Clothing Line Hopes to Make an "Alter-nation"

Two Bayport-Blue Point natives who bonded in high school over their shared passion for skateboarding are now using the Internet to get out the word on their product line – alternation clothing.  

The idea for the company came in 2006 as Matt Schnepf, 28, worked on a senior project concept to earn his degree in graphic design. 

“I was given the option of creating anything,” said Schnepf, president and CEO of alternation clothing.  

The finished product became a video magazine promoting sports such as skateboarding, surfing and bicycle motorcross, or BMX. To help market the magazine, Schnepf created a T-shirt that would go on to inspire his clothing line.  

“In alternative sports, everything’s about progression,” Schnepf said. “You’re always trying that next move, that next trick. At the same time (alternation) is also a play on words.”   

With certain shirts, the company hopes to be pointing towards a larger message. One design depicts a robot, weary after a full days work that elicits the concept of “outsourcing,” according to its creators. Another design shows an urban city titled “the end is near” that draws on home foreclosures.   

“We didn’t want to be one of those companies that just wanted to sell a t-shirt for $30,” said Tom DeJosia, 28, creative marketing manager and public relations for alternation clothing. He joined Schnepf in 2008 when the brand officially launched. The homegrown online company doesn’t have an office and merchandise is printed by hand on their own. 

For now, the merchandise is only available at Long Island Bicycles in Patchogue, Oil City Skatepark in Oceanside and Concrete skate shop in Manhattan. Patrons can also pick up merchandise at alternation’s booth during Patchogue’s Alive After Five street fair events- July 29 and August 12.  

While the brand doesn’t have a storefront, it does have a web address where the brand sells between 200 and 400 shirts per year.  

“I don’t know where we’d be without the Internet,” Schnepf said. “I think the 21st Century allows us to do that. Keeping it online is definitely the way to go. I think it’s tough to have a retail store with just one brand.”  

The company has launched Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and LinkedIn sites to help get the word out.

“It’s really that now we have all the social media, you don’t need overhead,” DeJosia said.    

The brand has seen a growing interest inside their target age demographic of 16 to 25 and has even expanded the line to women’s clothing and will soon launch children’s clothing after realizing there was a demand in the 6 to 7 age range. 

As the company expands, it hopes to keep the same message of altering and uniting. 

“The idea of alternation, that you actually create and change bringing all those cultures together and unite as one,” Schnepf said.  “It’s not just the designs, not just people taking about it, but people coming together and creating their own change.” 

“It’s a push to bring about a larger change of perception,” DeJosia said.