Although its sign may be smaller in comparison to the billboards of other Corner merchants, the orange and blue letters of Mincer's store are an unmistakable signal to Wahoos that they've come home.
Mincer's, the T-shirt and merchandise shop that sells University fashion mainstays such as "Friends Don't Let Friends Go to Tech," has transcended time. The store has undergone a complete metamorphosis since first opening in 1948, while continuing to meet the needs of the University community.
When it first opened in its Corner locale, the store catered to an entirely different clientele of University students: those who idolized Big Bopper instead of Dave Matthews and those who donned sweaters and blazers instead of the ever-prevalent Abercrombie.
The store was Mincer's Pipe Shop.
In the late 1940s, Robert Mincer, a New York pipe factory employee who had been dismissed from his job, decided to begin his own pipe business where he believed he could best prosper: a college town, said Mark Mincer, a 1985 Commerce School graduate and grandson of Robert Mincer.
"It was just after the Depression, and if anybody could afford to go to college, they could afford a pipe," Mark Mincer said.
Robert Mincer narrowed down his search to three potential college towns: Hanover, N.H., the home of Dartmouth, Lexington, Va., and, of course, Charlottesville.
"Hanover was too cold, and Lexington we couldn't set up to serve both campuses [Virginia Military Institute and Washington & Lee University], so Charlottesville was the winner," Mark said.
According to Mincer's employee Bill Cogswell, a 1995 Commerce School graduate, the shop only sold pipes, tobacco and cigarettes when the store first opened.
In fact, when Mincer's made its Corner debut in 1948, the Mincer family opened their shop further down the strip next to what is now littlejohns deli.
The space, however, soon proved too small for the growing business, and in 1954, the Mincers decided to move their business to its present location.
But why the transition from tobacco delights to T-shirts?
The University won the Men's Basketball ACC tournament in 1976, and Wahoos everywhere demanded T-shirts to celebrate. So the Mincer family decided to meet the need of University students and alumni, and the transition to University-oriented merchandising began.
And despite the major shift in merchandise, the Mincers continued to special order tobacco products for their most loyal customers, Mark said.
As Mincer's grew and became part of the University community over the last five decades, the store also expressed full belief in the tenets of the honor system, developing their own unique IOU system.
"We kept what we called a 'lettuce box' at the front of the store," Mark said.
If students were short on cash, they could leave an IOU in the box. The Mincers jokingly called it a lettuce box because students always asked, "let us bring the money later," he said.
Although the "lettuce box" no longer is affixed atop the store's counter, Mincer's still is part of the University community. The students and visitors clutching Virginia paraphernalia-filled bright orange plastic bags while plodding along University Avenue are testament to Mincer's place in the heart of the University.
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