Festa stuff proclaims your neighborhood, home state, or even area
code to the world. Founder Chris Festa's fascination with local flavors
has translated into about a hundred different designs for women and
infants.
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"I didn't have the attention span to write a novel or even a screenplay
so t-shirts are the great American way of getting something off
your chest and put it out there," said Chris Festa, Founder Festa
Stuff.
Selling for around $30 each, the shirts can be bought on-line,
by appointment in a showroom on North Broadway, and in about 35
boutiques in the Chicago area.
"We started out kid of going outward from Chicago. The "Midwestern
Girl" and the "773 Forever, I'll Never Move to Naperville" were
basically our first two shirts that we started to expand on," said
Chris Festa.
Now in about 130 stores in 30 different states, Festa's fun shirts
have indeed expanded nationally, but each design must still hit
a local target.
"I write them all and then I run them by people from there to
make sure they right ture and so we've pretty much hit the mark
on a lot of them and so we mix about I would say 70 percent flattery
with about 20 to 30 percent local knowledge," said Chris Festa.
For Erik Kittlaus, the word "Local" begins and ends with "L" --
in more ways than one. His "urban transit wear" celebrates Chicago
"L" stops. Shirts for all 144 "L" stations are available on Erik's
website, toghaus.com,
where you can try out different color combinations.
"It's specific to the neighborhood that you're in. I guess my
best-selling would probably be Addison, but I like all the small
ones. I love getting orders for the first time from some obscure
stop," said Erik Kittlaus, Toghaus Urban Transit Wear Creator.
Costing about $25 each, the shirts are spreading Chicago pride
far beyond the "L" lines.
"It's funny I've gotten calls from people who someone was wearing
it in like Houston and they got the URL off the back of the shirt
and called me up and ordered the shirt," said Erik Kittlaus.
Yet another neighborhood fashion statement option, neighborhoodies
opened a Wicker Park store in December.
"We started out of Brooklyn, New York, started by Michael de Zayas
who is still our president and CEO and everything else. I started
with him making himself a Ft. Greene hoodie which is a suburb of
Brooklyn and he was tired of the "I Love New York" and the generic
Brooklyn shirts so he made that and people asked him where'd you
get it, where'd you get it. Next thing, he was running it out of
his apartment, then he opens it out of the basement of his apartment
until we grew into a studio and actually having employees," said
an Barger, Neighborhoodies Manager.
The $50-dollar hooded sweatshirts and other clothing can be customized
with a neighborhood name or any other message.
"Once we went nationwide we decided to 100 percent customized.
It's great here because Chicago has such neighborhood pride that
it's been great for all the neighborhoods around here and a lot
of people that's been the main focus. It's been about 80 percent
neighborhoods," said Ian Barger.
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