Daily Inspiration: Meet Jamison Lammers

Today we’d like to introduce you to Jamison Lammers

Hi Jamison, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
My journey started way back in 2016! I had just gotten done with my super senior year living in my college town of Brookings, South Dakota! I had moved to Denver with a group of 7 people who all went to the same college as I did and wanted to get out of the small town farming community we were raised in. One of my roommates was a art major and would paint everyday in our garage, I would sit out there and watch him paint when I got off work. One day while I was watching him paint he just randomly said, “I think you’ll be good at this” and handed me a canvas, some paint and a few brushes and told me he wouldn’t paint unless I painted. Anytime I stopped painting and started watching him paint he would put his arms behind his back and wouldn’t start again until I started painting. I was going through a tough time in my life and ended up using art as a form of expression to get my emotions out. Next thing you know its 2018 and the app “Procreate” Becomes popular, I liked painting but, I am an extreme perfectionist, none of my paintings ever came out exactly how I had imagined in my head, I took the plunge and bought a Ipad and instantly became obsessed with digital art! It wasn’t long before covid hit and during covid I noticed that the music scene one of the main reasons I moved to denver was basically gone. I was working full-time for Xfinity at the time and was making good money, but decided that covid was my chance to break the barrier of everyday 9-5 life! I quit my full-time job and became a full-time artist investing 50-70 hours a week into procreate and tie-dye! I used tie-dye as my income since it was very popular during covid, and every moment of free time I was dialing in my skills and own unique art style on procreate! Soon I was selling a bunch of my own prints, stickers and clothing with my designs at a few venues around Denver. It wasn’t long until a few of the local Denver DJ’s wanted me to help them make their logo’s / symbols / and shirt designs. I did a few logo’s and shirt designs and everyone was then asking me to make their clothing for them the only issue was that every single DJ wanted embroidery. I scoured Denver to find out who was doing embroidery for the large music scene in Denver and to my surprise nobody was doing embroidery! I spent the next few days watching youtube videos and trying to decide my next move, after figuring out which machine was best for my skill level but also large enough to take on orders asap! I found a store in Lakewood that sold the exact model I had wanted, I decided to drop 17k that day which was a huge commitment and risk! I had never sewn before and was still a novice in the digital art / graphic design realm. The first day I ever ran my machine (took me 30 days to turn it on I was nervous) I did not know what a spin wheel was and had it pushed against the wall which burnt out the motor instantly it started schreeching, smoking, and shooting out oil! It was completely broken… My heart sank! I called the company I had bought it from and my purchase came with a 4 Year protection plan they had it fixed the next day. From that point on it was go-time! The next 1-2 Years flew by and I eventually brought on a few employees and started vending frequently! Cervantes one of the most popular venues in Denver asked me to be their first vendor for a new type of event called “Shift Thursday” – it was a vendor market for fans enjoying the events put on each week! I soon started trying to find garment’s that would appeal to my new customer base, I then stumbled upon the fluffy bucket hats, something I had never seen before! I decided to order a few in and see if I could embroider them, I made a few and the next time I was vending it was the first purchase made and a rush of customer’s were at my stand demanding for a fluffy bucket hat, I had only made two. The next thing I know someone runs up to my booth and tell’s me someone just bought that fluffy bucket hat off of the original buyer for $10 more then I had asked, and then some0ne else bought it from them for an additional $10! The $30 hat was now sold for $50 and I had people asking me about them all night. I realized I had hit gold! I went back home and threw every single dollar I had into the fuzzy bucket hats! I started going to music festival’s and renegade vending (hitting the campsites and selling in person) the bucket hats were such a success that it became my specialty item and started a huge trend in the music festival community that is still going on today! It is now 2024 and it is a huge crossroad in my career. Do I make a huge investment in trying to officially vend at music festival’s? I had been waiting to get a stronger brand image, and a website presence before I dove into festivals. I decided it was time! I spent the next 2-3 months creating a new logo/symbol as well as getting a website established. In our first festival season we did 6 Festival’s and did the official merchandise for 3 festivals. I will say this year was the hardest year of my life and for my company. Running a team, traveling all summer, planning out and designing official merchandise as well as make enough merchandise to pay the vending fees as well as keep up on making merch for the Denver DJ’s projects was a extremely hard balancing act! It was my year of learning and understanding what it is truly like to run a business! I made it through our first vending year with a lot more momentum than I ever expected! It is now March 26th and festival season year 2 is about to take off! I am extremely excited to see where we take it this year! I would say the biggest factor on getting to where I am at is determination, a positive mindset and the willingness to help others!

