Woodbridge man hopes to inspire with T-shirts

Vince Stubbs had "Change" before Sen. Barack Obama. Stubbs, 45, is the founder of Try Change, a T-shirt company he runs from his Wood-bridge home. The shirts are sold in area clothing stores. Stubbs also said he had the slogan long before Obama turned it into a political buzzword.

It all started as a positive reaction to something negative.

Stubbs, the corporate director of sales and marketing for Coakley Williams Hotel Management Company, was with his fiancée, Chrissie Ksanznak, in a Shoppers supermarket about two years ago. It was a Sunday afternoon. He saw a woman, probably in her mid-20s, wearing a T-shirt that read "Yes, I would f*** you."

"I couldn't believe that I saw that," Stubbs said. "I'm not a prude or anything, but it was a Sunday after-noon."

The next day he was on his lunch break in Springfield Mall. He saw a kid, probably between 7 and 10, wearing a shirt that read "Just hanging out with my bud," with a large marijuana leaf.

"I went to work and I thought to myself, what's worse: wearing a shirt like that, or seeing a shirt like that and not really saying something?" Stubbs said.

Stubbs, who served as the president of the Springfield Chamber of Commerce, came up with the slogan "Try Change," which he said is a positive message promoting peace, hope, faith and diversity. In other words, to let people know they can make a difference in their community, no matter how small. It's not a religious message either.

"We feel that it's important to put forth a positive message in the community," Stubbs said, adding that he used his chamber of commerce business connections to get the company off the ground and shirts into stores.

He launched the company on June 28 at the now-defunct Fashion Mechanics, hosted by WKYS 93.9,  in Potomac Mills mall. Now, he said his shirts are avail-able in 15 area stores.

Stubbs, who does volunteer work at the Hilda M. Barg Prevention Center, said 10 percent of the money from the shirts is donated to the center.

"We're actually an official partner of Volunteers of America," the center's parent organization Stubbs said.

"[The shirts are] not just about reaching your own potential, but what you see in other people," said Gayle Sanders.

Sanders is the director for the Hilda M. Barg Prevention Center, which is part of Volunteers of America Chesapeake. She's known Stubbs for years, as a volunteer at the center and said she saw his T-shirt idea "blossom" into reality.

"He's an extraordinarily positive person, optimistic and ener-getic," Sanders said. "He definitely believes in 'all good can come from people'."

Sanders husband owns a Try Change shirt, which she occasionally borrows.

"I love them, practically like art work," Sanders said. "Some of them you think you can frame."

This is thanks to David B. Anthony, a graphic artist who owns Georgetown-based DBA Intermedia.

"We do design and development for companies all over the world," Anthony, 28, of Arlington, said. Try Change is just one of hundreds of clothing companies that work with DBA Intermedia.

"Vince has a good outlook on everything he's doing," Anthony said. "He had a good message."

Stubbs gets his message—and outlook—from his late father, a Korean War veteran who volunteered his time at a veteran's hospital in New Jer-sey.

"He always said there's always someone out there who has it worse than you," Stubbs said. His father died a couple of years ago from a brain aneurism.

There was another instance that made an impression on Stubbs, too. While vol-unteering at the shelter a woman was asked to leave, for breaking the rules, a couple days before Christmas. There was another woman who only had $5 to her name. Before the first woman left, the second counted off three dollars, put it in a Christmas card and gave it to the first.

"Even she knew that someone was in a worse situation," Stubbs said. "I think that we all have this feeling of being a part of something big-ger than ourselves… it's about making a difference."

Staff writer Josh Eiserike can be reached at 703-878-8072.

WANT ONE?

Get a Try Change T-shirt at one of the following area locations:

» Fashion Mechanics, Springfield Mall and Manassas Mall » Evado, Fair Oaks Mall » SWANK, Pentagon City Mall