T-shirts and hoodies feature a unique American flag containing a QR code for online voter registration.
The QR code merchandise designed specifically for the upcoming November 2018 midterm elections is a project from March For Our Lives. This is a student-led protest group created by a group of students of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High in Parkland, Florida.
The QR codes will lead directly to online voter registration when scanned.
The QR code merchandise enables smartphone users to easily scan the design and register to vote in the upcoming elections. The creative director of March For Our Lives, t-shirt designer and former Parkland student, Jammal Lemy, hopes the apparel will encourage young people to vote, as young people are seen as one of the key demographics in swinging the November elections.
The group’s goal is to rally young voters to elect lawmakers who will pass stricter gun legislation. Gun control has been a hot topic in the US, especially in Parkland, where a mass-shooting took place at the school back in February of this year, resulting in the deaths of 17 people.
Sales of the QR code merchandise will also raise funds and awareness for the March For Our Lives campaign.
The t-shirts and hoodies have two main purposes. The first is to encourage young people to vote and the second is to raise awareness for the campaign.
“We needed to figure out how to mobilize young people across this country,” Lemy told Dezeen. “We needed a shirt that would help personify what our message was.”
The idea to add technology, according to Lemy, occurred by accident. He happened to be working on t-shirt graphics of American flags and advertorials featuring QR codes at the same time and decided to combine them.
The quick response code integrated in the flag design on the front of the appeal provides direct links to online registration sites that are accessible to voters in 38 of the country’s 50 states. The blue code that makes up where the stars of the flag would be, can be read by any digital scanner. Instead of the flag’s typical 13 red stripes, these have been multiplied and rearranged into different thicknesses so that they resemble the linear barcodes usually found on shopping items.
So far, the “United We Stand” apparel has been a success, with more than 10,000 people having registered to vote using the clothing. Lemy says that part of the success is that many people are 
intrigued by how the design works.
“Everyone pulls their phone out to see what it does,” he said.
All the available QR code merchandise can be purchased from the March For Our Lives website.
