Most schools are running three or four separate merch programs — and managing all of them through a combination of spreadsheets, bulk orders from a local decorator, and at least one Bonfire or Custom Ink campaign that someone set up three years ago and never took down.
The athletic director handles uniforms. The PTA runs its own fundraiser. The booster club does a pre-order twice a year. The principal wants a faculty/staff store for appreciation week. None of these talk to each other. None of them are on-brand. And every one of them creates work.
Here's how schools are doing it differently on Brikl.
The problem with the current setup
The fragmented approach has a few failure modes that show up every year:
Bulk orders create waste and complaints. You estimate sizes, someone orders 200 shirts, 60 don't fit right, and you end up with a box of mediums in the athletic office for two years.
Campaign stores aren't stores. Campaign-based platforms like Custom Ink Fundraising are batch-driven — they open, they close, production runs. If a parent misses the window, they're out. If a new student joins mid-semester, too bad.
Separate vendors mean separate coordination. The embroidery shop does the jackets. Someone else does the sublimated jerseys. The screen printer does the spirit tees. You're managing three vendors, three delivery timelines, and three invoices per program.
None of it is on the school's brand. The Bonfire store is branded Bonfire. The SquadLocker page lives on a SquadLocker sub-domain. The school logo is there, but the store doesn't feel like the school.
What one platform looks like in practice
On Brikl, a school runs all of these from a single account:
- Spirit wear store — always open, on the school's domain, with the school's logo and colors locked into every product.
- Varsity athletics store — separate store for each sport. Football has its own, swim team has its own. Coaches manage their own catalog; the athletic director has admin visibility over all of them.
- Booster club fundraising — the booster sets the retail price and markup. Revenue flows automatically at checkout. No batch reconciliation, no waiting for a check.
- PTA seasonal campaigns — a store that opens for back-to-school, closes after the deadline, reopens for homecoming. The PTA doesn't need a developer to manage the schedule.
- Faculty & staff apparel — embroidered polos for admin, performance tees for PE, branded outerwear for coaches. Separate from the student-facing store; staff log in through their own link.
All of these live under one Brikl account. One dashboard. One place to see orders, revenue, and store performance across every program.
Decoration methods across programs
One of the friction points in running multiple programs is that different products need different decoration methods — and most vendors specialize in one.
Varsity jackets need embroidery. Game-day jerseys need sublimation for full-color prints that hold up through a season of washing. Spirit tees can go DTG or screen print depending on volume. Player names and numbers on jerseys need heat transfer.
On Brikl, products using different decoration methods can all live in the same store. Orders route automatically to the right fulfillment partner. The parent checking out sees one cart and one checkout — they don't need to know which printer is handling which item.
This is the difference between a platform built for multi-method programs and a decorated apparel shop that's added an online ordering page.
How PTA and booster fundraising actually works
The fundraising mechanic is straightforward:
- The PTA or booster club sets up a store with products at their chosen retail price.
- Shoppers buy items individually — no bulk order, no commitment upfront.
- Brikl handles payment at checkout and produces each item on demand.
- The margin (retail price minus Brikl's commission and cost of goods) gets paid out to the organization.
There's no minimum order to make the economics work. A parent buying one hoodie contributes the same margin per unit as someone buying ten. The store can stay open year-round or be scheduled to close after a campaign window.
The PTA doesn't touch inventory. They don't manage fulfillment. They set the price, share the link, and track contributions from the dashboard.
District-wide rollouts
For districts managing merch programs across multiple schools, Brikl supports a parent account structure: one login, multiple school accounts underneath, each with its own branded stores.
A district lead can see all schools from the top level. Each school's athletic director or PTA president manages their own stores without touching anyone else's. Brand guidelines (approved logos, color codes, approved product categories) can be locked at the district level so nothing goes off-brand.
This is the setup districts use when they want to offer a consistent experience across all schools without requiring each school to manage a separate vendor relationship.
Moving from another platform
If your school is already using a team store platform, switching to Brikl is straightforward. Logos, product specs, pricing structure, and store layout all carry over during onboarding — typically in about a week.
Getting started
If you're running a school spirit wear, athletics, or PTA program — or if you're a district lead trying to standardize across schools — Brikl is free to start. No setup fee, no monthly subscription, no upfront inventory cost.
Explore the schools page for a full overview, or start a free account and have a test store live in under 30 minutes.