Aug 20, 2009
Project571 finds niche making organic logo clothing for collegesBy Jennifer YoussefDetNews.com

Combining their passion for the environment, college sports and fashion, Michael Wheeler and Nathan Dean have launched an organic collegiate clothing company named Project571.

The company’s products include T-shirts, sweatshirts, baby clothes and youth wear emblazoned with college logos such as Western Michigan University’s Bronco and Michigan State University’s Spartan.

Pairing environmentally friendly clothing with college and university names and logos seemed like an appropriate match to the business partners, who established the company last year. Michigan State was the first university to jump on board with the idea and grant Project571 a license to use its logo. Western Michigan University and Northwestern Michigan University followed suit.

With students returning to campuses and collegiate football about to kick off, the partners are hoping for brisk business from the 20 colleges and universities across the country with which they have licenses. They’ve created 15 new designs for MSU alone and made hooded sweatshirts — popular with college students — prominent on their Web site.

“We consider our universities to be the leader in green education and thought bringing eco-friendly products into the collegiate market would be a perfect union,” Wheeler said. “Project571 is proud to give students, fans and alumni the option to support the environment while supporting their favorite university.”

The online retail business is a spinoff from Wheeler’s Web site Green571, a not-for-profit site he launched the year before to educate people about environmental issues. 571 stands for 5 oceans, 7 continents, 1 planet. Users can sign up to receive a free daily newsletter telling them how they can reduce their carbon footprint.

The company’s administrative work is done in Chicago, but Wheeler, 33, and Dean, 32, who both have ties to Michigan — Dean is a Kalamazoo native and Wheeler has a summer home in New Buffalo — wanted to keep some of the work in the state. The T-shirts, sweatshirts and baby and toddler garments are printed in New Buffalo, where Wheeler works from his house, while Dean works from their Chicago office.

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