Branded Baron: Boston Tee Party Recap

Hello, World. On the Saturday, the 11th was a fun event called the Boston Tee Party, which consisted of 3 speakers in the early part of the day and then a whole convention on sneakers. Now, I'm very weary of doing 1st year events. because the outcome usually is never good, but being a t-shirt fan I decided I wanted to do it. I may be weary, but I also like to support those trying to do something cool. The turnout was okay, but I know next year once they lock the one speaker who couldn't make it due to one of his store's anniversary, it would be completely packed with people.

The speakers were good to have, especially if you were new to starting a t-shirt/clothing brand, but if you were running your business for awhile it may not have been anything so new, but a refresher course. I did take some notes on my iPhone, which probably made me look like a jerk texting through their lecture, but I was paying attention. The one speaker that I wanted to watch, turned out to be a disaster. His whole speech or lack of was to be about brand loyalty. I've been a fan of branding, so I'm always interested to learn about more tips on brand loyalty. The fellow had a couple good points, but he was all over the place and cursing way too much. I'm not offended by anyone cursing, but if you're trying to be a professional talking to other people who are professional or want to be, then you may want to clean up your act. Pretty much, you only drop a "F-bomb" when you want to help emphasize a point or if people are dosing off and you want to wake them up by catching them off guard with it. I don't know if the dude was trying to relate to the people or what not, but he did have trouble making his points because of his random tangents. I wanted to speak with this dude later and see if I can actually pick his brain and make what was not a good speech into a better experience, but he straight up bounced in the beginning of the 2nd lecture. The following speaker was a photographer who talked about using a photographer for your shoots and pros and cons of using a professional compared to your friend and with/without models. Those two were what I remembered. The last speaker was a screen printer and my apology to him, but I decided to finish setting up the booth since I already know about screen printing, the different inks, etc. Also, I was able to hear some of his lecture from where I was, so it wasn't too crazy.

After the speakers went on there was a break for lunch and everyone to finish setting up the booth, before the bands and the rest of the public are allowed to come in. Once everyone was good, the public started coming in. It was good to meet and catch up with all the people at the event. A lot of people were popping their event cherry, which was cool. I shared any info and tips I had to those I spoke with, because I wanted to. I'm a firm believer of helping out and sharing your knowledge, you don't have to share all of your secrets, but sharing some can be very appreciative and go a long way. It's not like I know a ton, not in the least, but I know I had some tips that I knew would've be helpful. Some of the setups were pretty good and made me feel like garbage for not doing it big, like I should have. The best setup was definitely Candy Effect Clothing, Nlightn Apparel had a good setup as well, and there was this other company that I couldn't remember, it had a foam gun shooting out birds.

I enjoyed myself, which is key to any event I participate in. I liked talking to people, but I was a bit upset I didn't get a chance to talk with everyone, which sucked. It was nice to see Regan Smith Clarke stop by. It was to good to see Lori and Pete of Cavata Clothing again. Tiff and I had fun chatting it up with our booth mates Renot and Stacey of Nlightn and Sean and Nate of Candy Effect. Big shout out to Jared of Design Juices and Tee Gazette now known as Indie Minded, who came all the way from the U.K. SOMEONE please explain to me Europe's logic. He's from the U.K., but instead of flying directly to the U.S. from there, he had to fly to Germany to fly to the U.S. How is flying to Germany than going to the U.S. cheaper than flying directly from the U.K.? Other than that hilariously flawed logic, it was definitely good to talk to him. The internet is great to start up conversations with people, but speaking in person is by far superior. I had nice conversations with B of B Toasted, which is a brand that has a funny and a bit of a twisted sense of humor, Justin of Monstros Apparel, Jason from Among Villains, GJ of Lil Love Driven, Chaz of Vicious History(who might be a bit cooler if Facebook is right in the fact that we share the same birthday), Nader of Labyrinth, and the organizer of the whole sha-bang Kelly of IndieMinded/Teegazette/Saucewear. Shout out to Gag Order for coming through and interviewing everyone. I'm a bit disappointed there was a problem with the audio for my interview, because it was fun interview, but check out one of their recaps here.

Next year should be ten times better, since the first one got all the kinks out. I'll take more pictures, since I barely took any. I'm curious to see how next year's event will turn out, since will consist of other indie enthusiasts and not just t-shirts.

Stay no less than Stunningly Fresh,
Joe