Why I made the breakthrough maths jersey

A few months ago, me and Tadhg had an idea to make a Breakthrough Maths jersey.

There honestly wasn’t a huge amount of strategy behind it.

It was maybe an ego thing, to some extent. I just thought it would be cool to have a jersey with the Breakthrough Maths logo on it.

That was basically the starting point.

We do a lot of events — Transition Year fairs, meetups, the Ploughing Championships, that kind of thing — and I wanted us to have something a bit more tangible.

We’ve had hoodies, bags, calculators and all that stuff before, and they’re great, but a jersey just felt more interesting.

More like something people might actually want.

So we got onto O’Neills and started putting one together.

Designing the Breakthrough Maths Jersey

The original idea was always to have a black base with the Breakthrough Maths purple through it.

I just thought that combination would look class.

We went through a few different designs over a couple of months. Some were maybe a little bit inspired by older Cork jerseys, some were more modern, some had different patterns.

Eventually we landed on this kind of modern stripy design, which I think works really well.

But the part we probably obsessed over most was the crest.

If we were making a proper GAA-style jersey, I wanted the crest to actually look like a real GAA crest.

Not just our normal logo stuck onto a jersey.

So we started looking at different GAA badges and crests we liked and thinking about what makes them work.

Because we’re from Cork, we also wanted a bit of Cork in there.

We looked at things like the Shandon Bells, Blackrock Castle, the idea of the safe harbour, hurleys, Gaelic footballs, maths symbols, all sorts. We also wanted a bit of Gaeilge on it. Every county crest has the county name as Gaeilge so ee wanted to do the same. Briseadh is the closest thing to Breakthough in Irish, and thats what I’ve always used.

Eventually we ended up with one that just felt right.

Tadhg is very proud of it, I’m really happy with it, and I think it’s probably the thing that brings the entire jersey together.

It looks real.

That was important.

Then People Went Mad for It

Once we had the jerseys made, we ordered a load and started putting a few photos up on social media.

And people just went nuts for them.

I genuinely did not expect it.

We’ve had other merchandise before and people have liked it, but nothing has come close to the reaction to the Breakthrough Maths jersey.

Even in the UK, where obviously there isn’t the same GAA connection, people still liked the idea of the jersey itself.

There was just something about it.

We brought them to meetups in Dungarvan and Kilkenny and people were constantly asking:

“Where are the jerseys?”

“Can I get a jersey?”

“Are there jerseys at the meetup?”

We’re heading to the Ploughing next week and we’ll be giving out more there as well.

Or at least we would be if I hadn’t basically run out of them.

Everyone Wants One for Their Exam Results

The funniest part has probably been the live streams.

We constantly get questions like:

“If I get a Grade 9 in GCSE Maths, can I get a jersey?”

“If I get a merit in the Junior Cert, can I get one?”

“If I get X result, do I get a jersey?”

At the start, I was kind of saying yes to some of these.

I thought it would be a nice thing to do.

Then I realised there were way too many people asking.

I literally cannot give a jersey to everyone who gets a Grade 9.

We’d go bankrupt in O’Neills orders.

The demand has actually been ridiculous.

The staff have loved them too. Everyone gets one day 1 now. Teh tutors too. They love wearing them in the classes.

We need to order more.

Actually, that’s not even true.

I’ve already run out.

It’s Weird Because Everyone Has a Jersey Now

What makes the whole thing even stranger is that branded jerseys are everywhere at the moment.

The 2 Johnnies have them.

Guinness has them.

Loads of brands are doing fake retro football jerseys, GAA-style tops, vintage sports shirts and all the rest of it.

It’s a very crowded space.

So the fact that ours still seemed to cut through and people genuinely wanted one was really satisfying.

I think maybe it worked because we didn’t overthink it.

We weren’t sitting around saying:

“How do we create a viral merchandise strategy?”. To be honest that’s never ever really been our strategy.

We just thought it would be cool.

And thankfully, other people agreed.

What Happens Next?

I definitely don’t think this is the end of it.

The reaction has made me want to do more.

We’ve already talked about maybe doing a goalkeeper jersey next, which I think could be class.

There are loads of directions we could go with it now.

It’s also just been really fun giving them out.

We gave one to Sean Carroll and a few other people, and seeing people actually wearing something with the Breakthrough Maths crest on it is still a bit mad.

Especially considering the whole thing started because I basically wanted a jersey for myself.

So yeah, I’m very happy with how the Breakthrough Maths jersey turned out.

Probably more than I should be.

And if you’ve been messaging me asking for one, I promise I’m not ignoring you.

I’ve just genuinely run out. More on the way soon (I hope).

TJ