AKRON, Ohio — The Akron Zoo has launched an online store, stocked with zoo-themed items in an array of collections.

Designs on the T-shirts, hoodies, cups, totes, puzzles and color prints are unique to the Akron Zoo’s online store, and not available anywhere else, including the zoo’s gift shop, the zoo said in a release. 

What You Need To Know

  • The Akron Zoo launched an online store with zoo-themed items bearing original designs

  • Designs on T-shirts, hoodies, cups, totes, puzzles and color prints are not available in the zoo’s gift shop

  • Collections include wild animals, diversity and inclusion, and prints and canvases of animals on-site in Akron

  • All items are made-to-order to create less waste and everything ships free

Offering unisex sizing for adult T-shirts and hoodies, the online store also offers baby, toddler and youth sizes.

All the items are made-to-order to create less waste, which means items can’t be returned unless they are damaged or misprinted, the zoo said. Everything in the store ships free.

The items are unique to the Akron Zoo’s online store, and not available in the zoo’s gift shop. (Akron Zoo)

The Akron Zoo has created several collections for its online store:

  • The Simply Wild Collection features many of the zoo’s most popular animals with quippy sayings like “Bearly awake,” “Gibbon You My Love,” “Howl you Doin’?” and “You Goat Girl.”  The Akron Zoo didn’t leave out its popular water creatures, offering an “Aw Snap!” design with lobsters and “Turtle-y Perfect!” 
  • The Red Panda Collection offers a shirts, puzzles and mugs with two different red panda graphic designs as well as items with images of Lulu and Penny, two of the zoo’s endangered red pandas.
  • The City Pop Collection features shirts and mugs with multi-colored, pop-art penguins, grizzlies, jaguars and lemurs.
  • The We Care Collection is all about sustainability and diversity, with items that feature a chameleon “Be the Change” design, a people and animals “bio-Diversity” design, a songbird “Support Music” design, a colorful “You Belong” design and “Akron Zoo Pride,” featuring the distinctive rainbow. 
  • The Summer Splash Collection features a colorful design series on shirts, hoodies, totes and mugs that showcases the zoo’s own Jackson the Grizzly bear, Noel the alpaca, Pandora the box turtle and Stratton the otter. 
    All items are made-to-order to create less waste. (Akron Zoo)
  • The Amphibian Collection pays homage to FrogWatch USA, the Akron Zoo’s citizen science program, which is part of a national network that helps participants learn about wetlands and amphibians conservation by reporting local data on the calls of frogs and toads. The collection features amphibians in a series of styles with the FrogWatch logo.
  • The Special Events Collection pays tribute to some of the zoo’s most popular events, such as Brew at the Zoo and Wine and Paint, offering unique designs on t-shirts, hoodies and wine tumblers. 
  • The Animal Canvas Collection is for those who would rather hang art on the wall than wear it. The 12-inch by 12-inch canvases, with built-in wall mounts, showcase many of the zoo’s beloved animals, including Ellie the tufted deer, Petry the bald eagle, Milan the jaguar, Tia Lung the snow leopard, Albus the barn owl, Shilah the coyote and many others. 
  • The Kopperhead Collection comprises images taken by the Akron Zoo’s freelance photographer, Lee Kopp, who captures many of the zoo’s most popular animals in frameable color prints.

A portion of all sales from the online store goes directly to help the animals, the zoo said.

The zoo’s summer hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. daily. The Akron Zoo is located at 505 Euclid Ave. in Akron. For more information, visit the website.

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