After its recent victory in the College Football National Championship, Ohio State’s merchandise reads “Undisputed National Champions” on everything from T-shirts to shot glasses. Oregon, not so much.
In order for a team to take the podium while wearing their championship gear, it has to be printed ahead of time. But what happens to the team’s apparel when it doesn’t end up on top?
The answer, as it turns out, varies depending on the circumstances. According to Slate, when USC lost to Texas in the 2006 Rose Bowl, that merchandise was either destroyed or donated, while Major League Baseball shreds the losing team’s gear and the NFL and NBA donate the merchandise to charity.
Mckenzie Sew On partners with the Duck Store to provide shirts like those that would have celebrated the UO’s victory in the College Football Playoff National Championship. The company is based in Springfield and is a collegiate licensed company, which gives it the right to manufacture and distribute official college merchandise. According to Tyler Norman, the Duck Store representative at Mckenzie Sew On, the Duck Store ordered about 2,000 national championship shirts.
“It’s rare that we would do an order like the one for the Duck Store with the national championship marks,” Norman said. “Typically we would just start right after the game or the event.”
Mckenzie Sew On now has shirts that are unusable to the Duck Store. In turn, they have a partnership that helps them deal with this. John Brown is a real estate broker and community activist. Among many other volunteer commitments, Brown works with Mckenzie Sew On to help them make use of shirts or hats they cannot sell due to misprints or premature victorious declarations. Similar to the NBA and NFL, Mckenzie Sew On chooses to send the products to people in underprivileged communities around the world, where the incorrect sports messages don’t detract from the garment’s usefulness.
Brown has known Norman as a family friend throughout Norman’s childhood, and Mckenzie Sew On has worked with Brown for seven years.
“I just do it cause it’s fun to help people and help causes,” Brown said.
He was recently named Eugene’s First Citizen of 2015 for his depth and diversity of community involvement. In the case of Mckenzie Sew On, he liaises with the Eugene Rotary to provide funding for the shirts to be shipped to parts of Central America or Africa.
“They’re perfectly good clothes,” Brown said.  “And it’s a good way to get use out of something that’s not going to be used.”
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