#119 - Proud 90: Rick Versace Jr. (Founder)

In this week's episode, I interview my good friend Rick Versace Jr., the founder of  Proud 90. 

Proud 90 is just a group of guys that love hitting the links. Breaking 90 is considered a win for the day when they go out.  Their approach to golf is similar to our approach to life - always have a good time, and don’t take things too seriously. It’s not just about hitting the lowest score out there. It’s about letting off steam after a hard week at work. It’s about kicking back and having a few beers with your buds while playing a game we love. It’s about getting out there and having a great time on the course, regardless of whether we're shooting in the 80’s or the 100’s.  At some point, it occurred to them that there was no golf brand for the average weekend hacker just looking to have fun — so they decided it was their duty to create one. And just like that, Proud 90 was born. 

They think their fierce, bold designs and comfortable, lightweight fabrics reflect how they choose to play the game — sometimes unconventional, but never too seriously. Don’t get them wrong! They are constantly working to improve their game, just as we're always working to enhance their brand. That being said, they know they will never be on the PGA Tour, but that hasn't stopped them from going for it on every shot and having a hell of a good time doing it.

Chapters

• 0:59 Where are you located?
• 1:52 Did you golfed a lot as a kid?
• 3:09 What is your handicap?
• 5:03 Did you play baseball in College
• 6:52 Did you like to work in finance?
• 8:18 What year did you start Proud90?
• 10:41 How did you come up with your logo?
• 13:43 In what year did you switch the logo?
• 15:44 How did you come up with the designs?
• 17:13 With how many designs did you start with?
• 29:06 Dont do gloves!
• 44:05 Where can people find Proud90?

Transcript

Speaker 1 0:00

Today we play golf. Let me show you how we do it in the pros. Welcome to Behind the Golf Brand podcast. I never missed with the Seven Iron , a conversation with some of the most interesting innovators and entrepreneurs behind the biggest names in golf. My friends were the golf clubs. I lived on the golf course, I lived on the driving range from Pro Talk . You should learn something from each and every single round.

Speaker 2 0:23

You play to fun from on and off the green. Why would you play golf if you don't play it for money? Just let me put the ball in a hole. This is Behind the Golf Brand podcast with Paul Libert Tore . What's up guys? Welcome to the Behind the Golf Brand podcast. This week I have my good friend Rick Versace from Proud 90 Golf. As you guys know, proud 90 makes probably one of the best polos that are out there, so I'm really excited to have 'em on the show. I've been a fan for a long time. I love the content that they do and just the way they portray themselves and have branded themselves the last couple of years is really cool. So I'm really excited to have 'em on the show. What's

Speaker 3 0:56

Going on, man?

Speaker 2 0:56

So where are you located?

Where are you located?

Speaker 3 0:58

Uh, we are in Bo Ratone, Florida. So between Palm Beach and, and Fort Lauderdale. For, for those of you don't know a lot of people, when I tell 'em Bo Ratone , they're like, oh, like Seinfeld. I'm like, yeah, exactly. So that's

Speaker 2 1:11

Exactly what it is. It's like a like Seinfeld. Exactly. <laugh> . It looks just like that too. Did you grow up out there or what?

Speaker 3 1:16

Yeah, pretty much. I , uh, moved down here from New York when I was six and uh, went to high school , you know, all school, and then moved away to Central Florida for a couple years for college and then moved up to New York for a couple years and worked in , uh, investment banking for a brief stint and , uh, realized that I needed to get back down to South Florida when I was up there for like two years and it snowed on Easter and, and , uh, had to get out of the cold and then came back down to Florida and been here ever since.

Did you golfed a lot as a kid?

Speaker 2 1:49

Growing up, who did you golf lot as a kid? Like, or do you get lessons or who taught you how to golf?

Speaker 3 1:56

Honestly, no. Like, I, I golfed with my friends probably in like high school and you know , I go golfing with my dad, like, you know, randomly growing up. Uh, but I played baseball my entire life, so like, we would go out and golf and just like mess around. We all had baseball swings, so like we could make contact but weren't consistent, weren't very

Speaker 2 2:16

All over the place. Yeah ,

Speaker 3 2:18

Big golf. Yeah, exactly. We were all literally just trying to see who could hit the ball the furthest that was. That's pretty much what our golf game looked like. Um, I never really had lessons, but like , I always loved playing golf. Like I, I enjoyed it. And then once I got to college, started playing even more with our buddies. 'cause like we just kind of looked at it as like a drinking event, you know, like grab a 12 pack and throw it in the back of the golf cart and , and go out and wax some balls for a couple hours. So never really like, played competitively even though like playing baseball and sports my whole life, like, I always have an element of like, competitiveness to, to my game. Like, I want to win, want to like play well, but it doesn't always end up that way.

Speaker 2 2:57

So then like when, like what are your, what's your handicap then right now? What do you think it is?

Speaker 3 3:03

I think it's like , uh, 17.

What is your handicap?

Speaker 2 3:06

That's what I , I'm a 15, 16 right now, so we're the same bro. Look at that.

Speaker 3 3:09

Yeah, man, we gotta go out and play. Yeah .

Speaker 2 3:12

We , we have to,

Speaker 3 3:14

It fluctuate dramatically though. It'll be like, I'll go out and I'll shoot like , uh, 89 and then the next time I'll go out and shoot 103 and I don't know what the hell happened .

Speaker 2 3:22

That's me. That's me too. It just depends on the course and how bad I'm doing that day. And it's like, and then I, I think I , I got down to like a 17 and I was like, oh man, I'm doing awesome. And then I played in some golf tournament and I played like complete crap and it was super hard golf course. And then I went like up, you know what I mean? Because then you'd like, it automatically registers on your account or whatever and you're like,

Speaker 3 3:42

Oh,

Speaker 2 3:43

Come on. Like, that's not even fair. Like I play , you know, and then, you know, you play a bunch more courses that are like your level, I guess you could say, and then it's like, oh, it goes right back down. So it's like, yeah.

Speaker 3 3:54

So my , I play this one course , uh, by me like pretty much all the time. It's the only course I play and it's like a relatively short course. It's, it's like a hotel resort course, so it's like, it's almost made to be easy for the hotel guests . And I was playing that for forever. And then I went and played in a , a golf tournament up in Georgia and it's like pine trees all line, the, the course completely different Course long . Yeah. And I shot like 20 strokes higher than I usually play . I'm like, what, what happened? I thought I was getting good at this, but

Speaker 2 4:23

I was like, me dude , when I was a kid. Like I played golf here in Arizona and then like, we don't have a lot of trees. It's out there , you know , and palm

Speaker 3 4:30

Trees.

