While relatively quiet in the fall, the weekends draw in an unrivaled crowd that turns State College into the third largest city in the state on home football game Saturdays. Through a stroke of genius, Penn State’s annual White Out game has become so iconic that it has been deemed “The Greatest Show in College Sports,” thanks to the likes of Kirk Herbstreit and Chris Fowler. In Downtown State College, there is one store that goes to great lengths to celebrate the occasion in style. 

Despite some experimental attempts that precede the official White Out, the game that we all know and love was cemented in 2005 as a way to get the crowd to participate and be more involved by providing a significant home-field advantage. The fans are so loud during this game that it has caused opponents to take a timeout on the very first play of the game. 

Penn State Football games bring a monster crowd to Beaver Stadium, but also to local businesses. One store in particular has committed itself to maximize the business that rolls into town on the weekends. The Family Clothesline recently went viral on social media for launching a collaboration with Lululemon, with eager fans lining up outside as early as 5 am for the drop. The store also hosts autograph signings with the Penn State Football team after games. These autograph signings and football game weekends bring in large crowds for the store, but nothing compares to the White Out. 

Eddie Banks, a manager at the store, explained what goes on behind the scenes to prepare for something so hectic and how they were able to transform the store into a sea of white. 

“For a weekend like White Out, we have to print a lot more of our white products so we can sell it all, as that’s what people want right now. We take everything that’s not white for the most part off the floor, and we replace it with white products” Banks said.

The company has its own print shop, which allows them to keep prices cheap. “Our print shop prints a lot more white products for us, and then throughout the week we bring it all over and we store it and just sit on it until we need it to restock the floor. After that, it’s pretty much just bringing all the white products that we can up to the floor and keeping it as stocked as we can,” Banks further explained.

The store received truckload after truckload of white products in order to redesign the store to have only white. Employee Ryan Frist provided a new perspective, sharing his experience of working in the eye of the storm. 

“A lot of people outside of town love to travel in for the White Out especially. That goes the same for any football game obviously, but with this year being Homecoming and White Out on the same weekend, it’s probably going to be pretty packed. Not even just people going to the game, but people coming back to State College to hang out. There’s a lot of alumni that’ll love to do that,” Frist stated.

Normally, The Family Clothesline is full of vivid colors and has varying products that could appeal to anyone’s taste, but during this special weekend, there is only one color visible in the store; white.

“Specifically for White Out, we have to keep our floor extremely well stocked and make sure everything that is white in our product line is out in the open and easily visible so that every type of product is available if someone wants to get it for the White Out or just in general,” said Frist. “We have to make sure that any Penn State alumni coming back is able to get any merchandise they want and that it is restocked because not everyone lives in this area.” Frist added. 

Not only was it an impressive win this past weekend for Penn State Football, but also an impressive effort by Family Clothesline staff to keep operations running smoothly. While you might not be able to see the store-wide White Out anymore, you can stop by before the Stripe Out matchup against Ohio State this weekend, because the store will be decorating for that too.