Just after a magnitude 4.8 earthquake rattled the northeastern United States on Friday, April 5, Kerry Colley glanced at his on-staff graphic designer and said, “Think we can make a T-shirt out of this?”
It took 15 minutes for Colley and his team to make the shirt and hang it outside his customizable apparel shop, in New York’s Upper West Side neighborhood. Colley didn’t advertise it on social media, and priced the shirt at $10, not expecting to turn a large profit, he says.
Soon, his shop — a franchised location of Big Frog Custom T-Shirts and More — had 70 customers waiting in a two-hour line, trying to get their hands on a grey, red and blue “I Survived The NYC Earthquake” cotton shirt that afternoon, says Colley. A customer told him that the shirt had been viewed almost 2 million times on social media platform X, he adds.
this is the fastest merch turnaround I’ve ever seen in my life pic.twitter.com/Y06Pl36g58
— america’s lounge singer (@KrangTNelson) April 5, 2024