Tailgate Shirts for Fall Gamedays (Plus the Order-By Date for Every October Saturday)

The shirt above is a real one: "PARKING LOT SEASON," printed on a $35 $29.90 tee. If your crew's next tailgate is two weeks out or more, you can have your own version made by tonight and worn on a folding chair by kickoff.

Jump straight in: design your tailgate shirt in the slogan studio — free, no account, and you can redo it as many times as you want before ordering.

The order-by dates for the rest of October

Printing and shipping run 5–10 business days. Work back two weeks from the Saturday the shirts have to be worn, not the day you think of it:

• Saturday, October 17 → order by Saturday, October 3
• Saturday, October 24 → order by Saturday, October 10
• Saturday, October 31 → order by Saturday, October 17
• Saturday, November 7 → order by Saturday, October 24

Being straight with you: anything before October 12 is already too tight to promise, so aim at a later Saturday rather than gambling on this weekend.

Check your own calendar against this. Most schools put homecoming on an October Saturday; the Red River game is traditionally played at the Cotton Bowl during the State Fair of Texas; Georgia–Florida traditionally lands in Jacksonville in late October or early November; and the World Series runs through the back half of October, which turns a lot of tailgates into double-screen operations. Confirm the date your group cares about, then count back fourteen days.

Halloween is on a football Saturday this year

October 31, 2026 falls on a Saturday. That's the one worth planning early, because it collides two things that both want a shirt: a full gameday in the lot, and a night nobody wants to be the only adult without a costume.

The move is a shirt that works as a costume without being one — something you can wear at 9 a.m. by the grill and still count as "dressed up" at 8 p.m. If you'd rather go the full costume route, we wrote about matching family Halloween shirts when nobody wants a full costume and group Halloween shirts with their own order-by dates.

22 tailgate shirt lines that don't need a team name

These work on any campus, in any lot:

• PARKING LOT SEASON
• GAMEDAY. ALL DAY.
• WE GOT HERE AT SIX
• THE GRILL DOESN'T STOP FOR ANYONE
• KICKOFF IS A SUGGESTION
• LOT B REGULAR
• SATURDAYS IN OCTOBER
• CHAIR, COOLER, CHAOS
• FIRST TENT UP
• I'M HERE FOR THE PARKING LOT
• TAILGATE ALL DAY, NAP ALL SUNDAY
• YES I BROUGHT ENOUGH
• THE TV WORKS. THE TEAM DOESN'T.
• CORNHOLE UNDEFEATED
• 50 DEGREES IS SHORTS WEATHER
• DESIGNATED GRILL OPERATOR
• WE'RE NOT LEAVING AT HALFTIME
• ALUMNI, TECHNICALLY
• GENERATOR GUY
• SNACK CAPTAIN
• STILL TAILGATING
• SEE YOU IN THE LOT

Better than matching: give everyone a job

Twenty identical shirts photograph worse than one design with different words on it. Keep the same typeface, colors, and layout, and change one line per person:

• GRILL
• COOLER
• CHAIRS
• CORNHOLE COMMISSIONER
• THE ONE WHO PARKS AT 6 A.M.
• MUSIC
• CLEANUP (ALLEGEDLY)
• BRINGS NOTHING, EATS MOST

It reads as a set at a glance, and everyone gets the one that's actually true about them.

Going alone still works

Most tailgate content assumes a crew of fifteen. Plenty of people go alone — alumni back in town for a weekend, someone who moved away and still watches every game, the parent whose kid is on the field. There's no minimum order, so one shirt costs the same per item as twenty. "ALUMNI, TECHNICALLY" or your own city and the year makes a better solo shirt than anything sold at a stadium gate, and it's the one people ask you about in the concessions line.

What you can't print

School names, mascots, logos, seals, conference names, and bowl-game names are trademarked. Don't put them on a shirt, even one just for your friends. What's safe and works just as well: your own city, the year, the lot number, your group's name, a road you all park on, and anything you wrote yourself.

Group orders, and the organizer's cut

Everyone orders their own from one link, so nobody fronts money for a bulk buy or chases people for $18 over a payment app. No minimum, same price per item at any quantity.

If you're the one organizing, you can share your design's link and earn 10% of what other people order through it — $3.50 on a tee, $3.90 on an oversized tee, $6.50 on a hoodie, $2.90 on a tote or pillow, $2.50 on a poster. Your own purchases don't count, payouts start at $10 via PayPal or Venmo, and the rest is in the affiliate policy. On a lot crew of twenty, that covers most of your own shirt.

Prices and the exact recipe for the shirt above

Tee $35, oversized tee $39, hoodie $65, tote $29, pillow $29, poster $25. Free shipping to US addresses, 5–10 business days.

• Slogan: PARKING LOT SEASON
• Typeface: Bebas Neue
• Style: Heritage
• Extra elements: "a simple line-art folding camp chair and a small cooler with a bottle opener, arranged above the text, never overlapping any letter"

Swap in your own words and it takes the same minute. Open the slogan studio.

Nobody at a store knows what your lot is called

Gameday racks are stocked months ahead with designs approved for everybody at once, which is why they can only ever say the team name louder. They cannot know that your crew has parked in the same corner for nine years, or what the running joke about the generator is. That part only exists if you make it.

Next: Oktoberfest group shirts, sports parent shirt sayings for fall season, or group trip shirts people will wear twice. New here? See how it works — it's free.