Speaker 2 4:30

And I went, played in like in Chicago, it's all these big oak trees and all this crap. And it's like you and the trees, you're hosed. Like if you know , and then, you know, yeah, I know exactly what you're talking about. That's

Speaker 3 4:40

Down here in South Florida, if you slice one outta the fairway, it's just in another fairway and you just go play it from there you go anywhere else, it's like, oh, that ball's gone forever. That's

Speaker 2 4:48

Gone. Yeah, it's in the forest. I'm not going in there. That's gross. Like, yeah, that's me . So then, so you grew up in south Florida and then when you went to UCF did you play baseball at UCF or did you just go to college at UCF?

Did you play baseball in College

Speaker 3 5:01

I went to , uh, Stetson in Central Florida. Not, not UCF. Okay . But I played baseball at Stetson freshman year and then quit halfway through the year. 'cause I wanted to have a more traditional college experience basically. I, I was

Speaker 2 5:18

Have fun,

Speaker 3 5:19

Probably partying a little too much. And the next year I actually went up to FSU for a year and loved it up there. Uh, Stetson like such a small school , it's only got a couple thousand students. It doesn't even have a football team. Well, it does now, but at the time it didn't. So I wanted like a big college experience and went up to FSU, loved it up there. It was amazing. But ultimately ended up going back down to Stetson 'cause it just , uh, there was a little, there was too much fun to be had at, at in

Speaker 2 5:48

Tallahassee. Yeah , totally good . I would bet .

Speaker 3 5:50

Yeah . So I bounced .

Speaker 2 5:51

So what year were you , what year were you there? Like when were you that

Speaker 3 5:54

2008 through 2012. So I, I think I was in,

Speaker 2 5:58

So like the key, those key years, like when, like, when they were like really good.

Speaker 3 6:02

I was back at Stetson already by the time that like Jamis was winning championships. Yeah, yeah. So I think my first year outta college , my senior year of college, they won. And then the next year, it was the year they lost in the championship. So I just missed it. Do

Speaker 2 6:18

You watch it ? There's that documentary right now on Netflix about U uc or , uh, us

Speaker 3 6:23

About us . Yeah.

Speaker 2 6:25

Yeah. So

Speaker 3 6:26

I was watching that

Speaker 2 6:27

A while ago.

Speaker 3 6:28

Was it Swamp Kings or, or Gator Kings ,

Speaker 2 6:30

Yeah, whatever . Yeah. Yeah. I watched something. What was that? Or that's a different What school is that? That's UC Oh , I'm so confused right now.

Speaker 3 6:35

Yeah . Flo , university of Florida. It's like Tim Tebow and

Speaker 2 6:38

Yeah. Tebow story because I was like, what happened Tebow? Right. And then I was like, oh, what's happened to that guy?

Speaker 3 6:43

Yeah, he's a

Speaker 2 6:44

Big dude. You went to New York and then you're in finance, right? And did you like it or not really?

Speaker 3 6:52

I, I honestly, I did like, it, it, I grew up with , uh, my dad owns a , a few different businesses and like, kind of always like, well , we had baseball games. He was always at our baseball games and like, we'd go on vacation and you could, you know, basically go and do whatever he wanted. And then, you know, I, I had this like, dream of working in finance. I had this like idea in the back of my head of like Wolf of Wall Street, kind of , uh, like role up there. Then I got up there and like, it was great. Like it was fun. I met a ton of awesome people. I learned probably more in the two years I was there than I did all four years at college. But ultimately at the end of the day, I was like, I wanted to get back down to South Florida. I yeah ,

Speaker 2 7:34

Kind

Speaker 3 7:34

Of always had like the itch to kind of do my own thing. So, you know, two years in I was like, you know, let me stop working 12 hours a day, making other people money and let me go try to work 12 hours a day, making myself money. So, so , uh, came back down to South Florida, started working with my, my dad started running his sales and marketing for, for like six or seven years and helped grow some of his businesses. Uh, tried a few things out along the way that, that didn't necessarily pan out. And , uh, and then ultimately, you know, started Proud 90 and , and started growing this thing.

Speaker 2 8:10

So when you, what year did you start Proud 90

What year did you start Proud90?

Speaker 3 8:15

Were four and a half years in, so I wanna say officially 2018. But the first, like six months to a year was really just like, had the, i the initial idea for the brand put together like a logo, got like, came up with a name, threw together a really basic website and had like five or six different designs, but like, wasn't really promoting it a ton. Like didn't , uh, didn't have a really a lot of inventory to even sell. It was really just kinda like something I joke and say, like, it was a side hustle that paid for my golf habit pretty much. Like I'd sell shirts to like friends and family that, that liked them. And , uh, probably that was like the first year and a half was really like, that's how it went. You know, I was still still working my full-time job , um, with my dad and was doing Proud 90 like in my spare time. But like, I was getting a lot of, a lot of people that like saw the brand and like saw some of the designs. They were like, oh, this is, this is a really cool idea. Like, you know, I , I like it. So I always kind of knew there was something more there, but never like, carved out the time to be able to like really focus on it. And , uh, in, I guess end of 2019, beginning of 2020, obviously , uh, covid hit and it was a terrible time for a lot of people around the world. And for me, my job with my dad was in corporate travel and all of a sudden corporate travel gig, you know, there's nothing going on. Like my, my role used to be traveling around visiting , uh, corporate clients around the country. And obviously there was no travel whatsoever. So I had a lot of time on my hands , uh, back in the beginning of 2020 and, and had Proud 90 , kinda like up and running and it was doing minimal sales, but just needed a little extra, extra attention and extra push. So I really, you know, put my head down and started working on like, you know, working on building out the website better, better design, coming out with better prints and better designs for, you know, our shirts, finding better manufacturers. And then in that first year , uh, you know, we really started to, to gain traction pretty quickly and, and , uh, yeah. And it's, and that we're , he , we are where we are today.

How did you come up with your logo?

Speaker 2 10:37

So, okay. First question. How'd you come with your logo? The dog ?

