Ralston took this idea and traveled to Santa Catalina Island with a friend, referred to as “Crazy Arab” to spray-paint designs on beach towels.

Tourists had to bring their own blank T-shirts from a local sporting goods shop, and Ralston and “Crazy Arab” embellished them with depictions of monsters, surfers or hot rods at $2.80 a piece, sometimes making as much as $100 a day.

The shop was called Ricky’s Crazy Shirts, and, to Ralston’s knowledge, it was the first store ever devoted exclusively to T-shirts and sweatshirts.

[5] In October 2001, Mark Hollander became president and chief executive officer of Crazy Shirts Hawaii, taking over from Rick Ralston.

[6] Under the new leadership, Crazy Shirts expanded in new untapped markets across the nation, such as South Carolina and Santa Barbara and moved its production facility from California back to Hawaii.

The move created over 50 new jobs in Hawaii and unified all of the company’s production-related activities, including artwork and catalog production.

Hollander currently oversees the operations of the company’s retail locations across the country, as well as the production facility and administrative offices in Halawa Valley, on the island of Oahu, Hawaii.

Kliban Cat Designs – Crazy Shirts once held the exclusive clothing rights to the cartoon created by cartoonist B.