Today we’d like to introduce you to Brandon Pinder.
Hi Brandon, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today?
I was born & raised in Miami, Florida, Carol City to be exact. Grew up a cool laid back class clown for the most part. I guess you can say I was pretty popular because my mom wouldn’t let me attend my neighborhood school Carol City. So I just ended up knowing more people because I went to Norland. After graduating high school I bounced around colleges trying to figure out my place in this world. From Bethune Cookman in Daytona Beach to UF in Gainesville. After a couple of years in college, my mom decided to sell our house in Miami and move to Georgia. She found a nice big house and a better-paying teaching job. Sooner or later I ended up right behind her. For a couple of years, we even worked at the same school together. She taught Kindergarten and I was the Intel Technician/Computer Teacher. Then in 2012, my beautiful daughter was born. Doing what any good father would do I moved back to Miami to be there. Unfortunately, that didn’t work out for long so back to Georgia it was. I ended up working for the USPS until I got really sick. It was to the point I couldn’t even work more than 1 day a week for more than 4 hours. Then in 2016 when my mom retired our whole family took a trip to Orlando to celebrate her. I was down to my last and I had an epiphany. I knew I wouldn’t be able to go back to work so I decided to start a brand built on something my mom had been telling me my whole life. She always said then and still does now “Son, when you wake up look in the mirror and tell yourself ‘I Love You’ and Thank God For Another Day”. Now six years later that brand is thriving and on the rise. It all started with one hat and now we have over 200 styles of products & accessories on our website.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It hasn’t been smooth at all but it’s been worth it. In the beginning, I didn’t know what to do or where to start. My first hat was just me taking a blank cap to LIDS and asking them to print the letters “TYGFAD” on it. Every time I wore it people would ask what does it mean and I would say “Thank You God For Another Day” and you can see they eyes light up cuz they relate to the message. They would ask where they could get one and I’d always say “coming soon”. I had no money at the time to buy a bulk of products or get an official logo made or anything but I knew I had something special. One day I was talking to my dad and I told him what I wanted to do and he immediately got on board and made a suggestion. He said “Son why don’t you change the ‘You’ to a ‘U’ that way you can say ‘TUGFAD’ and then said what about the ‘U’ with the two dots and BOOM that changed everything. The next day he sent me a check to get started and I went straight to work. I researched and figured I’d start with hats. I got my first official logo done and printed 50 red and 50 blue hats. I released them and within a month they were all gone. But what was next? Shirts? Other Clothing? I did more research and even traveled to Florida to find a company to print some shirts for me but the prices were out of my budget. I made some money but I still had to support myself and take care of my daughter and all of life’s other challenges. So I was at a standstill. I wasn’t raised to be a quitter tho. I talked to my mom, my dad, my friends, and prayed for a way. I didn’t know what to do. Money was getting low. People were inquiring about what was next. I felt the pressure. I almost gave up. Then one day as I was talking to my daughter and she could see I was sad she told me “Daddy turn that frown upside down it’ll be ok”. She was 4 at the time. That was nothing but God. The very next day as I was scrolling on Instagram I came across a company that does drop shipping and handles everything for you with no upfront cost. I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t waste no time. I made a free Big Cartel website and dropped some shirts. But It didn’t happen for me right away I can tell you that. I dropped a lot of different shirts and other things but still didn’t get many sales. Over the next couple of years, I had to learn and fail a lot to find products and ways to make my brand stand out and get to the masses. To this day I’m still doing that and I will continue. The thing is now I know a lot more and understand what works for me and my brand. I’ll never stop learning and improving but we doing some good sales now. Shoutout to my dad for giving me that first push I appreciate you forever. You can RIP knowing your son is still making it happen like you taught me.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Aside from owning and operating the clothing line “Thank Ü God For Another Day” I took it a step further and created a consulting agency called “Öne Öf Öne Consulting”. We specialize in clothing brand startups, Artist/Entertainer merch creating, Photography merch, and/or any rebranding for various industries. I realized that there are a lot of other creatives who want to tap into the merch market but either don’t know where to start or don’t have any startup funding to do so. I’ve partnered with my drop shipping company to provide the same service I started with as well as info on all other steps needed to get a brand off the ground the right way. I’ve learned a lot in the past 6 years and I want everybody to have the same opportunity to grow as I did. I’ve helped numerous clothing lines as well as photographers start merch lines to bring in other streams of revenue to help facilitate and feed their real passions, which is to just be able to CREATE.
Have you learned any interesting or important lessons due to the Covid-19 Crisis?
Yes. A lot. Covid-19 helped me understand the need for complete transparency and how to communicate to the consumer better. I’ve always been one to run the business on a “treat people how I’d like to be treated” basis. When Covid shut the world down that all changed because everybody isn’t like me and what may satisfy me may not necessarily satisfy someone else. So being that I was drop shipping my products for the most part a lot of packages wouldn’t arrive in the same time period as they used to before Covid. I had to learn to communicate more efficiently and more frequently than before and just be totally honest with every customer on how long it would take for orders to come and also reassure them that the order was being properly prepared in a safe manner to where they wouldn’t have to worry about the virus being brought into their homes. Sales went down at first but then picked back up so I had to pivot some things and learn how to prepare for gaps in certain seasons or times when people don’t shop. It was tough but we made it through and are basically back to normal.
Contact Info:
- Email: info@tugfad.com
- Website: www.tugfad.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/tugfad
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/tugfad
- Twitter: www.twitter.com/TUGFAD_
Image Credits
@theovision1 @ineedthemax @tugfadphotoz
