For almost 30 years, Michelle Younger has been buying merchandise for Silver Dollar City in Branson, Missouri. The 1880s-style theme park offers guests about 40 rides as well as 41 shops for guests to browse while they’re there. Younger says people love the landscape that surrounds the theme park.
“We are nestled in the heart of the Ozark Mountains,” she says. “All of our rides and buildings are built into the natural landscape. You meander through to find all our rides and shops, with plenty of shade and landscaping.”
Apparel is a big category for Silver Dollar City’s retail shops, with many of them offering a variety of name-dropped T-shirts, hoodies and more for guests to commemorate their time at the park. And while the apparel category itself is timeless, Younger notes that style preferences have changed quite a bit over the years in the souvenir apparel category.
Younger says some T-shirt style preferences have come and gone, but one overarching trend she’s noticed is that customers want higher quality souvenir apparel than they did in the past. She notes that attractions retailers could get away with selling very basic, cheap cotton T-shirts a little over a decade ago, but today, people expect more.
“The souvenir industry has grown in the fact that they now follow fashion trends, producing garments that you could sell on Amazon or in a department store,” Younger says. “It’s not just selling basic garments anymore, and that has been a great improvement. You have more to choose from — more fashionable colors and styles.”
Since theme park attendees are choosier when it comes to their apparel and souvenir selections, these destination retailers are stepping up their apparel game and offer the latest trends in this category.
Good, better, best
Knoebels Amusement Resort in Elysburg, Pennsylvania is known for being one of the largest free-admission theme parks in the U.S. as well as for its rides. Owner Buddy Knoebel shares that the Golden Ticket Awards recognized the park’s Phoenix ride as the best wooden roller coaster in the world six times. Guests also love the carousel, haunted mansion and other classic rides.
At Silver Dollar City, Flander’s Dry Goods is dedicated to the park’s Fire in the Hole ride, with a lot of shirts, hats and other fun merchandise to celebrate that ride.
The theme park has about a dozen gift shops as well, all of which have different themes: a Mine Museum gift shop, an American Heroes shop, a Christmas shop and more. Knowing that a lot of families frequent the theme park, Knoebel says he makes sure to carry high-quality and affordable souvenirs at the shops. He notes that customers are always surprised at the affordability of the souvenir T-shirts in particular.
“One of the big draws to our shirts is the price,” he says. “Our shirts are all reasonably priced. As we set our pricing, we make it family friendly. Our pricing mantra is we want to make it affordable. We want to make it something they can take home.”
Younger says she takes a similar approach at Silver Dollar City’s gift shops, carrying “good, better and best” merchandise to give customers quality souvenirs at different price points.
Regardless of what someone’s price point is, Younger says customers really want soft and comfortable apparel.
“Over the last maybe eight years, we’ve gone to using nicer garments — ringspun garment and garment-dyed garments,” she says. “The value is better, and they last longer. We really home in on using better quality and resortwear-style garments.”
Younger says Comfort Colors garment-dyed T-shirts are popular for custom theme park shirts. “That garment has been very trendy for a good four to six years now, trending with everyone.”
Tri-blend materials are also a hit. Younger shares, “Tri-blend has a softer, almost luxurious pajama feel.
People want that soft feel on their body. That has been a big trend for men and women alike for quite some time.”
Theme park gift shops also need to carry a wide range of sizes for guests of all ages. Matthew Ogden, revenue manager at Morgan’s Wonderland in San Antonio, says the theme park’s two gift shops carry a variety of kid sizes as well as sizes XS through 3XL for adults.
“The bulk of the sizes are medium through XL as those are the sizes that sell most,” he notes.
With kids being a big part of the demographic at Morgan’s Wonderland, Ogden adds that he makes sure to focus on kid’s apparel and merchandise in the gift shop displays.
“Know your demographic and who you primarily sell to,” he says. “In our case, it’s children, so our displays focus on attracting the children’s attention to pull them into the store and convince the parents to buy. The more colorful and centrally focused the display, the better.”
Applying the trends
Theme park retailers also need to keep a pulse on general apparel trends when designing and purchasing T-shirts for their gift shops.
Tie-dye T-shirt designs have been extremely popular in 2024 at Knoebels Amusement Resort in Elysburg, Pennsylvania.
In recent years, tourists love souvenir tie-dye T-shirts, no matter the attraction. Knoebel says tie-dye shirts are some of the most popular designs at the park. The theme park features about a dozen shops, many of which carry popular apparel for guests. Knoebel says the park even has a dedicated Shirt Shop, which has over 150 different T-shirt designs.
“Customers love tie-dye,” says Knoebel. “If you go into the Shirt Shop, there are probably a dozen different tie-dye designs in there.”
Younger adds that cropped T-shirt and hoodie styles have been popular among younger customers for a while.
“Cropped T-shirts and cropped fleece hoodies became strong sellers a few years ago,” she says. “Now the reason they are still trending is because of high-waisted pants! You don’t want to look frumpy. A cropped top sets just right above high-waisted pants.”
Shirts with a heathered look are also trending lately, Younger says. She has also noticed that people seem drawn to T-shirts that use puff ink and varsity lettering.
“Those trends are driven from the fact that the ’80s and ’90s are back in style right now, be it with graphics, movies and even garment styles,” she says.
She notes that she recently attended some trade shows where puff ink and varsity letter fonts were popular.
Some other apparel trends she has seen at fall trade shows include the use of corduroy material, chenille patches and neutral color schemes with splashes of some bright colors.
In addition to customized souvenir apparel, Younger says Silver Dollar City’s shops also offer some trendy apparel brands for customers. Some brands include Lazy One, Life is Good, Simply Southern and Girlie Girl.
She adds, “We really focus on trends, and we offer a variety of garments at our retail shops. We want something for everybody.”
Keep things celebratory
Following trends is important, but theme park retailers can’t forget to always tie their T-shirts, hoodies and other apparel back to favorite attractions, celebrations and festivals at the park. These retailers can have a lot of fun with this, as different rides might have anniversary celebrations each year and various seasonal festivals are great occasions for new apparel designs.
At Morgan’s Wonderland, Ogden says guests love ride-themed shirts or those that feature the park’s butterfly mascot. “Our Stardust line has been a top seller, which is a shirt with a navy color that has colorful open hands reaching out to touch butterflies,” he says.
Ogden adds that 2025 will mark the theme park’s 15th anniversary, and the gift shops will feature new merchandise that commemorates that milestone, including shirts.
A 50th anniversary shirt for the Haunted Mansion ride was a top-selling souvenir at Knoebels in 2023.
“We could not keep those shirts on the shelves,” says Knoebel. “Everybody had to have one.”
New or reopened rides also make for great shirt designs. Silver Dollar City reopened its Fire in the Hole ride for the 2024 season, and Younger says everyone had to have merchandise tied to that attraction.
“Right now our top-selling shirts revolve around Fire in the Hole,” Younger says. “That was our new ride this year. It was more about people wanting that souvenir because of the name on it.”
Even once a ride has been around for a while, it’s not a bad idea to offer unique merchandise around that attraction, especially if it’s a popular one at the theme park. Younger advises always keeping ride-themed merchandise fresh for a new season.
“We have some season passholders, repeat customers. You don’t want customers always seeing the same thing,” she says. “We try to keep it fresh.”
