Blizzard spurs business idea

Antioch business owner Marc Mallen is always looking for innovative ideas for his custom T-shirt printing business.

When your business name is Innovative Ideas Screen Printing Company, that’s what you do.

Mallen said the ideas for T-shirt designs started coming as the snow began falling during this week’s blizzard. He said he has seen blizzard-related shirts on the Internet, but nothing striking. He also felt the prices were too high.

So, Mallen made three designs at his Main Street shop in downtown Antioch, and plans to print a couple dozen of each. The shirts come in black or white and are geared for people who have a good sense of humor, he said.

“Survivor of Snowmageddon 2011” and “I Survived the Blizzard of 2011 Feb. 1-2” are the words written on two of the designs. The latter has a list of 38 names for the blizzard that he heard on the news or read about on the Internet. A third design is for a more mature buyer, he said.

The cost is about $12.

Mallen opened his shop in 1990 and loves Antioch’s downtown business district. Wednesday’s storm kept him from opening his shop to customers, but street crews were busy removing snow in time for him to open Thursday.

“Thought it would be a good collector’s piece,” Mallen said. “We may never live through this again.”