When game ends, company’s race begins

January 07, 2009|By Martin E. Comas, Sentinel Staff Writer
LEESBURG — Whether the Florida Gators or the Oklahoma Sooners win college football’s national title game Thursday night, workers at TL Sportswear will have little time to celebrate.

As the game clock ticks off the final seconds, employees at the Leesburg operation will race to print tens of thousands of T-shirts announcing the winning team.

And within hours, the finished hot-off-the-silk-screen-press shirts will be boxed, loaded into trucks and rushed to store shelves across the country, including JCPenney, Belk and Bealls, by Friday morning.

T-shirt makers have stake in Final 4

March 31, 2007

LEESBURG — T-shirt king J.R. Hirschfeld and his employees will huddle around television sets tonight and closely watch the Final Four college basketball games, especially the battle between the defending champion Florida Gators and UCLA Bruins.

Hirschfeld’s company on Main Street prints T-shirts and sweatshirts with school logos for colleges — including all four schools in the Final Four. The merchandise is then sold in stores across the country, including Macy’s, J.C. Penney, Belk and Bealls.

The two winning teams tonight will meet in the national championship game Monday night.

T-shirt company is in the game

By Martin E. Comas, Sentinel Staff Writer | January 6, 2007

LEESBURG — T-shirt tycoon J.R. Hirschfeld and his employees will try to get as much sleep as they can before Monday’s college football title game. When the battle between the Florida Gators and the Ohio State Buckeyes ends just before midnight, they’ll pour some coffee and fire up the silk-screening machines at TL Sportswear. And for the next 30 hours or so, they will speedily print thousands of T-shirts announcing either the Gators or the Buckeyes as the new national champions of college football.

Cinderella Team’s Win Huge For Local Printer

March 31, 2006|By Martin E. Comas, Sentinel Staff Writer
LEESBURG — J.R. Hirschfeld went to the University of Florida. He’s an avid Gator fan and a university booster.

But when the Gators play the George Mason University Patriots in college basketball’s Final Four on Saturday, Hirschfeld is not sure whom he’ll cheer for.

“You’re asking me a hard one,” he said. “My heart is with UF, but my pocketbook says George Mason.”

T-shirt Shop Has Heisman Link

Sports Fans Can Find Apparel Boosting Their Favorite College Teams And Trophy Contenders.

September 27, 1999|By Sara ShecKler, Sentinel Correspondent

LEESBURG – A Leesburg business that designs and manufactures T-shirts and sweatshirts that bear college sports logos also is producing apparel that has contenders’ names for the Heisman trophy.

J.R. Hirschfeld and his wife, Elaine, own TL Sportswear, a division of Tri-Lake Inc., at 110 Satellite Court in Leesburg.
Hirschfeld said his business is one of two manufacturers in the country to make Heisman logo apparel. The other is in Chattanooga, Tenn.