Always Denied
If your design includes any of the following criteria, it will be blocked by an art allocator.
All depictions of alcohol - alcoholic beverage use, kegs, beer cans, alcohol bottles, beer bongs, brand names, designs in the style of alcohol logos (additional restrictions: drinks in hand, coolers, solo cups)
All depictions of drugs - drug use, drug slogans or slang words, or drug paraphernalia
Any depiction of a group of individuals that is demeaning - minorities, ethnicities, or cultural segments
Any religious depictions in a demeaning way
Any depictions of men or women in a demeaning way
Any depictions relating to sex - sexual paraphernalia, or sexual orientation
Any use of profanity
“Crawl so hard standards wanna fine me” is not approved and will ALWAYS be denied.
Frequently Denied
The following denials are very common and vary depending on the organization. If you need to check your organization, visit our Greek Licensing resource page.
Include the specific chapter name when using a year other than the official founding date. Otherwise greek licensing will assume the year is incorrect and deny the design (ex: Chi Omega, Zeta Chapter founded 2014).
Avoid revealing men and/or women such as swim suits, hula skirts, shirtless figures, or strap-less dresses.
Use of licensed or copyrighted material including characters, phrases, logos, song lyrics without permission from the property owner.
Any subjective or promiscuous verbiage such as Crazy, Wild, Sober, Damn, Notorious, Get Rowdy, Party, Bombed, Nauti, Naughty, Down and Dirty, Dirty.
The word Rush in conjunction with sorority names. We recommend using Recruitment instead.
FRAT, FRATTY, SRAT and SRATTY are all commonly denied.
PC or Pledge Class is commonly denied. We recommend using New Member or New Member Class instead.
Celebrities or Musicians are commonly denied.
Firearms are commonly denied (ex: cannons).
Designs on the Lower Back for placement over the butt.
Designs on the Center Chest that look like swim ware, such as sea shells.
Overly boastful statements are commonly denied (ex: Delta Zeta is the greatest sorority on earth.)
Mixing English and Greek Letters is commonly denied
Spelling Errors for Graduates
Use the following guide as a reference!
Commonly Denied
The following design ideas are considered risky, but less frequently seen than the denials listed above. Denials are common, but vary depending on the organization. If you need to check your organization, visit our Greek Licensing resource page.
Altering the American Flag by changing the stars out for something else.
Varying the Height of Greek Letters. Usually greek licensing prefers each letter be the same height.
Questionable Design Content such as skulls, trippy imagery, empty mason jars or lip graphics.
Questionable Apparel or Product Items such as halter tops, sports bras, or stadium glasses.
Proofing Tips for Affinity Submissions
Affinity will deny designs when they cannot see the whole design or cannot read small text. Here are some submission tips to help avoid a denial for these situations!
Designs On Hooded Items
If the design is partially covered by the hood, you can submit a separate proof to affinity without the clipping mask portion. We recommend still keeping the uncovered portion on the order app for customer clarity.
Alternatively, you can use special location marks to ensure the design prints below the hood.
For Small Text in designs
For dense small text designs, submit these at 500dpi to the order app to avoid a denial! Be sure to check your PNG export settings to change your resolution size back to 300dpi for your next order! Try not to submit all designs as this high of a resolution, but for designs with a lot of small text this is perfectly ok!
Create a zoom box for specific features
Affinity may request clarification on a specific area of a design with small text. you can create a zoom box in your proof images when you submit to avoid these denials. This is also helpful for small sleeve designs that may be difficult to read still even when proofed ont he front and back images.