Duct tape fashion isn’t just for Lady Gaga anymore. Now the Duck brand is putting its own twist on the trendy adhesive with a line of college-licensed duct tape.
And, yes, the University of Oregon is one of 25 schools that Duck has licensed since last fall.
| 
| Duck offers duct tape with the marks of 25 universities. It retails for $6.99 to $8.99 a roll. |
Duct tape clothing and accessories have become the latest rage, making for interesting high school fashion shows and unique themes for college mixers. Turns out that duct tape can be used to create wallets, purses, shirts, pants, visors and backpacks.
Duck, a brand within the Avon, Ohio-based ShurTech family of products, sells the college-licensed duct tape at most of the major retailers, including Wal-Mart, Target, Michael’s, OfficeMax, Home Depot and Lowe’s as well as campus bookstores, retailing for $6.99 to $8.99 per roll.
This week at the national convention for college bookstores called CAMEX, a campus market expo in Houston, Duck will participate in a fashion show with cheerleading outfits it made from duct tape.
Robert Cuthbertson, the category manager for the Duck brand, says he knew the college-licensed duct tape would be a hit when rival mass merchandise stores began clamoring for the product.
“We realized we had something when buyers were demanding exclusivity and they got angry when we told them that we’d showed it to another store,” Cuthbertson said. “We had to be very diplomatic with the way we approached customers on this. Wal-Mart and Target were both very gung-ho about being the first to market with it.”
Duck hit the shelves with an initial regional offering of Wake Forest, North Carolina State, Virginia Tech and Appalachian State, all schools represented by Licensing Resource Group. An executive at ShurTech knew a contact at Licensing Resource Group and they began discussions about the product. The manufacturing facility is based near Hickory, N.C., which explains the original mix of schools.
“The early sales were going great,” Cuthbertson said. “In one location, we sold out of 60 units in three days. Now we have several other retailers looking at it and we’ve expanded the selection.
“What we’ve found is that with the colleges, you have a mass of people who are emotionally connected with their school. And the [do-it-yourselfers] have a strong emotional connection to duct tape. With two highly emotional items, you’ve got lightning in a bottle.”
Duck is offering 25 schools — among them are Alabama, Auburn, Texas, Florida, Florida State, Oklahoma, Nebraska and Penn State — and has 10 more awaiting approval or in the production stages. Cuthbertson said Duck has set a goal of licensing the top 40 best-selling schools through Licensing Resource Group and Collegiate Licensing Co. In addition to the Duck brand, CLC also has issued a license for duct tape to Executive Fan, a Michigan company founded and run by John Hicks, the former Ohio State lineman who was runner-up for the 1973 Heisman Trophy. Executive Fan tape is found in CVS, Walgreens and Dollar General, among other stores.
“Duct tape is a new product for collegiate licensing but complements several other items in the home improvement category,” said Dave Kirkpatrick, CLC’s vice president of nonapparel marketing. “We have been encouraged by the response from major retailers and believe that hardware may be a new frontier for collegiate licensing.”
Kirkpatrick added that ShurTech also has expressed an interest in licensed bubble wrap.
“The beauty of it is that the college product is opening the door for us to talk about some of our other duct tape colors and prints, like the zebra print and tie-dyes,” Cuthbertson said. “It’s really created a lot of interest.”