Speaker 3 10:42

So it's actually a funny story. The logo is originally , uh, like a duck head with an X underneath it, like the Golf Club X thing. And the idea at the time was like, oh, proud 90, like duck hooks, like, you know, really wanted, like something that kind of stood out, but also had a little like, funny idea to it. Um, and about six months in, we got a cease and desist letter from a hunting company called Ducks Unlimited. And they're , uh, fairly large brand down here. Like I I knew them in college . Yeah. And I guess they have a trademark on the duck head just in general. Like our , our , our duck head didn't look anything like theirs, but , uh, they seemed to, to think that it did. Uh , and they, the letter basically said like , um, stop using our likeness, or we'll come after you for any , uh, any profits you've made using the , the logo, blah, blah, blah. And at the time I was like, I haven't made any profits, so what are you gonna do? But , uh, ultimately

Speaker 2 11:49

I have no money, bro. So Yeah ,

Speaker 3 11:51

Exactly. It's like my dad come and get it, but , uh, ultimately I was like, all right , whatever. Like,

Speaker 2 11:58

So after this I'm like, well, how close was it though? Or they just, or were they just flexing?

Speaker 3 12:04

I think it was like, it was a duck, a profile of like a mallard head, which they also have. But

Speaker 2 12:13

Yeah , go to websites. Why ?

Speaker 3 12:15

Yeah. It , I'll try to find you a , a copy of the old logo to show you That's crazy . Wish had . So then what'd you , so ,

Speaker 2 12:22

So then what'd you do? So you're like, okay, time for a new logo because I'm messing with this. Yeah .

Speaker 3 12:26

If I want

Speaker 2 12:26

This . Literally

Speaker 3 12:27

I was like, I was like, there no, no one knows the brand anyway at this point. Like, if we're only six months in, we're not even doing marketing. Um, so I was like, all right , lemme just change it. And I was trying to, I was like really racking my brain trying to figure out like what's in a new logo that we can, can , uh, like, you know, change to, and trying to think of all these different like fun, kinda like golf related things.

Speaker 2 12:52

Yeah .

Speaker 3 12:52

And I was taking my dog for a walk on a golf course one day, and I have a 145 pound great name , great Dane named Tank. And he was standing next to the, the pin like that. And I was like, you know what, maybe that should be our new logo, you know, great Danes , like they say, don't, don't live very long. So it's, it was like, part of it was like, all right , let me immortalize tank in the brand. And uh, and also once we've got like the mockups and everything, I was like, oh yeah, that's, that's a hundred percent it. Like that's, that's what we want. And like the , the tagline like, I don't know , unofficial tagline is just like, let the big dog eat. So that's, that's how we landed on the Big Dog logo tank and uh, and almost getting sued.

Speaker 2 13:38

So then, so like what year did you switch the tank? The Tank logo?

Speaker 3 13:43

2020? Uh, probably like the beginning of 20 . Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2 13:50

When you were like , okay, we're gonna , so then , um, like how did you like come up with the idea of these design shirts? Because not a lot of people were doing it even in 18 because like , everyone's like, oh, you know, everyone jumped that bandwagon with bad , bad birdie, but like, bro, this 18 like Bad Birdie was like, there's, there were nobody back then. You know what I mean ?

Speaker 3 14:11

Yeah. It's funny 'cause at the time, like I had this idea and I was like, oh my God, this is a revolutionary idea. Nobody's doing this whatsoever. Like, people, like, I'm gonna be the first one ever to, to make fun prints on golf shirts. And then fast forward, like a year in , I came across Bad Birdie. I was like, oh , there are other people doing this <laugh> . But that just almost, it , it like , oh ,

Speaker 2 14:30

You come across 'em like when you're watching TV and you're like,

Speaker 3 14:32

Oh no , I didn't see, they weren't on Shark Tank yet .

Speaker 2 14:35

Oh , okay . You're like, oh my God, this is not happening. As

Speaker 3 14:37

I started like going on our website all the time and like running ads and everything, I started, the algorithm started picking me up and, and showed me one of their ads. I was like, oh, that's similar to what we're doing. That's, that's not ideal. But I also, it was like validation, right? Because I was like, oh, okay, there are other companies doing this. Like, there's obviously, I mean , the market right . Demand for it

Speaker 2 14:58

Out there .

Speaker 3 14:58

Yeah. You know , what do they say ? Scary first , first guy through the wall gets bloodied. So I don't know if we were the first guy through the wall. We definitely have got bloodied a little bit along the way, but, but it's, it's nice to see, I mean, it seems like there's a new brand popping up every week trying to do patterns.

Speaker 2 15:13

Yeah. But I think it's, it's

Speaker 3 15:16

<crosstalk> . Yeah . It's , it's just, I look at it as like the more that like the big boys start doing prints like Callaway and like, I dunno , FootJoy, it just , it opens up the, the market for like more patterns and prints and fun stuff. So it's just better for us and better for golf in general. But , um, what was the original question?

Speaker 2 15:37

So then , so, so when you came out with the first design, like how did you come up with those designs? Was

How did you come up with the designs?

Speaker 3 15:42

That the first design? I actually have it sitting right next to me. I didn't, I didn't plan this, I promise. This was

Speaker 2 15:48

The , oh , we didn't plan this. You guys. <laugh> kidding. We didn't really , we really didn't .

Speaker 3 15:52

Sitting next to me on desk ,

Speaker 2 15:53

He looks at it every day . He's like, this is where you were <laugh>

Speaker 3 15:57

Kidding . This, this is the first design is Tropic Thunder and it's literally like a Hawaiian button down that we just turned into a golf shirt. And the idea came from, I think it was like Ricky Fowler and Jordan Spieth golfing on spring break. And they were like wearing like open floral button downs and like one of 'em had no shirt on and no shoes and board shorts. And they were , they were just golfing. And I saw it on Instagram and I immediately thought to myself, I was like, yeah, like these guys can get away with it. 'cause they're professional golfers. Like they don't have to wear the same old boring stuff that everybody else does. But the rest of us have to be like, all buttoned up and like, look country club professional and like myself, like I , I, like I said, I like to go out and golf and just have a good time. And a majority of my friends are the same way. Like, we're not trying to get on the PGA tour anytime soon. So , uh, you know, that kinda sparked the idea. And then, you know, the original design was, so

Speaker 2 16:51

You saw a picture and you're like, Hmm . I was like, maybe we should do something.

Speaker 3 16:55

How can we make this for the rest of the golf world? Yeah, pretty much. And you know , the , the initial design was this floral , uh, Hawaiian shirt Tropic Thunder and , uh, made a couple other designs to start out that

With how many designs did you start with?

