Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, February 1, 1991 TAG: 9102010692
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER/ NEW RIVER VALLEY BUREAU
DATELINE: RADFORD LENGTH: Medium
DJR Enterprises, a Radford-based custom sportswear company that came up with the "Desert Storm Troop Supporter" sweatshirts and T-shirts, presented the check at Pulaski's Red Cross office Thursday.
Now the DJR folks are looking for other rallies as potential markets, promising $2 to an area's Red Cross for each shirt sale.
DJR President David McDaniel, 44, said some of women working at the Radford facility had read about the Pulaski rally and suggested the new imprint.
DJR's artists designed a five-color imprint showing a map of the Persian Gulf, a destroyer, an F-15 Eagle jet and two soldiers.
They have been selling well.
A customer walked into the DJR office Thursday to buy another one for himself. He'd bought several, but people where he worked kept demanding to buy them from him.
The sweatshirts cost $20 and the T-shirts $12. They're available at DJR's plant at 1012 First St. in Radford and at DJR stores in Blacksburg and Harrisonburg.
When McDaniel started his enterprise in Radford, most of his building was occupied by a radiator shop and he had about five workers. Today, DJR has taken over the building, adding a second floor and more rooms. Its employees number more than 20, and have reached 35 during business peaks.
Djr does business nationwide. It designs its own catalogs and McDaniel does photos for them.
Ever alert for new business opportunities, McDaniel is considering going into advertising, as well, since DJR already has all the capability except actual printing.
The company's name comes from the initials of three fraternity brothers who started it. McDaniel, who majored in math and chemistry at the University of Alabama, eventually ended up as sole owner and sold his merchandise out of the trunk of his car.
After marrying a student he met at Longwood College, he lived in Petersburg about six years. He relocated here because Virginia Tech and Radford University provided good markets for fraternity and sorority clothing imprints.
At the start, DJR sewed onto clothing its imprints designed to customer specifications. Three years ago it added screen-printing, the process used for the troop-supporter shirts. Last year it added computers that can direct how symbols are sewed onto fabrics.
"We can do one to 1,000" once the image is in the computer, McDaniel said, and not just on clothing but on glassware and other items.
"In the very beginning, we did everything by hand. Now we write our own software to do our business," he said. "We have the largest inventory of Champion and Russell Athletic [sportswear] in the state of Virginia. . . . Your college and athletic people, they know those brands real well."
by CNB