Joliet's Top 5 Percent Custom T-Shirt, Sign Shop Flourishes

JOLIET, IL — Ezra Tillman is a military veteran. He's a Joliet small-business owner. He's faced stomach cancer. And these days, life is going great.

"I'm a cancer survivor, two years ago I was diagnosed," Tillman told Joliet Patch's editor Monday at his West Jefferson Street custom T-shirt, apparel and sign shop, Top 5 Percent.

"I'm fine," Tillman continued. "I'm fine, and it's not slowing me down. They were able to take care of it."

In May 2017, Tillman and his wife, Kimberly, opened Top 5 Percent. They're at 1256 W. Jefferson St. in Suite 103.

"It's been working out," Ezra Tillman told Joliet Patch during Monday's interview. "We've grown a lot. We started off with one machine. Now, we have eight machines. We're able to supply pretty much all of our customers' needs. We ship all over the country."

Top 5 Percent handles orders from as far away as Texas, New York and North Carolina. On Monday, Tillman was processing a T-shirt shipment headed for Arizona.

"We ship," he said laughing.

"We started it from scratch," Tillman said of Top 5 Percent. "My wife and I are both ex-military. She fought in the first Gulf War."

Tillman and his wife have lived in the Joliet-Plainfield area for more than 20 years.

Joliet Patch asked what's the busiest aspect of sales for Top 5 Percent.

"We sell more T-shirts than anything," he answered. "We're a full print company, custom T-shirts, promotional items, signs for storefronts, stickers, magnets. We definitely do a lot."

One of Tillman's local clients is the Joliet Slammers independent baseball team.

Tillman said he created the signs displayed along the outside of Joliet's baseball stadium. A couple additional noteworthy customers of Top 5 Percent are Argonne National Laboratory in Lemont and Popus Gourmet Popcorn in Joliet's Marycrest Shopping Plaza.

"Our goal is to keep on expanding and eventually hire more full-time employees because we definitely have been busy," Tillman said.

Leasing first-floor office space at 1256 W. Jefferson St. has worked out well for Top 5 Percent these past three-plus years, Tillman said.

However, there is a good chance the Joliet apparel store may need to find a new location, sooner than later, "so we can expand our offerings," he said.

"We want to stay here, but right now, we're at our limit because we can't add any more machines. I'm definitely going to stay in Joliet," Tillman told Joliet Patch.

Top 5 Percent stays open 8:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday. The business is closed on weekends.

Even though Top 5 Percent is on Joliet's busiest street, "99 percent of people find us on the web," its owner said.

Top 5 Percent has 66 Google Reviews at the moment. Every single Google review are five stars.

"We make sure our customers are happy," Tillman said.

Want to learn more about Top Percent? Visit the Joliet apparel and signage shop's website here.