Speaker 2 17:10

<crosstalk> what many design you start out with. Like what was your initial run? I got your initial run, but like what was your initial like set, let's call it, how did you buy? I tried not buy. How many things designs did you have initially when you first launched?

Speaker 3 17:25

I think we either had 10 or 12. So we had this one

Speaker 2 17:29

Enough to fill the page. Right. <laugh> , that's the way I do it. I'm like, so you don't look like you have one product. It's like, oh, we have six. Yeah . Or we have 12. Yeah , but

Speaker 3 17:38

You have to scroll down just this much to be able to see more products.

Speaker 2 17:41

Yeah. You gotta go over the bottom to see that that's where it ends. Like it's not like, oh , we only have four shirts. Sorry.

Speaker 3 17:46

We had some funny stuff, man. We had a , uh, a shirt that was all , all blue and it had a pocket on it and the pocket on the chest was just like a big picture of a panda. Uh , I don't know where the,

Speaker 2 17:58

You know , like whatever, maybe some will buy it. Like

Speaker 3 18:01

People like pandas. That's what we were going for. And uh, we did some stuff with like, we would do it all over print, but then have a , a solid shirt with like the sleeve, the top of the sleeves have like a stripe on it, which admittedly we haven't tried out in a while. And I kind of want to get back to, 'cause it's, it was kind of a cool look, but it was so early on that we were just testing different things . Like we were , people

Speaker 2 18:21

Were ready . That's the problem. Would you like that isn't , don't you think that's the problem about, like, you don't know what design people are gonna resonate with, right? Yeah . So

Speaker 3 18:31

You

Speaker 2 18:31

Think, you know, so you have , it's like a shotgun, right? I mean, that's the hardest part. I would say

Speaker 3 18:36

That was one of my, the, the biggest realizations that I had as we started putting out more designs more frequently. You know , I , I'm very involved in the design process and like working with our , our designers to, well

Speaker 2 18:48

It's your money. You're like, dude,

Speaker 3 18:50

Yeah . You're like,

Speaker 2 18:50

That does not work. We're, we tried that three years ago and I know I like have 97 left of those shirts,

Speaker 3 18:57

But I'm learning that my des my uh , like favorite shirts guy are definitely not always the, the favorite shirts of the rest of the world. There's been a few that, and we try now we try to do surveys before we , uh, launch anything. We'll like send out a survey with 20 new designs that's

Speaker 2 19:14

Smart.

Speaker 3 19:15

And let people say like, strongly would buy this, would never buy this. And

Speaker 2 19:19

You do that , you do that to all your buyers that ever bought a shirt from you and said, Hey, what do you guys think? Or do you have a certain,

Speaker 3 19:24

Not everyone group of people ? We typically try to keep it to like , uh, some of our like VIP customers , um, just like more of our target . Yeah, yeah , yeah. Exactly. And, and it's cool 'cause like getting them involved in the design process and like what's coming out for the , the next collection and everything is , is a lot of fun. You get a lot of funny feedback and a lot of different suggestions. Like a , a lot some of the designs we've done have been like, just suggestions from our customers that we're like, oh yeah, that's pretty cool. We'll we'll do that. But , um, but there's been times so like, we'll do the survey and one of them will flop completely and I'm like, ah , no man, but that's pretty sick. We gotta go with that. And then like inevitably we launch it Sure

Speaker 2 20:04

A nd l ike, d oes i t t anks? T hey're l ike, t hey're a lright, c ool. O h m y g od. S o

Speaker 3 20:08

We got presents for my entire family for Christmas now. That's great. <laugh> .

Speaker 2 20:12

It's the panda shirt. Yay . We all get panda shirts . Yeah . <laugh>

Speaker 3 20:17

Man . I wish I still had one of those laying around.

Speaker 2 20:19

You have it somewhere. You know, we have like one left in a box I'll wrinkle

Speaker 3 20:23

Up . I actually have a box. Our original , uh, printer. That'd be cool . <inaudible> manufacturer sent us over a giant sheet. It's like 10 by 12 feet long of all the different prints on it. Oh ,

Speaker 2 20:36

That's

Speaker 3 20:36

Cool. Um, and I have it in the , I would say I could run and go get it right now. You could see what exactly what all of our first prints were, but um , I don't wanna leave. I don't wanna That'd be

Speaker 2 20:46

Cool artwork though, wouldn't it? Wouldn't that be cool like to have it on a wall and be like, that's why's , that's why I saved it . That's where we started. You know what I mean? Like you

Speaker 3 20:54

Frame

Speaker 2 20:54

It and be like, oh , I may not frame it because that's so big. But like, it'd be cool to

Speaker 3 20:58

See

Speaker 2 20:59

That for a brand.

Speaker 3 20:59

That's why I saved it. I wanna ultimately like either cut them out and frame them and put them on a wall and like try maybe make like a like proud 90 throughout the year's wall, you know, and have like, this is where we started. 'cause you know, we're , we're constantly on top of just like the cut the patterns and everything. We're trying to do different stuff every day , like trying to learn like what our , our goal as a brand. Like yes, we make fun golf apparel and like the , you know, patterned shirts are our bread and butter like a majority of what we do. But like ultimately we just wanna make fun and memorable golf products. So it , we're not necessarily like pigeonholing ourselves to just fun shirts. You know, we want to really try to do a lot of creative things in the golf world and whether that be other apparel items like gloves and we do shorts that do really well. Um, but also like, I don't know, like tum .

Speaker 2 21:52

I love it .

Speaker 3 21:52

Love it . Yeah . No ,

Speaker 2 21:53

I love it. I think you guys are , I don't know , I I've always loved what you guys did from before. Like , when I first met Rick, I was like, yo, I've been like a fan for like two years and we were e like we were messaging. I it was , it was who was I was messaging with .

Speaker 3 22:06

Oh , Matt was my name . Matt .

Speaker 2 22:08

Matt , like two years ago Right when they first came out. Or , or at least when they were , that's the first time I heard about we , not when we first came out. But that's when I first like you were marketing a lot more back then. I would say as or as you started marketing 'cause you were like, Hey, we're proud 90, you just wanted to say hi, you know, or something. But I mean, I think what you guys are doing is phenomenal. Like it's good , it's good stuff. Like it really is you guys. Like it's good and the patterns are great and that's the hard part with pattern stuff. It's like a lot of brands just throw a bunch of crap and they're like, it would be it be stuff you would never wear. And these are all like, well thought out, funny, cool patterns. Like yeah , I dunno . So like, that's bad . Kudos to you to figure that out.

