By Anne E. Bromley, anneb@virginia.edu
Mark Mincer, a 1985 alumnus of UVA’s McIntire School of Commerce who owned the iconic store on the Corner bearing his family’s name, died Saturday following a lengthy battle with brain cancer. He was 60.
Mark Mincer was diagnosed with glioblastoma in October 2020. Although doctors told him that half of patients typically live just 14 months, he lived more than two years, with his wife, Tara, and other family and friends helping as much as they could.
Mincer followed in the footsteps of his father and grandfather; the three generations of owners dating to 1948 have made the store, now called Mincer’s UVA Imprinted Sportswear, an institution in the shopping-and-restaurant district adjacent to UVA. Mark’s eldest son, Cal, has taken over management of the still-thriving Corner store, which sells a vast array of T-shirts and other UVA-branded merchandise. The family opened a second Mincer’s store at The Shops at Stonefield in 2013.
Starting in 1948, Mark Mincer’s grandfather and father–and then Mark–made the store an institution in Charlottesville. (Left, courtesy of UVA Library; photo on right by Dan Addison, University Communications)
“We were with him and he passed peacefully,” Tara wrote Saturday on the Caring Bridge journal, where she and family members have been keeping well-wishers informed about his health.
Over the weekend, tributes to Mark Mincer flooded social media. The stores closed on Sunday to allow employees time to reflect.
In an earlier post on Caring Bridge, Tara Mincer thanked friends and neighbors for their support, writing, “Your kind words and encouragement continue to light up these difficult days, so thank you.”
Last year, UVA Today published an article about Mark, his family, and the enterprise that has decked out University students and supported the Cavaliers through thick and thin for more than seven decades.
A memorial is planned for Friday.
This story was originally published on UVA Today Jan. 30, 2023.
