You spent a fortnight agreeing artwork, another week on sizing, and a decent chunk of budget on getting your logo onto 60 garments. Six months later the print is cracking, the embroidery has puckered and the whites have gone grey.
Almost none of that is a decoration fault. It is laundry. Branded clothing gets washed harder and hotter than ordinary clothes — workwear because it gets filthy, sports kit because it comes off soaked, leavers hoodies because teenagers wear them daily — and each decoration method fails in its own particular way when you get it wrong.
This is what actually protects the branding, by method and by garment.
Start with the one rule that covers most of it
Wash at 30 degrees, inside out, and keep it out of the tumble dryer.
If you remember nothing else, that single instruction prevents most of the damage we see on returning garments. Heat is what kills printed decoration; friction is what kills embroidery; and the tumble dryer delivers both at once. Turning a garment inside out puts the fabric between the decoration and everything else in the drum.
Everything below is refinement on that rule.
Washing embroidered clothing
Embroidery is the most durable decoration you can buy — thread does not crack or peel — but it fails in two specific ways: puckering and snagging.
Puckering happens when the fabric around the stitching shrinks at a different rate to the stitched area, leaving the logo sitting in a little dimpled crater. Hot washes and tumble drying are the usual culprits, especially on cotton and cotton-rich polos and hoodies, which shrink more than polyester.
Snagging happens when a loose thread on a raised logo catches on a zip, a hook-and-loop fastening or another garment's fastenings. One pulled thread can unravel a surprising amount of a satin-stitch letter.
What to do:
- Wash at 30 degrees on a normal cycle — embroidery does not need a delicate cycle, it needs a cool one
- Turn garments inside out so the stitching faces the drum wall, not other garments
- Fasten every zip and popper in the load, including on other items
- Skip fabric conditioner on technical fabrics; it coats fibres and can dull thread colour over time
- Air dry. If you must tumble, use the lowest heat and take it out slightly damp
- Never iron directly over stitching. Press from the reverse, or put a cloth over the logo — a hot plate flattens the raised texture that makes embroidery look expensive in the first place
Embroidered outerwear — fleeces, softshells and workwear jackets — deserves particular care, because a hot wash also strips the water-repellent finish off the shell. Cool wash, air dry, and the jacket keeps both its logo and its weatherproofing.
Washing printed clothing
Printed decoration sits on top of the fabric, so its enemy is anything that softens, stretches or abrades that layer: heat, aggressive detergent and friction.
Screen-printed garments
Screen print — the standard for printed hoodies and tees in any quantity — is tough, but the ink film will eventually crack if repeatedly heated and flexed.
- Cold or 30 degree wash, inside out
- Liquid detergent rather than powder. Undissolved powder granules are abrasive and grind against the print in the drum
- No bleach, and no whitening or oxygen-boost additives on coloured prints
- Air dry flat or on a hanger; tumble drying is the single fastest way to craze a print
- Iron inside out only, never directly on the design
DTF and heat-applied transfers
Transfers are held on by an adhesive layer, so they are more heat-sensitive than screen print. Everything above applies, plus: leave a new garment 24 hours before its first wash so the adhesive fully cures, and never iron the design at all — press from the reverse if you need to.
Vinyl names and numbers
Vinyl is the most heat-vulnerable of the lot. Cold wash, inside out, air dry, and keep an iron nowhere near it. Vinyl lifting at the corners is nearly always a tumble-dryer story.
Sublimated sports kit
Sublimated kit is the exception that proves the rule — the dye is bonded into the fibre, so there is no layer to crack. It will not fade meaningfully at sensible temperatures. The risk with sublimated kit is the fabric itself: polyester holds onto sweat bacteria, so kit that sits damp in a bag all week starts to smell permanently. Rinse it, wash it within a day or two, and skip fabric conditioner entirely — it blocks the wicking that the fabric was bought for.
Whites, hi-vis and the greying problem
Branded whites and hi-vis are the two things people most often ruin by trying to clean them properly.
Whites go grey from dye transfer, not dirt. Wash them separately, do not overload the drum, and resist the urge to raise the temperature — you will shrink the garment around the embroidery faster than you will brighten it.
Hi-vis loses its certified performance long before it looks worn out. Fluorescent dye degrades with washing and UV exposure, and the reflective tape delaminates in hot washes. Check the garment label for the manufacturer's stated maximum number of wash cycles, wash cool, and replace hi-vis on condition rather than on appearance. A faded hi-vis vest is not a hi-vis vest.
Getting your team to actually do this
The care instructions only work if the people wearing the garments know them, and nobody reads a label.
- Put it in the handover. When you issue new workwear or kit, include one printed card with four bullets: 30 degrees, inside out, no tumble dryer, no ironing the logo
- Tell them why. It will crack lands better than follow the care label
- Order spares up front. A 10% overage on the original run costs far less per unit than a reorder of three garments in eight months
- Ask for the artwork to be kept on file so replacements match — we keep every design, so a mid-season top-up sits alongside the original batch
Frequently asked questions
Can I wash embroidered workwear at 60 degrees for hygiene reasons?
Some sectors require it. If you do, expect faster fading and a higher risk of puckering, and specify polyester-rich garments from the start — they shrink less. Tell us at the quoting stage if garments will be hot-washed and we will recommend fabrics and backing that cope with it.
Why has my printed hoodie cracked after a few months?
Almost always tumble drying, or ironing directly over the design. Both soften and flex the ink film until it crazes. Air drying alone usually solves it.
Is it safe to iron branded clothing at all?
Yes, if you keep the iron off the decoration. Turn the garment inside out and press the reverse, or lay a thin cotton cloth over the area. Never use a steam burst directly on vinyl or a transfer.
Does dry cleaning damage embroidery?
Generally no for embroidery, but dry-cleaning solvents can attack heat-applied transfers and vinyl. If a garment carries both, tell the cleaner which is which.
Should I use fabric conditioner?
Not on sportswear or technical fabrics — it coats the fibres and ruins moisture-wicking. On cotton hoodies it is harmless, but it does nothing for the decoration either way.
The short version
Cool wash, inside out, air dry, and keep the iron off the logo. Do that and embroidered workwear will outlast the job it was bought for, and a printed hoodie will still look right at the reunion.
If you are choosing decoration for a new order and want it to survive a specific laundry regime — care home hot washes, muddy Sunday-league kit, five-day-a-week site wear — tell us the conditions and we will spec the method around them rather than the other way round.
