and pasting your Spring URL to the same area. This will trigger the feature. 

Note: If you have a custom domain, make sure you use your original Spring store URL, displayed on the Linktree integration page within your dashboard.

Your embedded Linktree shop will display the first six products in your Spring store. If you want to show different products, then “star” them in the stores tab of your dashboard. Now they’ll appear at the top. 

This one’s a game-changer. Hopefully you’ll be connecting with more fans than ever. Are you ready to set yours up? See what ours looks like as you get started.