BUFFALO, N.Y. — "I remember being so excited that we hit $10,000 dollars so this is just, we're in unchartered territory here," 26 Shirts Founder Del Reid told 2 On Your Side, as it was announced his company had surpassed $2 million in donations to local families and charitable organizations.
"Back when we started the Bills Mafia movement in 2011, it just continued to grow so quickly. People were asking us to share and retweet all these different fundraisers and different things going on," Reid explained.
He and his friends from Bible study came up with an idea to sell a new shirt every other week for a year, to raise money for some of the causes.
"Ten and a half years later into that one-year project, and we're doing two or three shirts a week, and we're selling more than shirts. So the name doesn't mean anything anymore," Reid laughed.
He's right. These days, 26 Shirts sells shirts, hats, mugs, flags, aprons - Reid says anything they can use to fundraise.
This month, they're also expanding into the event space when they host Mafia Con, to raise money for PUNT Pediatric Cancer Collaborative and Western New York Heroes on July 20th.
"We're going to have player appearances, podcasters, and vendors. So we're really excited about that. That's a brand new world for us to enter into in terms of putting on events," Reid said.
Reid says it's just the latest way for his company to continue its mission: to keep helping as many Western New Yorkers as they can.
"We're always grateful for the community who comes alongside us to support what we're doing. Without our customers no money gets raised," he said. "We'll continue to celebrate Western New York and support Western New York for years to come."