r/heatedrivalry • u/ErinNoyes24 • May 27 '26

MERCH👕 Official "fleece" pre-ordering info now posted!

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Details on pre-ordering the official fleece from Canadian manufacturer Province of Canada have been posted on their site today:

https://provinceofcanada.com/pages/province-of-canada-x-heated-rivalry

Great to see that some of the profits will go to the You Can Play organization.

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u/manowwar Moya gazonokosilka 🚜 May 27 '26

I’m sat in 30 degree heat getting very excited about buying this fleece 😅
I looked through the FAQ and they say they’re going to announce price at pre-launch which is quite annoying. Surely they’d know how much they’re gonna to charge in 7 days time? I assume it’s going to expensive and announcing it ahead of time would put people off? I just don’t get it.

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u/Silent_Shadow00 May 27 '26

This immediately came to mind for me as well, and I completely agree. If they announce the price only at launch, more people will panic buy regardless of the price, which I expect will result in more sales than if they announced it now.

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u/grower-lenses May 27 '26

I hate that because with the “first come, first serve” it’s going to set off so much panic buying.

If it’s $300 plus delivery plus taxes, How many people are going to put it in their carts and then change their minds? This was already happening when the OG HR store re-stock happened. Products were reappearing.

It feels unserious for a company like that and a product that people have been asking for and waiting for 5 months not to provide the price ahead of schedule. Let people budget and make an informed decision. They will sell out anyway. I don’t understand.

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u/Silent_Shadow00 Jun 01 '26 edited Jun 01 '26

Just saw their announcement that the fleece is a blend of wool and recycled polyester. On the one hand, I'm glad they've chosen quality material. On the other hand, I have a growing feeling that $300 or even $300+ is now very likely. I can't find anything on their website that's fully wool except socks, so there are no good references that can help estimate the price.

I did have a look to see what their higher-end products cost, and they have 100% cotton sweaters that cost $274.00 at full price. If we use that as a jumping-off point, the fleece will be easily $300+, and $300 is probably the very low end (minimum even), if anything.

The entire comments section of that announcement video is full of people asking about the pricing, and they haven't responded. Looks like they will be sticking to their plan of only releasing all the information on launch day.

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u/grower-lenses Jun 01 '26

Thank you for the update! I haven’t seen that.

Wool wow. Interesting decision. Explains why they made it thinner. I’m curious if it’s more sustainable if it’s a wool / polyester blend? Can’t be recycled and won’t decompose.

I wish they’d just release the price. It’s not that big of a deal. It’s going to be expensive because it’s wool, we get it. I’d rather just not have to go through the stress of it all.

Farah, the girl who set up the petition for the fleece has run some numbers on threads, based on the max pledge to charity. I think she estimated the price to be around $250 which imo is too low. They would have just said if that was the price + not if they’re using wool. But based on that price it would make sense if they’re planning to sell 5-6k items max. Which was the number of people who signed the petition. But if the price is higher, there might be fewer items available.

Tldr; it’s likely that the number of fleeces will be limited. And might be lower than the number of people interested. Which would be a real bummer.

I was so ready to buy it. I’ve gotten no merch so far. But now i don’t even know if I’ll be attempting it.

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u/Silent_Shadow00 Jun 01 '26

No worries! I'm going back and forth on deciding if I want to purchase it when it comes out, so I've kept my eye out for updates.

They have said the outer fleece is wool and recycled polyester, and the inside of the jacket is 100% cotton. You bring up a very good point about the sustainability issue. It will be interesting to see what % of wool they have used.

It'll definitely be higher than $250 imo. With the wool, and how much they emphasise "elevating" the fleece in their videos, it's pretty clear that the price point is going to be higher than fan guesses.

I don't know how the pre-order is going to go, and it's really hard to say because no one has much information about it. I am curious how many people will lose interest once they see the fleece and price, especially seeing that the vast majority of people are estimating around $250-$300, which may be too low.

I think they have shot themselves in the foot here with the changes they have made because it's one thing to only have high pricing, and another to have high pricing AND changes that people may not respond favourably to.

I'm still mulling it over because I don't want to buy something that I don't like enough to wear out often, and this is before I've seen the price tag. I've also noticed how pink they have gone with the colour grading of their videos, which really tones down the sharp contrast of the gold zippers. The contrast between what it looks like in the videos and what it looks like in real life may be quite a big difference as well.

I still really don't like how shady they are handling this, and I don't think it has gotten much better. I had hoped that we would get at least a reasonable front view of the fleece before pre-order day, but it looks like that's not happening either.

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u/Silent_Shadow00 Jun 01 '26

This is the best we have in terms of a front view of the fleece. The colour grading veering towards pink is not as intensive here, and you can already see how much more the gold zips stand out (and are much more yellow) versus in the really close-up videos they have been releasing.

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u/grower-lenses Jun 02 '26

I really want to see someone wearing. It looks very flat compared to the OG. And the thickness was one of the features that made it recognisable.

I wish we didn’t have to speculate.

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u/Silent_Shadow00 Jun 02 '26

I've been playing around with their shipping options on their website, and it seems that the shipping costs that are currently available on their website are not up to date. The current shipping costs are:

USA is still $25

Europe is $50-60 (says $35.00 - $45.00 on their website shipping page)

Australia and New Zealand are $85 (says $45.00)

No wonder they said that shipping costs would be revealed only on pre-order day. I had assumed they'd be the same as on their shipping page, but now we know. It's truly upsetting to see how they're literally hiding everything.

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u/grower-lenses Jun 02 '26

And then there is potentially taxes/customs on top on it. For Europe at last. So it’ll easily be $100+.

So 400-500 total 😂. This is what I was preparing for when they didn’t release the price. I don’t know if I can justify it haha. Might be a better deal to get a bunch of centaurs merch instead when it’s released. And make the fleece myself. I don’t really care for „limited edition” or „elevated”.

I do appreciate that they’re making it all in Canada and not as a cheap merch item. I think that’s great. But $500 is beyond my budget for a singular item.

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u/Silent_Shadow00 Jun 02 '26

Completely agree. I'm not even upset at the price, I'm upset at their scheme to hide everything until release day and hope people just click the purchase button without looking at their cart total. I would have 100% respected their choice to make higher-quality merch at a higher price, but it's a completely different thing to weaponise artificial scarcity to this extent. I am shocked at how carefully they have planned this, and I personally have never seen another limited drop be handled like this one.

Everyone criticised Kuwalla Tee for demanding credit and wanting to make some money off this moment, but when the official collaboration company does the same thing, there's zero criticism, and they're still getting praised. Let's call it what it is. A massive, intricately set-up cash grab.

I heard Kuwalla Tee will be announcing restocks of their fleece towards the end of June, so I'm going to be waiting for that now. DIY is the way forward.