Speaker 3 22:45

Thank you. Appreciate it . That it's obviously with it being 90% of what we do around here , these patterns is a lot of detail and a lot of thought goes into creating each different pattern that we make. You know, some of them are a little off, like more off the wall than others. Some of them are like a little bit more subdued, you know, just because we realize that like, you can't wear a shirt with like unicorn pool floaties on it every day to the office. But like some of , we have some stuff for, for guys that wanna wear it every day. But , uh, yeah, it's funny 'cause like as we started selling wholesale, people would be like, oh, what's the story behind this collection? I'm like, one of them is a, a bear driving a golf cart. One of them is a bunch of,

Speaker 2 23:27

So I was at the golf course, my dog and I saw a panda bear driving a golf cart. <laugh>.

Speaker 3 23:34

Like, the story is, they're just, they're fun. Like there's, there's not much more to it. I , you know, each one has like a little bit of backstory, but there's no like clear linear. Like you're

Speaker 2 23:44

Like, bro, bro, there's no like, story. Like that's it. Like, oh, what's your inspiration? You're like, listen, we're not in Fashion Institute here in New York. Okay. Like, we're not making like, there's no like theme here. Like, oh , it's , uh, we

Speaker 3 23:55

Putting designs out hoping people see it on Instagram and like, holy, that's ridiculous. I

Speaker 2 23:59

Have the coolest shirt, I'm gonna buy that. That's funny. I'm gonna wear that or whatever. What was , what was that thing? What movie was that? Where , uh, will Ferre , was it Will Ferrell who was in it? No, no, it was Zoo Leaner . Right. And they like had the, remember in Zoolander at the end and they had the like, fashion show and the, the collection was called

Speaker 3 24:18

Darl Leak . Garbage

Speaker 2 24:20

Darl Leak <laugh> Darryl Leak . Dude. So fricking funny. That would be you guys . I'll do a Darryl Lee collection. Trash ,

Speaker 3 24:27

Trash , we and . We'll like do a Dar Lee collection one day we'll do , uh, Oscar the Grouch on a , a bunch of ,

Speaker 2 24:32

We Oscar the Grouch and like just plastic bag, like garbage bag and stuff. Like, that's so funny. That's a fun thing . We all , you guys have been asking for the collection. Here you go,

Speaker 3 24:42

Dude , we, and like we're, we are not limited to like any one direction to go in. Like we, we, when we sit down and put together new designs, we literally say like, all right , this one did really well last drop. How can we make something wilder brighter, more fun than that? And that's like our thought process is how we start out and then kind of go from there and say like, oh, well if we're gonna do that, we could do this too. And then it's just like our design meetings are literally just like

Speaker 2 25:09

Laughing your asses off. Like, oh , try this. Oh , let's pretty

Speaker 3 25:12

Much writing a hundred different ideas on a , on a whiteboard and being like, all right , how do we get rid of some of these? So,

Speaker 2 25:20

So when you first did your initial orders, like back in the day, like what was your MOQ like a hundred? Probably a hundred shirts or a thousand shirts. I have no idea.

Speaker 3 25:28

Uh, I wanna say it was 500 when

Speaker 2 25:33

We started out. Something

Speaker 3 25:34

Like that.

Speaker 2 25:34

Of one design. Of one design, right?

Speaker 3 25:36

No, no. Um,

Speaker 2 25:38

Oh , that's cool. So you could do like, I want a hundred of this one and a hundred of that one and a hundred of

Speaker 3 25:42

This . Yeah , exactly . It was like a hundred and test the market. Yeah. Um,

Speaker 2 25:47

What sizes did you guys make though

Speaker 3 25:49

At first We did , uh, even of all sizes, we split it between like small through Triple xl . What'd

Speaker 2 25:56

You learn from that?

Speaker 3 25:56

I didn't know what I was doing. What ?

Speaker 2 25:57

No . Yeah . No. Like no one knows that's what to do.

Speaker 3 26:00

I learned that a lot more people wear Triple X's than I thought and nobody wears smalls.

Speaker 2 26:04

Really?

Speaker 3 26:05

Yeah.

Speaker 2 26:05

Really?

Speaker 3 26:06

I think, honestly, I think , uh, not a lot of other brands, especially in our space, do Triple X's . So we've been , uh, we've been able to kind of fill that awesome , that market a little bit. Um, but like large in Excel , sell , double everything else, like almost probably everything else combined. Um , so

Speaker 2 26:24

Yeah, I think large in Excel is probably the, the majority, right? Like dude , yeah,

Speaker 3 26:29

By far I would

Speaker 2 26:29

Say

Speaker 3 26:30

Definitely

Speaker 2 26:31

Excel . Definitely Excel is probably the majority I would say.

Speaker 3 26:33

Yeah, exactly. And

Speaker 2 26:34

Then like large and then two Excel is probably like, it goes out and then probably not a lot of mediums, right? Or smalls.

Speaker 3 26:41

Yeah, mediums and smalls not as much. Um, but large and X seller , like definitely in top sellers, mediums and double X like are , okay , triple X sells a decent amount and then small as

Speaker 2 26:52

That's what sucks though, right? Because you're only, let's , let's say, let's say you , let's just do easy math. Like you're gonna buy 500 MOQ just for your first run and then you're buying a hundred of every style, right? Then you gotta break that down into how many like sizes, right? So small, medium, large, extra large, double XL , triple X's , six of 'em . Let's say you don't even do Triple xr . You just do double, you only get 20 shirts, right? Yeah . For each size. And then if like, nobody buys these guys 'cause they're the wrong size. Now you're still four or half your shirts, no one's wearing. 'cause it's the wrong size. Like that's the hard part with starting out. I mean, you learn as you go, but capital on stuff that's not selling

Speaker 3 27:28

When you're starting out. And then you have a couple, you know, weeks of good sales because you have all your largest and Excel stocked up, but then they're all gone and now you're hoping that people are gonna come buy the mediums and smalls like Yeah, that, that , that's definitely like part of the learning curve. You know, coming from I was, was in corporate sales and marketing. So like, and then before that in investment banking, I didn't know anything about inventory management. How

Speaker 2 27:52

Would you Yeah .

