Our pal Brett Bowden lays some wisdom on us to start the new year. Two hearty thumbs up from the Ink Kitchen on his main points: 1. Stay close to your vendors, good ones like SPSI are incredibly important to your business  2. Don’t forget to have fun, otherwise what the hell are we doing all this work for.

Here’s Brett’s take on his most excellent adventure:

The Great White North

I took some of our slow time in December to go meet some vendors and learn more about the products we use. We thought hard about where the best placed to visit in December would be… and of course,  we picked Duluth, MN!

Since we flew into Minneapolis, our first stop was Mall of America to do some important research. We rode a couple of roller coasters here and then visited stores in the mall to look at screen printed t-shirts.

Next stop, SPSI.  These guys are based out of Minneapolis and now have locations in other parts of the United States.  We have a branch very close to us in Texas.  We got the full tour of their very nice facility.  Rows and rows of supplies as well MHM automatic presses ready for a new home.  The most impressive part of the building was their basketball court.  My company is mostly made up of old musicians who have no business on a court,  but I channeled my inner Larry Bird and shot a few hoops.
Our next stop would be just short of the North Pole, a town called Duluth.  This is quite a beautiful town, and I assume a wonderful place to visit in the summer.  This is the home of a company called Ikonics who make Chromaline emulsion, ink jet films, sandblasting equipment and more.  We went up for a lesson on using our products better.  We toured the facility, where they showed and explained the process of making emulsion.  Many parts of the process are similar to brewing beer.  I am a fan of learning how products are made.  We then sat down for an explanation of their products and discussed what we use and what could help us with different applications.  It was a fabulous time and we learned a whole lot.

I would encourage anyone to learn more about the products you are using.  Be friends with your vendors.  Seek information.

The more you know!

Brett Bowden
El Capitan, Printed Threads