ONE HUMAN.
SEVERAL ROBOTS.
ZERO MIDDLE MANAGEMENT.

I'm a working artist in the Bay Area. I paint, I make mosaics, I show in galleries, and like most artists I know, I can't afford the merch of the artists I love. A hand-printed artist tee costs fifty or sixty dollars because the labor behind it is real: the printing, the inventory, the packing, the emails, the nights. Those prices are deserved. They're also out of reach for a lot of people who care the most, including me.

Alien Variety Goods is my answer. The deal is simple: the art stays human and the labor gets handed to machines. Every drawing in this store started as ink on paper (okay sometimes an iPad), drawn by my hand. From there, an automated pipeline does the rest. It cleans the image, builds the colorways, mocks up the products, writes the listings, and when you place an order, it tells a print shop to make your item. Nothing is printed before you ask. Nothing sits in a warehouse. No robot has ever drawn anything here, and none will.

Because the machines work for scab wages, the prices can be honest. Everything is printer cost plus 20%, with shipping passed through at cost. I'm going for volume, not margin, because the whole point is that people like me can actually buy this stuff. And to be clear about the automation: it didn't take anyone's job. It took mine.