Speaker 3 27:54

The

Speaker 2 27:54

Skill you never learned. Yeah,

Speaker 3 27:55

I

Speaker 2 27:55

Mean, even buying product, like, it's like, that's not your forte, right? Like, you were like, oh , I went to school for fashion, or I went to school for, I was a buyer for somebody. Like , I don't jack . You're like, I'm gonna go find a factory and I'm gonna like make some cool shirts.

Speaker 3 28:09

Starting out. Like, before I knew anyone in the industry or really anything about the industry, literally it was Googling sublimated golf shirt manufacturer and trying to find companies that way. And like you found, found some people, but like, they weren't always the best people. So it's definitely a lot of trial and error for the first like, I don't know , year, year and a half,

Speaker 2 28:31

Bro . I've had the same problems. I mean, it's the same thing. Like, you know, like you get , you , you think you have the right manufacturer and they , you don't. Yeah . You know, and then you have another one and it's like you're , you're hoping to find the , the unicorn. Really?

Speaker 3 28:45

Yeah. You get it . It helps if like, you find someone that you can trust and, but I know there's always issues and just like every business, like their business is just like ours. Like there's always gonna be setbacks and issues and delays. So don't

Speaker 2 28:59

Do gloves. Don't do gloves. Dude, I know you're probably didn't . Oh , I'm gonna do gloves.

Speaker 3 29:03

Did you try gloves?

Dont do gloves!

Speaker 2 29:04

Yeah. It was a big mistake. Don't do it. Really?

Speaker 3 29:06

It was a nightmare. Why ? No one bought them or they would just crap.

Speaker 2 29:09

Oh crap.

Speaker 3 29:10

Really?

Speaker 2 29:11

I mean they , they like, well they were all crap. I was all excited. I like had I think seven designs, right? I had like pink orange, you know, whatever, a bunch of colors. And I had black and I had white and then I had a camouflage one, right? Yeah. Which was kind of cool too. All excited. All excited. And then like, they all came in, they were looked great, they looked whatever. Great packaging. I designed the packaging, all this crap. And then like, I went golfing with my friend and I gave him a a What color was that? Red or I don't orange . I don't know . I gave him some kind of color and the fricking glove bled. So like all of a sudden it took the glove off and his, his hand was, I don't remember some color

Speaker 3 29:53

That

Speaker 2 29:53

Was like the color of the glove. And I was like, that's

Speaker 3 29:56

Amazing .

Speaker 2 29:57

<laugh> . Yeah. So now I like , and I've been selling 'em and I'm like, oh no. And then what do you do? So then I like sent an email off my email list and was like, Hey, I'm getting reports. And I had this issue too, like, if you bought 'em, I'll refund your money. I don't want you guys, you know , to like have to deal with that. I go, however, if you just wanna like roll the , I go, they're not all like this, but I don't know which ones are aren't. So if you wanna roll the dice, I'm literally selling 'em for like eight bucks. Right. Or whatever. Right . Some low price. And then what happened ? I got sold out, everybody bought it and they're like, I don't give a. Yeah , exactly . But like , I was honest about it, but yeah , that's tell you don't do gloves, dude. I would've , you gotta find the right manufacturer. And like,

Speaker 3 30:34

I , I would've immediately when that happened said, hey, sorry. So the people who bought it apologized , but then start marketing it as like a trick glove and have people buy it as gifts for other people. Like, hey, wanna really screw it your buddy? Like buy this glove. It's gonna turn their head blue or their hand blue .

Speaker 2 30:50

That'd be hilarious. That'd be hilarious. I say I was trying more like damage control. Like, okay , great. Tell 'em janky products. So that is one thing that was funny

Speaker 3 30:58

Early on when like, you have those little issues, it's like the , the world is over. It's like the sky is falling. Like, we'll we, I don't know , we would have like inventory like coming in that gets delayed for a week. And at the time I was like, oh my God, our customers are never gonna talk to us again. We would like pre-sale stuff or like our wholesale customers and like maybe just desensitized to it a after a couple years. Like it's still a big deal, but it's not like, not like, oh man, this is over. Like they're , I'm gonna have to shut up , shut down shop because of this. So when you ,

Speaker 2 31:37

I think it's , I I feel like those first couple years are the , are so, so hard because you have to learn so much and you don't know what you're doing. And every penny counts. Right? Every dollar. And it's like you're trying to live off of it. You're trying to support your family, you're trying to like run a business and like big setbacks like that can like kick you in the nuts. 'cause you're just like, well I was expecting that , you know? Yeah , it was , I mean people still bought 'em . It was hilarious. Like people still bought all my gloves. Yeah . And then like, I'm like, okay, there's no returns. Whatever. I said that right? Like, and then, you know, but I was very honest and then like two months later some guy was like, oh, my hand turned red. I'm like, no. Like I told you that was gonna happen. Like that's

Speaker 3 32:19

Why it was $8 . Bucka .

Speaker 2 32:20

You paid $8 for a golf club, bro. You know, whatever. I charge seven bucks. It was like nothing. I was like, well sorry, I'll tell you , I told you 15 different places that could happen. So

Speaker 3 32:30

Yeah, <laugh>

Speaker 2 32:32

Just throw the trash or they , or they think about gloves too is they rip like people are like, oh, I wore it one time and it ripped. Can I get another one? Well , well obviously you brought the wrong size. Like

Speaker 3 32:41

Bro, real, every golf club I've ever, ever had has ripped. Like no , I'm like ,

Speaker 2 32:46

Bro, like tell don't do gloves. Don't do gloves. I know. You're like , oh , do gloves , don't do gloves.

Speaker 3 32:50

Alright . Good to know.

Speaker 2 32:51

It's like, it's like the money pit. 'cause you're gonna have to like look what if you have to because they're cheap. They're cheap to make. They're really cheap to make . But like if the MQs are not that high, I don't know that , that is my advice. You can take it for what it is, but

Speaker 3 33:03

Good to know. I'll take that into consideration. <laugh>,

Speaker 2 33:07

You're like, oh, we just bought 10,000 gloves. Now you tell me this . So what's coming out like with you guys this year? Like, I know we're kind of already in September, but like what's, what do you have going on for the rest of the year with the holidays and stuff

Speaker 3 33:19

Like that ? Yeah, so we started doing , uh, a whole line of solid polos with just like

Speaker 2 33:25

And gloves. <laugh> and gloves. Just

Speaker 3 33:27

Kidding. We have the best gloves that you'll ever do .

