Crafting Abalone - That Time 6 Friends Had An Idea

How did Abalone even start? It's a good question, especially when you take into account that making a hat isn't the most original idea a group of buddies has had. What's fun about Abalone is that depending on who you ask, you'll probably get a different origin story of our brand each time.

 

Lucky (or unlucky if you could care less about me) for you all, you get to hear my (Nick's) point of view. 

 

Spanning all the way back to our sophomore year, I had big aspirations of going to Manhattan to attend a journalism school for a semester. Maybe by the quality of my writing in these blog posts thus far you can put two and two together that that didn't happen. Basically, King's College, a prestigious journalism school with strong ties in New York City forgot how a budget works. The students at the university the semester before me were getting eviction notices on their dorm doors, some of the school's top donors passed away and the higher ups on the school board were spending money they simply didn't have. I had to back out of New York, but that wasn't before my five buddies decided to live together in an on-campus apartment. I would be going for round two in the dorm I lived in sophomore year, and forced to trek up a trademark San Diego-type hill if I ever wanted to visit their place.

 

On one particular visit to their humble abode, some of the guys pitched an idea to me. A brand. They'd start with hats and see where the wind took them. Wind being the amount of money they could make early on if we're being so honest. The beauty of this all was that our friend group had the recipe for a successful brand. Thad can make a website, Trip knows numbers, Will loves fashion, Charlie can sell us, I can write and Thomas has one hell of a following on social media. The missing piece was the brand. That's the biggest piece though, and the one we found to be the trickiest.

 

We needed a name. We needed a logo. We needed a story, an identity and a purpose. Some of the fellas surf a spot called "Ab," short for "Abalone." Perfect. One down. We then spent a few weeks searching the web and our brains for the ideal logo. Something that hinted we lived on the water, but that wasn't going to handcuff us to the surf market. Once we felt inspired by what we found, we pitched the idea to a super talented friend in graphic design. She moved quick, and within a few days we had a logo that all of us were psyched on. We smacked those beautiful, loopy letters on a clip art hat and watched as our vision started to take form. 

 

Next was actually getting our hands on some samples in hopes that we'd be able to finalize everything and start selling by the start of our senior year. Thad got straight to reaching out to Uncle Bill, our wonderful manufacturer, and the samples were ordered. Summer had started by this point in the story, and threw in another handful of challenges. A few of us had started internships and other jobs, and the time zones we were in made it hard to ever coordinate any type of formal meeting. Thad was in Boston, Trip was back home in Nashville, and the rest of us were still on the West Coast. Anyways, back to the samples. Thomas finally got his hands on the two tone Forest Green hat and a royal blue hat that immediately wasn't what we were hoping for.

 

It's not that we weren't digging the royal blue, but we just felt that it was too bright for the fall and winter months that we would be selling in. A couple of sporadic FaceTime calls later, and we were able to come up with our second round of samples. This time the colors were darker, and we added a shell as a side piece. Now keep in mind that Uncle Bill makes hats for Seager, Coors and June Shine, so (understandably so) things weren't necessarily moving at the pace we had envisioned back in the spring. 

 

The second round of samples finally hit Thomas' doorstep, and we felt like we had some real winners. The Maritime Blue hat caught everyone's eye and we thought the Cherry Red hat would be a Christmas time favorite.

 

We finalized the Forest Green, Cherry Red and Maritime Blue sometime after, but the job wasn't finished. We needed, and are still looking for, our identity. We know what sets us apart. It's the same thing that made us friends four years ago and has kept us solid brothers for so long. But now it's just letting you guys in on it. The piece of hemp or canvas you throw on your head is just one piece, but these blogs, the videos we pump out on social media and everything else Abalone-related that you see is the other half. And we know those things are far more important than the materials we sell. Because ultimately, we want you to feel like you are a part of something bigger than yourself.

 

So that's the story. Abalone is still a baby, only birthed in April of this year. But she's growing fast, and with each day that goes by the growing pains get less and less fervorous. It's one thing to type out this story, but anytime the fellas and I get to interact with you guys we want to be able to communicate the story right then and there. If you told us back in April that this is where we'd be mid-November, we'd probably believe you. We're confident in Abalone and the community it is going to create.

 

So I think the only lingering question is when you are going to enter a chapter into our story. There's a blank page calling your name... Oh, and a snapback hat. Take both while you're here.