Trying to explain Who We Are can get a little complicated so follow closely. The business was started in 1974 by Larry Mays as a one man operation making trophies and awards. In 1976 he moved to a new storefront located a few blocks from where his little brother Greg lived. At the time Greg was in 8th grade. Greg started working at the shop engraving plates for trophies and plaques, hand bending trophy columns and assembling awards. Larry paid Greg a half-cent for every letter he engraved on old pantograph hand engraving machines (Larry charged 5 cents to his customers). The joke was, considering how many mistakes Greg made, that he was overpaid!! Greg disagrees.
Soon after we moved into our new location we added Sporting Goods to our product offerings. When we couldn't compete effectively with the big bad local Sporting Goods store and the national chains we got out of sporting goods and began offering screen printed and embroidered sportswear. We used a home built screen printing machine and heat lamps to dry the shirts. We graduated to an Advance 4-color manual press and our first infrared dryer.
We then moved into our current facility in 1990. We added equipment - automatic presses, gas fired dryers, proper exposure equipment, retensionable frames, etc. - and expanded our operation. When we started out in embroidery we were using an old 6 head single needle machine - the first of it's kind in our town. Wow, those were the days. Today we operate much more modern Tajima equipment.
Near the end of the last century (we're emphasizing how long we've been in business) we decided to become contact decorators to the Promotional Products Industry, offering our screen printing and embroidery services to Distributors around the country. To serve this channel we started a new "company" called Boardwalk Marketing. Boardwalk serves PPD's exclusively - Boardwalk does not sell to end users. Our parent company is called Mays Marketing (we aren't very creative with our company names, we know). Mays Marketing still servers end user clients in our hometown of Erie, PA. We have a small staff of dedicated people who work hard to serve both our local and national clients. When you call on the phone you will likely talk to either Larry or Greg. If you want to trade war stories about days gone by be prepared for a long conversation.
Larry and Greg have drawn on their more than 40 years of experience in the apparel decorating world to help shape the Quote Magician. We continue to work with our local clients - every day. And we work with PPD's who have to serve clients - every day. We created a tool that works for us. We hope it will help you as well.
