FRAHM's 8th Birthday

On the 2nd of July 2018 it seems I did two important things, according to my photo library. Sent all the annotated notes back on the latest sample. And got a haircut with my son. Oh, and Robbie gave him my son a plane to throw. That's important.

A few days ago it was FRAHM's 8th birthday. I didn't celebrate.

The 2nd of July 2018 was the day I launched pre-orders for the FRAHM Original Utility Field Jacket. I was making 100 in black, from size Small to XL. Yep, only four sizes, one colour.

I begged our factory, now our best partner, to make them. They agreed.

And here we are.

I sold 13 in the first few months. It was brutal. Jason, my best friend and cofounder, who joined recently, said “If you can sell 13, you can sell 130, then 1,300.

As of today, it is 38,302. What I once sold in months, now happens in an evening.

I didn't do anything to celebrate that our birthday because I'm not that kind of person. It wasn't our 8th birthday, it was the eighth year of this project. And all I could think about was what was next.

Apart from my family & friends, I’m not sentimental. I’m always looking forwards. I’m told I should be proud. I guess I must be.

In fact, this blog is a reminder to myself a slap on the back. I don't.

Being forward thinking is great because it's positive, because I'm an optimist, because I believe in the future, in people, in my own ability, in my team, in our product, in progress.

But it's not so good because you should live in the present and enjoy what you have now. You don't know what's coming, good or bad. Tough Beautiful teaches us that.

When I was younger, I looked back a lot. I looked back at what might have been. Regrets. People who'd wronged me, perceived or otherwise. What could have been. What was great but now lost.

I didn't like that person. I changed him for this one.

Just before I met my wife, 30 years ago, I decided not to backwards. Not the person who was sad, bitter or regretful, but somebody who was going to make the future better for themselves and others.

I decided I wanted to like myself, and I had to build that.

I had try. Be willing to fail. So I started taking risks.

I feared regret more than failure. Still do.

People often ask me what I'm most proud of at FRAHM.

There are lots of things, but one always comes to mind.

That I started. Starting is the hardest thing.

And it wasn't just hard. It was painful. Frightening.

We were living through the worst period of our lives. The hardest. The worst health. The biggest debt. The most tired because our kids were tiny. We'd just moved to a different city. It had all gone wrong. It was still going wrong.

But Emmalou and I decided to try. Because otherwise we’d sink. We needed the back ourselves.

It felt like we were sticking a finger up at our own situation and saying, "No. We're still the same people we were a year ago. We can do it."

Trying something hard seemed like the only way for me to get my psyche back into some sort of balance. To give myself something to be proud of. Something I was good at.

And I am good at it.

I'm not really good at running a business.

I'm really, really good at trying, failing and learning. I move on fast, no lesson left unlearnt.

I guess that's the message.

I always have a message. I love a speech. People at work laugh at me, rightly so, because I love to give a motivational talk.

The message is:

Try.

Keeping trying.

Keep fail. That comes from trying.

Enjoy pushing yourself & learning.

I reckon, if you’re already a FRAHM Owner, you live this already.

Even if (when) you fail, you'll feel good for trying.

The worst thing is to think, "Do you know what? That'd be fun. I'd be good at that. Maybe it'd work.” Then spend the rest of your life telling people maybe it would have worked. maybe. If only. 

Telling myself maybe it would have worked. But I never found out.

Never asked out my wife. Never found out if we could have kids. Never rode up the mountain. Never asked a factory if they’d make 100. Never…. Could have. But didn’t.

I'm not just talking about starting a small business, your own business, your own brand, or your own mega-billion-dollar whatever you want it to be.

I'm talking about anything.

Building your own shed from scratch. Painting landscapes. Getting fit. Saying sorry. Living in Tokyo. Whatever the dream is that you hold back on. We all do. I do.

Starting, building, running, maintaining, growing a business is hard. I wish it wasn’t. But that’s the price. That’s the satisfaction. Every now and then, it all comes together. I/we/you paid our hours, weeks, years of Tough, for that moment of Beautiful.

I hope the Toughs are reducing and the Beautifuls increasing.

Go get ‘em cowboy.

Thank you for making my jump into the unknown eight years ago beautiful.

Onwards.

Nick