Sound Off Apparel Collaborates with Local Musicians for Charity

Launching July 1st, Sound Off Apparel is a company that partners with bands to co-design clothing that raises funds and awareness for a charity of the musicians’ choice. Founded by Louis XIV drummer Mark Maigaard and marketing professional Erin Goss, the project features a new partnership each month and produces cool graphic t-shirts that donate over 40% of the proceeds from each sale to the chosen cause.

Sound Off’s first collaboration will feature local band Transfer as the co-designer with help from Petey X from Rocket from the Crypt who will be printing the shirts through his print company Merch Lackey. Transfer has long been one of San Diego’s most recognized bands, having recently gotten off a successful international tour with Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, and holding the title for Best Rock Album from the San Diego Music Awards in 2010.

Transfer has elected to benefit the San Diego-based charity Center for Community Solutions (CCS) which provides prevention and intervention services for sexual assault and relationship violence to over 11,000 individuals each year. Seven dollars from the sale of each shirt will go specifically to CCS Prevention and Education Services. Locally, the Youth Risk Behavior Survey showed 12.4% of San Diego high school youth reported being “hit, slapped, or physically hurt on purpose by their boyfriend or girlfriend.” This is higher than the nationally reported rate of 9.5%. Violence is a learned behavior, CCS uses education as a tool to prevent violence and build safer communities by teaching healthy relationships, conflict resolution, and bystander intervention skills to youth throughout San Diego County. This education is in high demand; there is currently a 2-3 month wait list for schools and at-risk youth centers to receive CCS prevention education.

According to Verna Griffin-Tabor, executive director at Center for Community Solutions, they are grateful to be the beneficiary of Transfer’s T shirt promotion in partnership with Sound Off Apparel. “We seek every opportunity to raise awareness on the importance of promoting healthy relationships and prevention violence, and this is a wonderful way for us to reach a new demographic, “she said. “Everyone in our community plays a role in violence prevention and we are thankful for this support.”

Shirts will be sold through the Sound Off Apparel website in addition to one night only at The Casbah on July 13th where Transfer will be headlining a concert. In celebration of the performance and Transfer’s collaboration, the donation amount per shirt will be increased to ten dollars.

About CCS

Center for Community Solutions (CCS) was founded in 1969 and serves over 11,000 youth and adults in San Diego County each year. CCS currently provides a continuum of services for relationship violence, sexual assault, and elder abuse spanning from immediate emergency response services including a 24-hour hotline, 24-hour hospital accompaniment for sexual assault survivors during forensic examinations, and emergency shelter to longer-term support including follow-up victim advocacy, trauma-focused counseling services, legal assistance, transitional housing, and economic self-sufficiency services. In addition, CCS works to prevent violence before it starts by providing prevention and education workshops to over 3,000 San Diego youth every year. For more information please visit www.ccssd.org or call (858) 272-5777.