A few years ago, Twin Cities resident AbdulAziz Al-Salim was looking for a witty, Muslim-themed t-shirt but all he could find were fairly unimaginative creations. So the 23-year-old started his own company to design and sell shirts with a Muslim point of view. Thus began his first business venture, Muslim Tees, a small company with a big message.
Full Transcript:
A few years ago, Twin Cities resident AbdulAziz Al-Salim was looking for a witty, Muslim-themed t-shirt but all he could find were fairly unimaginative creations. So the 23-year-old started his own company to design and sell shirts with a Muslim point of view. Thus began his first business venture, Muslim Tees, a small company with a big message.
Maha Ali has jet-black hair, olive skin and a bright smile warm enough to melt a cold winter afternoon. Today, she happens to be modeling in Uptown for photographer Khaled El-Sawaf, one of the founders of Muslim Tees.
“Give me a big smile,” El-Sawaf coaches. “Someone just bought you a new Mercedes Benz…”
The focus of this photo shoot is Ali’s t-shirt, a black tee proudly sporting the word “Islam” in large, white type. The letter “A” is in the shape of the African continent.
This t-shirt is the product of Muslim Tees, a company founded by a trio of college-educated, Minnesota-born Muslims. Their goal is to design hip t-shirts that say something about Islam, bash stereotypes, and look great. This includes the unfounded idea that Muslim don’t care about fashion; Maha Ali’s no stranger to that particular stereotype.
This is the idea behind Ali bringing her designer wear to the photo shoot, to disprove the notion “that there isn’t too much– that it’s just modest clothing– no design to it, really.”
“We’ll keep the purse in her hand because we also like to promote good taste and style,” says the photographer. “What kind of purse is that..? She has a Chanel purse. A Chanel purse with a Muslim T-shirt.”
“Do you wear this shirt elsewhere?” a reporter asks.
“I do,” Ali says. “I get all the shirts that I take pictures for.” This, it turns out, is all the pay she receives for modeling the shirts. “Yes. We’ll talk about that later, though.”
That same afternoon, a Muslim Tees meeting takes place at Taqee Khaled’s apartment. Of the four co-owners, just two live in Minneapolis so Khaled and El-Sawaf huddle around a cellphone perched on a coffee table for a conference call.
“What about Nora? Khaled asks referring to another of the business’ owners, Nora Alfaham
“Can someone call her? Give her a ring,” inquires Abdulaziz Al-Salim, the group’s business guru.
When asked about Muslim Tee’s prospects for success, Al-Salim declares it a possible and promising niche market.
“The idea of a shirt business is old,” he says. “You bring a Muslim flavor to it — as we’re bringing — is a new and different and untested business idea.”
So far, the company has sold about 1,400 shirts, mostly online and at conferences. The firm’s most popular shirt appropriates a popular icon, the cellphone battery symbol, and uses it to explain one of the benefits of Ramadan, the holy month of reflection requiring worshipers to fast every day during daylight hours. Underneath the battery symbol are the words “Time to recharge.”
Since non-Muslims focus on the fasting part of Ramadan, Al-Salim says it’s important to remind others that Ramadan is more about reconnecting with family and with God.
Another shirt features the pair of Arabic letters that begins the Shahada, an Islamic creed. “It is the simple negator when you say ‘No Gods.’ ‘No Gods But God.’ If you say that and you believe that you are Muslim, that’s all there is to it,” said Taqee Khaled.
Those who can’t read Arabic are bound to miss the shirt’s meaning but Khaled says that’s OK.
“Most people, when they see it, they say, ‘Oh, that’s cool,'” he said. “It doesn’t necessarily matter that that’s all they think when they see it because it does look cool.”
During their conference call, the group struggles with creating a shirt focusing on the plight of Palestine. Nora Alfaham weighs in from Ohio and suggests a design to emphasize peace, although AldulAziz Al-Salim has a different take on the issue.
“I think that’s an Islamic concept,” Alfaham says. “You have to be the one, be a better person. If we’re not going to start we’re going to be here for the next 100, 200 or 300 years waiting for someone to show us a sign of good will. That’s my reason to make it a dramatic shirt, but stay away from violence.”
“How can we sit here from afar in our convenient homes, well away from the conflict and make these huge assumptions, you know?” Al-Salim said. “Would you be saying the same things if you were in Gaza? Would you be saying let us be the bearers of peace and what not?”
Yet not every Muslim Tees discussion is fraught with seriousness.
“Remember the ‘Sheiks on a Plane’ idea?” Al-Salim asks.
The Muslim Tees idea combines indignation at Muslim holy men being denied permission to board a commercial jet with a play on Samuel L. Jackson notorious cult movie, “Snakes on a Plane.”
“Gosh, I loved that shirt so much,” Khaled interjects. “This shirt was awesome. I swear to goodness. We had like a silhouette and this plane taking off and it was super like 70s stylized, and it had silhouettes of these four sheiks, you know.”
In the end, Muslim Tees dumped the “Sheiks on a Plane” idea. “Even though that shirt, I think it would sell, we didn’t want to become that genre,” Khaled said.
Muslim Tees has recently added new designs on the Hajj and other topics.
Comment