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I would say Yes and No to be honest. I think I took a unique approach to the apparel game just after hearing a lot of other artist’s complain about things and pointing out errors for a few years before I dove in. By offering embroidery I did not and still don’t really have any competition so sale wise its been smooth. Every other factor of owning a small independent company has been a struggle. Embroidery has a very steep learning curve so getting worker’s that arent already fully employed has been one obstacle, financial side of things, I also have never been a manager so the logistical side of things as well as paying taxes and being able to afford an accountant has also been an issue! One thing that you don’t really realize is that owning a company and running a business are completely different things! Something I did not realize until year 4, everything about efficiency, invoicing, money management, scheduling and inventory really started to make sense! By not having any business background or knowledge I didn’t understand that a business is almost it’s own ecosystem in a sense! Every task kind of feeds off of another. This is year 5 and I would say the road keeps getting harder after you start seeing all the holes in your ship and as the owner you have to figure out how to patch them up just right.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
Our company makes unique one of a kind clothing! One of the main reason’s I decided to name my company Open Minded is because we make every single garment a 1/1 artistic piece! We change the garment color, tie-dye color, and the thread color’s used on each design to give each piece of clothing it’s own look and personality! I would say what sets us apart from most other clothing production companies in Denver is the fact that our company is completely “In-House” from designing the customer’s design’s, to the mock-ups to ordering the customer’s garment’s in and the entire production and fulfillment process is done within our company! We do not get things made over-seas which lets the customer have a lot more control of the design process and we can get the customer’s orders to them much sooner. The other thing that really sets us apart is our website’s drop-shipping / hosting capabilities! We are a grassroots company that’s main objective is to uplift and help other artists, DJ’s, vendors and small businesses grow with us! We offer drop-shipping at a fraction of the cost these larger companies are charging! So at a low cost and no true minimum order size we can get the customer;s vision and idea’s out there at no risk since the customer’s clothing is all mock-ups and does not get pushed into production until it is actually sold! This way the customer does not get stuck with a bunch of inventory and we don’t have to store the customer’s inventory as well! The last thing that make’s Open Minded stand out is our art style! I based my entire company off one of my favorite game’s growing up, “Kingdom Hearts” which was developed by both Disney and Square Enix (creators of final fantasy) which in my opinion was the perfect mix of “beautiful and dark” – I decided to follow in their footsteps and create an art style of my own that captures three main elements, Beautiful, Dak and Trippy with a little bit of pop-culture sprinkled in!

So maybe we end on discussing what matters most to you and why?
Supporting Other’s and providing for my team! What’s the point of making it if your gonna celebrate alone?? I was also raised in a very loving family, being the youngest of 11. I still can hear my mother telling me everyday of my life, “Jamison, if there is one thing you do in this life all I ask of you is to help others!” I have stuck with that mindset my entire life!

Pricing:

• Embroidery Services – $1.00 Per 1,000 Stitches
• DTF Heat Transfer – $0.12 Per Square Inch
• Digitizing Pricing – $50 For simple designs – $150+ for artwork
• Drop-Shipping Services – 10% + Production Cost
• Tie-Dye Customs Starting at – $50 t-shirts / $75.00 Hoodies – Each comes with 1 free embroidered design!

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.openmindedapparel.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/open.minded.apparel/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/OpenMindedApparel/