Long ago, a reader asked why I don’t sell t-shirts. I hemmed. I hawed. I had nothing. I went to design a t-shirt. It swiftly became clear why I don’t sell t-shirts: lack of shirt design skills.

So I’m putting it to you, the readers. I want you to design a Roots and Grubs shirt. There will be a prize: three free shirts, plus a selection of my favorite snack foods, including Corn Pretz and Kinder Eggs.

Here are the ground rules:

1. The contest ends on May 31, 2007, at midnight PDT. I’ll make a thingy in the sidebar to remind you that the contest is on.

2. Artwork should be submitted in PNG or JPEG format. The image size must be 2100×1800 pixels (either portrait or landscape orientation is fine). Shirts may be one- or two-sided. For two-sided, just submit two 2100×1800 PNGs. Oh, and tell me which one is the front.

3. Consider setting the Roots and Grubs name in American Typewriter Bold, like I do on the site–but if you have a cool idea that uses a different font, that’s fine. You can use the word “and” or an ampersand, whatever looks good. There’s no need to put the URL on the shirt. As Dan Savage put it, GFE.

4. All submissions become the property of mamster. I reserve the right to sell multiple shirts (and, naturally, send out multiple snack packs). If I pick your shirt, you’ll be identified as the designer on the “buy a shirt” page. But not on the shirt, because that would look silly. This is my way of saying I’m not going to cut you in on a share of the shirt proceeds, because I expect the shirt proceeds won’t even cover my annual hosting costs. If something happens that causes people to buy a million shirts, however, I am not going to forget who designed the shirt.

5. Man, I really hope something happens that causes people to buy a million shirts. Maybe some kind of brain parasite? If you want to work on that angle instead, go for it.

5. Send submissions to rootsandgrubs AT gmail.com. If you end up with a file larger than 10MB, Gmail won’t accept it, so contact me for alternate arrangements.

Other than that, have at it. I have no preconceived notions about what the shirt should be like: it could have a cartoon, a stock photo, a quote, a cool logotype, or all of the above. I can’t wait to see what you come up with. Thanks for participating. Feel free to email me or post comments if you have questions; I’m sure there’s something important I left out.