New Dallas t-shirt company opens early to raise money for Haiti

by Sarah Blaskovich

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The owner will be selling shirts at an ArtLoveMagic show on Saturday in hopes to send $2,500 to Haiti.

DALLAS — Justin Nygren wasn't going to open his new t-shirt business until sometime in February, but when the effects of the earthquake in Haiti rippled through North Texas, he decided to jump in early. His new business, called Shirts=Awesome, will design and print shirts and (he hopes) “take over the world … with shirts.”

But before he begins making profits for his new company, he's selling “Help for Haiti” shirts for $15 each. He hopes to sell 250 shirts, a process that will likely be aided by a live printing of them at ArtLoveMagic show UNDERGROUND on Saturday. “Selling 250 shirts at $15 each, we will be sending around $2,500 to Mission of Hope after we take care of Uncle Sam and cover the cost of the shirts themselves,” he said. “I can't help but think about how amazing it would be to see the Dallas community get behind a project like this and make a significant impact on Mission of Hope's work in Haiti.”

Nygren began the business after being laid off from a corporate job in 2009. His hobby of making shirts became a much-needed income. And the name? Pronounce it “shirts equals awesome.” Nygren chalks up the name to a quick decision as he was designing his blog via Wordpress. “Being the true 80's kid that I am, I just typed in the first thing that came to mind and it stuck,” he said. “A little kitsch never hurt anyone, right?”

Here's a little more about Shirts=Awesome and their fundraising project:

Explain your mission with Help for Haiti.

Our idea behind the Help for Haiti shirts boils down to the moment I found myself watching the news with people dying and trapped under rubble for days on end after the quake.  I was really wrestling with what I could do locally that could make a difference in Haiti beyond sending money to an organization that I had no ties to.  That was when I remembered a friend who had worked with Mission of Hope [a group that's providing supplies and ministry to the people of Haiti].

We originally hadn't planned on opening Shirts=Awesome until February, but realizing that I could help raise funds for an organization that is at the head of relief efforts there, and one that I had personal ties to, was when we decided we needed to open early.

A lot of companies are making efforts to help Haiti. Why should people support your company?

Personally, I don't care if people support my company and our efforts to help people in Haiti.  What I do care about is that people do something, anything at all, to help.  If they choose to support us by buying a shirt, they can know that with this project, we are only covering our costs for printing the shirt and the rest is going directly to Mission of Hope.  We don't have a lot of overhead now, which means I believe we can give more money directly to people and less to administrative costs like some larger charities.  Oh, and they get a cool shirt in return.

What are you going to do to make Dallas a better place?

Dallas is at the locational center of everything we are doing.  Our graphics team is made up of Dallas artists and we purchase all of our supplies and equipment from here, so contributing to our local arts economy is pretty high on our list.  Creating garments that show off Dallas' local artistic talent is something that you'll be able to see from us  soon in a new line of shirts called "Local-icious.” Knowing that we are able to support local artists and bring something creative and unique to the wardrobes of Dallas residents is, well, awesome.

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