This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Welcome to Side Hustle School. My name is Chris Guillebeau. In today's story, we'll look at a bass player who starts a clothing brand/hustle called Basslayers. This concept is interesting. People routinely wear garments that show their passion for sports, school pride, or certain labels.
Now this bass player, who is also a respiratory therapist by day, wanted a way to wear his love for music in the same way that those students or sports fans would. So he got to work with a co-founder to create that clothing line to appeal to musicians from all walks of life. Now as a side note, making side hustle school is like memory lane for me every week because in addition to all the different ideas I learn about that I want to pursue myself, I'm often reminded of random projects over the years that I started or tried to start at one point. Long ago, I had a business called Cheap Bass Strings. I was a bass player myself in what feels like another life, and I resold electric bass strings in bulk.
And so I had that website and sadly, it never really took off, never really got in tune, but I did it for I think about three to six months while I was doing some other stuff. So fun fact, we're probably never gonna profile Cheap Bass Strings on side hustle school since it never really made any money, but it was something I haven't thought about in a long time. All right, sports fans have options to showcase their love of the game through apparel. Why can't musicians do the same? That story coming right up.
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Based in Dallas, Texas, respiratory therapist Russell Harris is passionate about music culture. As a bass player in his spare time, he loves nothing more than playing, creating, or just talking about music. But he's often felt that music culture was missing something that other subcultures have, the ability to express your love for music through your clothes. He knew that basic apparel like T-shirts and baseball caps helps you show your support for a particular artist. You could show that you're a believer, a little monster or a deadhead, for example.
I believe those references are Justin Bieber, Lady Gaga and the Grateful Dead. But there was no clothing range out there that showed your passion for music in general. So he set about creating a brand that would do just that. And his first step was to enlist the help of his fashionable friend, Chris Mathis. They met at a Dallas coffee shop over the course of a few weeks to brainstorm ideas about what products music lovers might want.
They both felt they should start with one product to test the market. If they got a good response, they could expand their catalog in stages. And because Chris is a self-proclaimed hat snob, they figured they would start with headwear, specifically baseball caps and skull caps, which you might also know as a beanie. They chose the name base layers, one word with a Z at the end, base layers. This is a play on a term base layer, which is often used in sportswear, but for base players and layers of clothing.
They felt the layers aspect stopped them from being pigeonholed so that they could expand into other types or layers of clothing in the future. To create the product, Russell and Chris started with some initial designs they could take to a manufacturer. They then ordered samples from multiple manufacturers to test the quality and understand which were selling junk, you know, in their words, and which were selling caps, which would last. They knew a poorly made product would be totally off key to their market. So they had a mantra of we refuse to sell junk.
Through a process of elimination, they found a manufacturer who made high quality cap designs at an affordable rate. These hats would then be sent off to a local embroidery factory that would add the base layers logo to the front panel. All of these elements were factored into the final price of the product, which ranges from $16 to $32, depending on style. While the first run of hats was being designed, Russell and Chris made a Shopify store to help them track orders and take payments. It was the easiest and most affordable option for them.
That first run of products and a Shopify website brought their startup costs to $4,000. Russell and Chris set themselves a launch date of October, 2018. This gave them a few weeks in between receiving the product to start promoting and building anticipation in advance. On Facebook, Russell did something interesting. He began adding people in the music industry as friends and talking to them about the product.
He focused mainly on bass players and asked them questions about what they would want to see in a music focused clothing range. This quickly led to him reaching his limit of 5,000 Facebook friends, starting from a base of just 500. But despite the digital age we live in, both Russell and Chris say the best way to market their product has been to wear it. Whether they're going out for the day or just running to the store to get some bread, they treat themselves like walking billboards. If you can confidently wear your product with pride, they say it will help others picture themselves doing the same.
This walking billboard approach has led to a lot of interest. For example, while eating breakfast in a Little Rock, Arkansas hotel, Chris was approached by a guy asking where he got the hat and what the logo meant. That person turned out to be the rapper Ray J, who took home the hat Chris was wearing. Since launching bass layers in October 2018, the reception and sales have been strong, and they now want to expand to reach more musicians. They also hope their brand will catch the attention of someone like Damon John, founder of FUBU.
They're going to start by attending in-person events like guitar shows and conventions. It sounds like they're tuning up for the next stage. [Music]
Well, I think that bass layers is a great name. I think that's just the perfect ideal name. I also like the Facebook strategy of using your personal account in addition to a fan page, because what often happens, you know, in this case, they do have a fan page, but that fan page has, I don't know, 200 or 300 fans on it, which is not a bad start at all, but of course you got a long way to go.
If you want complete separation between, you know, your personal life and your side hustle, then this wouldn't be a good idea, but a lot of people are happy to be associated with their project. So in this case, it was a good strategy, you know, to use his personal account to go out and add friends and, you know, connect with musicians in that way. So you might want to consider that because a lot of people struggle in getting traction to a new Facebook fan page. Also Shopify is a great choice in this kind of situation. I especially recommend it for people who are selling physical products like they're doing.
It's really good with helping you keep up with inventory, among other things. And you can also get a free trial for Shopify, by the way, at Shopify.com/sidehustle. Now I did have one comment for them or one suggestion critique on the about page, which long time listeners know I always look for the about page. They actually have a pretty good story here. On the about page, it talks a bit about how this brand came to be.
They've got a bit of a mission statement, kind of a rallying cry here. You know, it says something like, "Base layers understands that music binds us. We fall in love through it. We celebrate with it. It causes us to think." You know, and it goes on for a bit.
Eventually it says, "Welcome to base layers, wear your passion." So I think that's all really good. Couple of things though, would be nice to have a picture of them because there's just these words. You know, you kind of want to know who is behind this. Like, okay, base layers is this mission. Who is behind the mission?
And also there are several typos that I saw right away as soon as I read the copy. I think a lot of other people would notice too. So, you know, it's easy to make this mistake because you've been working on your site for a long time. You know, and I've done this too. There's lots of typos and mistakes I've made.
So it's really good to have somebody else go through and just, you know, review what you've written for your site. They're probably gonna catch something that you might miss. So just a couple of suggestions there, but overall it sounds like they're on the right track. And I look forward to seeing what happens next with base layers. All right listeners, thank you so much for being out there.
You are the reason we make this show. Inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is so much better. Today's show notes, including links to base layers, anything else I mentioned in the episode, Shopify, et cetera, will be at sidehustleschool.com/797. Episode 797, almost all the way to 800. And of course we're gonna keep rolling from there.
Do come back tomorrow. My name is Chris Guillebeau. This is Side Hustle School. [Music]
From the Onward Project.