Speaker 2 33:29

Oh, no, no. We're

Speaker 3 33:30

Gonna turn your hand brown and

Speaker 2 33:34

Well , I got supplier for you if you want one of those supplier <laugh> .

Speaker 3 33:37

Perfect. Uh, no . So for right now, we're still sticking with our bread and butter and just doing apparel , um, apparel, hats, pants. Um, and then we'll do, like, during the holidays we'll do like some fun products that really are just like free gift products. Like we're not, don't even sell them on the site a lot of times. Um, but like the main thing that we've been seeing, because like the way that our collections typically work is like, we'll launch in October-ish for like fall and like for the , the last two months we've been selling to all of our wholesale customers. So like the products already like are out and like people have been buying the, like, the new collection, but only the wholesale guys. So we've seen a lot of , uh, like got an idea as to like how the new collections are gonna do once they get online. We've been selling , uh, solid polos that have just, I'm actually wearing one right now. Like the , uh, the collar has like just little detail on it. Cool .

Speaker 2 34:34

Yeah , that's really cool because

Speaker 3 34:35

Like one of the , the main, not main things, but like we have a lot of customers that like, love our brand, not just for the prints . They love like the touch and feel. Feel. Yeah. They're just comfortable shirts. They're

Speaker 2 34:46

Quality and they wanna support your brand and they like what you're doing too. Like ,

Speaker 3 34:50

But they're like, I can't wear Tropic Thunder to the office every day . And I wear a golf polo to work every single day. So like, you know, last year we did just regular solid polos and I mean, although people bought them it like, I don't know , it pained me to do it. I'm like, oh, these are so good's not

Speaker 2 35:06

Who you are. Right? Yeah . You're just like,

Speaker 3 35:09

Yeah, exactly. So like, these are like much more along the lines of what we're trying to do. They're , they're still fun. They still have like the element of our patterns and you know, we could see people coming like buying pineapple party and then coming and buying the blue one with the little pineapple party like, you know , uh, elements to it. So that way they have like a weekend polo and a workday polo. So,

Speaker 2 35:32

So smart dude. That's

Speaker 3 35:33

Really smart. So that's the main thing that we're doing. Um, and then we have some hats, like all over printed hats that are, are coming out in the next couple weeks. So we

Speaker 2 35:40

Got got some cool, like full print because your other hats are just like white, right? And then the bottoms have the, the lids have the , um, the bundle .

Speaker 3 35:47

Yeah. Which

Speaker 2 35:47

Is smart too. That's really smart.

Speaker 3 35:49

Yeah, they , they were pretty cool. They, the , uh, what we found was like, I don't know , whenever you , we do something that's like middle of the road, like out there, they don't do as well. So like the under the , the brimm was like people who weren't really interested in getting like a full print, they didn't sell as well as you would think. So we're, we're going like all in just like full print, like rock and roll and, and then like other solid hats that have like a patch with the print in it, so.

Speaker 2 36:22

Oh , that's smart. That'd be cool.

Speaker 3 36:23

Yeah.

Speaker 2 36:24

So what would the pat , what's in the patch? Is it gonna have the logo and then have the print behind it or what? Yeah,

Speaker 3 36:29

Yeah, exactly. So it would be like our bestselling prints with patch right here, the dog in the middle so

Speaker 2 36:34

It matches and

Speaker 3 36:35

Matches

Speaker 2 36:36

His shirt. That'd be sick.

Speaker 3 36:37

Yeah. Yeah, exactly. So that's

Speaker 2 36:38

Really smart.

Speaker 3 36:39

So we're probably ,

Speaker 2 36:40

So , um, the other thing I wanna say too , what I thought was his genius. So I met Rick through Remic, CEO of golf who was on the show while back too. And like, one thing I thought was just brilliant that Rick did, which Remick talked about was the, the House last year. Can you guys, can you talk about that, like what that was and I mean it was brilliant.

Speaker 3 37:03

Yeah , it was

Speaker 2 37:03

Brilliant

Speaker 3 37:04

For sure. So early on in the brand we, we tried to put a big emphasis on , uh, influencer marketing. So just partnering with either big or large influencers or bigger small influencers. Um, and just really trying to get the brand out there as much as possible. Like at the time we were still pretty, pretty new and, you know, wasn't really a recognizable brand. So we just began reaching out to all these guys who are on Instagram, TikTok , you know, YouTube, whatever. Um, and just saying like, Hey, like, you know, we'd love to send you some product, like let us know what you think. So, you know, we were doing that a lot and like getting a lot of good content from like the golf influencers that were just like out doing their thing. And that kind of sparked the idea of like, well, what if we brought them all to one place and just had them collaborate with each other and just like, have them wear Proud 90 all day every day and, and just go out and say like, listen, we're not asking to shoot like commercials for us. We just wanna like document you guys doing your thing on a daily basis and like, let you go out and just have freedom to just create all day every day , but just happen to wear Proud 90 while you're doing it. So it kind of sparked the idea of, of the content house that we did last year and we had , uh, four slash five guys , uh, come down and put them up for a month. Uh, got them a house in , uh, in Bo Raton and just like all of our local connections with golf courses just said like, Hey, you guys can go play these five courses whenever you want. And like, if there's another course that's like on your bucket list, let us know and we could try to set that up for you too. And , uh, they just shot content nonstop. And like the cool thing was like Remic, like he was big on, I can't remember if he was bigger on TikTok , but bigger on Instagram. It was on TikTok .

Speaker 2 38:51

I think

Speaker 3 38:51

He was bigger on, on one of the two, bigger than the other. But then somebody else in the house , uh, Kaden Davies , um, he was big on TikTok . So like he , they helped each other say like, this is what I'm doing on TikTok , this is what you could be doing. And like, it just allowed Remic to blow up his TikTok and like vice versa. And they're like, Busta Jack came down and uh, who was it ? Busta , uh, was only there for a couple days because he still had a full-time job at the time and then had to go back to Texas and go to work. And he had such fomo from missing out on the content house that after being home for a week and like seeing all the guys down at the content house creating, he called us. He's like, guys, I just quit my job. Like I'm doing this full time . I don't care. Let's go. So

Speaker 2 39:36

Wow. I didn't know that. That's crazy.

