Our Story
We are Amalgamated Culture Works, directly descended from the Amalgamated Cultural Workers of America and we’ve been screen printing shirts since 1981. We’re located in Burlington, Vermont, on the shores of Lake Champlain. Burlington is the largest city in the state and the home to the University of Vermont. We’re proud of our home; it is a great place to live and work although occasionally it does get a little cold.
Wayne Turiansky started ACW in March of 1981 in his living room in the hills outside of Wallingford, VT. Originally, he only sold custom printed t-shirts, although within six months of start-up a customer suggested ACW create a line of Vermont shirts to peddle to stores who made their living from our state’s substantial tourist trade. Wayne ran around to every artist he knew and within a few weeks had cobbled together a small line of simple, humorous designs. They took off and after logging over 40,000 miles on his 1966 Volvo station wagon within the next year, Amalgamated Culture Works became the world’s largest producer of Vermont t-shirts
By summer of 1982, he had outgrown the living room and moved to a storefront in Rutland, some 13 miles north, and had hired his first employee. Years of growth followed and in the spring of 1986, ACW made the big move north to Burlington. Now a company of several employees, we were well received in the Queen City. Over the next 30+ years ACW thrived under Wayne’s leadership. Staff has always been key – having a solid team over the years with people like Don Doubleday, Ed Cawley, Rob Pitone, Curt Prestash, and others allowed Wayne to step back.
In 2021, Rob Pitone, ACW Production Manager of 13+ years approached Wayne with a proposal. He and his wife Tammy had often talked about owning a business and working together. With a recent change in Tammy’s career path and Wayne looking for more time to spend with family and to do some globe trotting, the timing seemed right. In September, 2021 after 40 years leading ACW, Wayne handed over the reins to Tammy and Rob, although he is only a phone call away should we need his expert advice.
Today we split our time between custom prints and our in-house designs that we ship to retailers all over the country, though we’re still small enough that customer service is our number one focus. Our team has over 50 years combined experience and we love new and unique projects! Give us a look over and feel free to contact us by email, phone, or our Request a Quote form and we’ll do our very best to make your dreams come true, as long as your dream is to have a custom printed tee, cap, sweatshirt, tote, sweatpants, shorts… you get the idea!
