An Intern's Perspective of 26 Shirts

As summer is beginning to wind down, we asked current intern Gabriella Buzzelli if she wouldn't mind sharing a little bit of what she's done at 26 Shirts for the past few months. She was happy to!

I started interning for 26 Shirts in May of 2015.

I came across 26 Shirts because I am very fond of co-founder Dan Gigante’s company, You and Who. When Dan gave me the opportunity to work with 26 Shirts, I was thrilled.

I have been working with marketing the Chicago line, attempting to find more customers, beneficiaries, and artists from the "Windy City." It’s definitely difficult trying to create a name for your company in a city you don't live in, but I believe we’ve been doing a pretty good job.

My role for the company takes place half in the office and half out of the office from a virtual setting. I do all my Chicago marketing research from home, trying to find the next best beneficiary for us to help. I love doing my work from the office because the atmosphere is great and the people I work with are fun. I think we all have this underlying passion and drive to help our specific beneficiary of the week, which makes everyone's attitudes more positive.

When we are preparing a shirt order, I love seeing how we have customers from all over the United States. I’m well-aware that there are Buffalo sports fans all over, but I believe that some people look beyond the fact that they are getting one of the coolest limited edition shirts around, and focus more on the fact that they are helping someone in need. I loved being a part of that.

My best memory from this entire experience was from when we were preparing the order of Orchard Park shirts for 2 year old beneficiary Livvie Wilcox, who suffers from Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. Her order was one of our best selling shirts of all time. That day, Livvie herself walked in and hung out with us for a bit. She was the cutest, happiest little girl I’ve ever seen and knowing that my work there that day was helping her made my day tremendous. Things like that happen all the time at 26 Shirts.

It’s an amazing company that is doing all this for an extraordinary cause.

--Gabby Buzzelli

Are you a college student in the Buffalo area interested in possibly interning with us this fall? EMAIL US and let's see if we're a good fit!