Domestic T-shirt makers have depended on automation to fend off the imports that have inundated many other types of apparel companies.

For example, suppose a T-shirt maker has 100 T-shirts.

So, given all that, maybe the Brazilian T-shirt maker Huck's starry-eyed Neymar shirt with the text "Messi who?"

"There has always been a market for superhero shirts," said Marek Kiyashka, an owner of Changes, a T-shirt maker in the Bronx.

Of late, he has become the favorite motif of gift shop owners and T-shirt makers.

"I'm a small-business owner, too, and I'd rather give my money to the small guy than a behemoth like Starbucks," said Ms. Velasquez, 24, a T-shirt maker who sells her designs on the sidewalks nearby.

And T-shirt makers find ways to combine commerce with conscience (left).

There were several T-shirt makers.

For T-shirt makers, Malcolm X may be a bonanza and recessionary godsend.

Platform sells 25 brands of clothing, and the companies' profits range from $1,500 a year for an independent T-shirt maker to $1 million a year for big brands like Ecko.