Speaker 3 39:38

Yeah. Yeah. So it was pretty cool. And then like those guys came out of it like bigger than ever got. Yeah. I think their first deal was they're crushing

Speaker 2 39:46

It, bro. They're crushing on YouTube right now. Yeah,

Speaker 3 39:48

Dude. They're good golfers, man. They, they're just like stupid good at , at golf. Like really ? Yeah. I think we played one round with like, as a welcome round with everybody and like Joey Cold Cuts came down and joined us 'cause he was working with us at the time at the, the Boca Raton Hotel over here. The the easy resort course that I was telling you about and when you

Speaker 2 40:07

Look really good at

Speaker 3 40:08

Yeah, exactly. But , uh,

Speaker 2 40:10

Man Rick's so good. It is like, yeah, he is

Speaker 3 40:12

<laugh> bust his shot like nine under or something. Holy

Speaker 2 40:16

I t

Speaker 3 40:16

Was , it was wild. And I was like, all right , cool. Well I'll , I'll take my 87 and go home.

Speaker 2 40:22

Yeah . I

Speaker 3 40:22

Don't know why I just said seven. I don't even know if I've ever shot his 87 in my life, but , uh,

Speaker 2 40:27

You did one time you got you down to , I saw you got down to 16.

Speaker 3 40:31

Yeah, exactly. But yeah, so it was awesome. And like,

Speaker 2 40:34

That's so smart dude, because like, I mean , it's such thinking outside the box and that's why like, I, that's a mad respect for you because like that takes big balls to even do that. Right? The cost of like putting that whole thing together, you know, and but the vision of seeing the talent, the people there, they're not like about to blow up, you know what I mean? So it's like industry not even looking at them yet. I mean, I guess like social knows who they are, but it's just so smart dude. Well

Speaker 3 41:00

That was the thing too. 'cause that was like, we had to find guys who were willing to come down and not like, we couldn't pay them $10,000 to come down for the month. You know? And that's what some of these big guys get. Like if you want them to , if you want them to put out content free for your month, like $10,000 and above, you know . So

Speaker 2 41:19

At

Speaker 3 41:19

The time, like those guys were all kinda like , I'd probably say medium sized , uh, influencers with like 30 to 50,000 followers on each channel. And like, I I'm, I think like that month of them just like, like grinding it out, putting out content every single focusing

Speaker 2 41:36

Yeah . Working

Speaker 3 41:36

With each other, being

Speaker 2 41:37

With their peers. That's the other thing too, which is so smart.

Speaker 3 41:41

And I think like a lot of them had like, tremendous growth from being down here, which was awesome. That's re was cool . Did

Speaker 2 41:47

Changed his life. That's what Reic said on their show. He is like, it changed my life. Yeah .

Speaker 3 41:50

Because

Speaker 2 41:50

He said what his job went down there too, and he is like, had I not done that, there's no way I'd be doing this right now.

Speaker 3 41:55

Yeah. So

Speaker 2 41:56

It's like, you know, he said like, because he, he learned how to step up his game and he was taught by a peer and like helped out. It wasn't like, I think that's a lot of people understand it's like when you're in influencer or whatever, like you're an island, like you're just doing your stuff.

Speaker 3 42:12

Yeah , right .

Speaker 2 42:12

It's all you're doing. Everyone's islands and it's like they have friends that do the same thing. They can be like, no, don't do that. You know, or you know , that's a good idea. Or let me show you how to do this. Like, that's so massive. Yeah . Because it's like, it's one less skill you have to learn and you can't learn these skills in school. It's like you'd learn by doing, it's like running a business, right. You learn by doing. So I, yeah , that's, I heard that . I was like, that guy's smart as hell.

Speaker 3 42:35

That's cool though . I didn't , the fact that Remic said that , that that changed his life, that makes me happy. 'cause like he's a super good dude. Like he's, he's, we still worked with him a bunch since the content house and like always willing to, to come down and like do different collabs with us and everything and Yeah, I know at the time he was still like trying to figure out like how to do the influence . Well,

Speaker 2 42:55

It's a scary thing. I think, you know , it's like if you a job,

Speaker 3 42:58

Because you

Speaker 2 42:59

Gotta pay your bills, you

Speaker 3 43:00

Take it to a certain level . Like you can't live off free golf stuff. You know, like you , you need someone to start paying you real money and until you get to a certain level,

Speaker 2 43:08

But you can do free, you can do free for a while if you have a job, right? Yeah . And this is like your free fun , but like, if you wanna make that jump, like you gotta get paid because you're not gonna able to do it. It's impossible.

Speaker 3 43:19

And it's kind , it's like the, the chicken or the egg, it's like you almost gotta quit your job and start doing it full time to be able to get to that level. You know ? Honestly, it's similar to like how Proud 90 got started. Like if, if my job in corporate travel didn't get shut down,

Speaker 2 43:36

You would never have done it. You've never done it, dude. A

Speaker 3 43:37

Hundred percent . But doing it for a couple hours at night at home, there's no way we'd be where we are right now. You

Speaker 2 43:41

Would've just been like one other brand out there that's doing it. Yeah . And like you would've never gotten to the level you're at now. There's no way. Because you don't have time.

Speaker 3 43:49

Yeah. Because

Where can people find Proud90?

Speaker 2 43:49

You're making good money right. With your other job and Yeah . And it's like, why, you know, and you're doing this for fun and that's how I did this. That's all for fun. It was fun. It was like, yeah , no , well, I'm a huge fan of Proud 90. Honestly. I , I have been for a long time. Um, where can people find Proud 90 ?

Speaker 3 44:06

Uh, so you go to our website, it's just proud ninety.com . Proud nine zero.com . Our Instagram handle is Proud 90 Golf. Uh, TikTok , I think it's the same thing. Uh, you know , we're trying to be everywhere, so , uh, and you could email us at any time our customer service just info@proudninety.com. If you ever wanna like, you know, chat, ask them like, Hey, saw Rick on the podcast, wanted to ask him a question about this. Like, feel free to reach out. Always happy to , to meet some, some customer stuff.

Speaker 2 44:34

Well, thank you so much for being on the show. I really appreciate it. I'll see you guys in the next episode.

Speaker 4 44:39

Thanks for listening to another episode of Behind the Golf Brand podcast. You're gonna beat me and golf stay connected on and off the show by visiting golfers authority.com. Don't forget to like, subscribe and leave a comment. Golf is always more fun when you win. Stay out of the beach and see you on the green.