Decorator Surprises Browns Locker Room With 'Playoff Pound' Shirts

By Brendan Menapace

Check out your window to see if any pigs happen to fly by. Maybe check your calendar to make sure it’s not Opposite Day or something.

The Cleveland Browns have made the playoffs.

Crazy, right?

Since this hasn’t happened since 2002, some celebrations were in order. GV Art + Design, an apparel company based in Cleveland, surprised the team (as much as the team surprised us) with T-shirts in a box labeled “do not open until Sunday 4 p.m.,” when it was safe to say they were officially playoff-bound. In the box were T-shirts with “Playoff Pound,” which the players sported in the locker room.

They have officially arrived!

We’ve had hundreds of calls and emails all day so just wanted to give a heads up that our new Playoff Pound shirts will be available in all 3 stores tomorrow at 11 am!

Grab one tomorrow and be one of the first to get your hands on a Playoff tee! pic.twitter.com/FbUGUFI2ep

— GV Art + Apparel (@GVartwork) January 5, 2021

“What’s more iconic than the pound?” Greg Vlosich, owner of GV Art + Design, told WKYC. “So we really wanted to play off of that. It’s always ‘playoff bound, playoff bound.’ So we really anted to tie in what makes it Cleveland and what makes it a Cleveland feel.”

Vlosich said that once the shirts hit the site for the general public, the business outdid its usual Cyber Monday sales.

The Cleveland Browns, for all of their ups and downs (mostly downs), have been a marketing gold mine. Sure, the sadness is there, but there’s so much personality and love for this franchise, and even non-Browns fans want to rally around them sometimes.

Remember those Victory Fridges Bud Light placed around Cleveland, beckoning fans to crack one open when the Browns won? They even did it twice!

Few franchises or businesses lend themselves to such feel-good marketing opportunities with such appeal. And being a sports team, they have a built-in market in the Cleveland area.

Sure, you could make the case that the Browns should “act like they’ve been there” and not celebrate an achievement that's minor compared to, say, winning the Super Bowl. (A third of the NFL makes the playoffs each year.) But what’s the fun in that? This year, everyone is looking for something to celebrate or some lighthearted fun. If you can’t get behind the Browns rocking some surprise T-shirts after a playoff drought old enough to enlist in the military, well then we just don’t know what to tell you.