For Brandon Tomlin the choice was clear, he could believe in his dream or possibly regret never taking the leap; he chose to jump. When he first asked his father for help to start Cronik Gear two years ago Bernard Tomlin gave his son a choice: take the money for the business or be paid to not try at all, hoping to persuade Brandon into giving up on his dream. “He said I will give you the money straight up if you don’t do it. He was almost positive that he wouldn’t get his money back, but he loved me enough to say ‘hey this is your dream and I’m gonna let you do this’,” Tomlin said. However much to his surprise, the elder Tomlin received all of the money back within two weeks of the business’s opening. “He was really surprised when I gave him the money back just two weeks into it and now he and the rest of my family are on board. They’ve been really supportive now that they see I’m on to something,” Tomlin said. Tomlin, a University of Oklahoma junior, and his business partner Kayla Whitehouse, a fellow OU junior, began their journey with a chance meeting during a Costa Rica trip two years ago. They talked about possibly starting a business together, but he thought nothing of it until a phone call a month later. “She called me a month later asking me if I wanted to pursue it and I’m like yea I want to so we came up with the name and then trademarked it and found a manufacturer, which was probably the hardest part and we just went from there,” Tomlin said. They settled on the name Cronik, and began basing their designs on clothing styles found both in America and internationally. “I’ve always loved Pac Sun [Inc.] style of chill and comfortable clothing so I wanted to incorporate that, but we also wanted to add some of the styles we saw in Costa Rica,” Tomlin said. Whitehouse, a business major, saw the potential for them to create something no one else was doing. She felt with their experience and access to college students they were the perfect team to succeed. “Since we are actually a part of the college age group we know what the style is and what students look for in clothing. And Brandon staying on campus [as a resident advisor in Headington Hall] gives him direct access into the group we are targeting,” Whitehouse said. Their first and most successful product thus far is the “volo,” a mixture of a polo styled jacket with a hood and a v-neck. Tomlin and Whitehouse based their design on the clothing that inspired the business. “We both remembered seeing some really cool hoodie type things while we were in Costa Rica and we’d never seen anything like them before so we had to include it,” Whitehouse said. Tomlin regularly sports a volo to promote the style and even had a “#wearitwednesday” event in December where students gathered in Headington Hall for a selfie later posted on the company’s website and facebook page. Earlier in the semester Tomlin took part in the Union Programming Board’s “Treat Yo Self” event to further gain traction. His friend Quan “Q” Phan, the director of the event, felt it was the perfect way to help out his buddy. “Brandon’s my friend and if I can help him and anyone else by promoting their awesome products, then I’m happy to do it,” Phan said. Despite their success, Cronik and Tomlin have faced some adversity, mainly in the form of advertising on campus. “I’ve ventured into trying to set up a table on the south oval, but because I’m my own company it was too expensive and because I’m not a student organization I can’t officially sell on campus,” Tomlin said. He has managed to circumvent the system by wearing his product and allowing his friends and potential customers the opportunity to see it up close. “I always have gotten compliments on my style and so I figured the best way to sell them was to let them sell themselves. All my friends own them and being on campus so much has definitely helped,” Tomlin said. Tomlin eventually hopes to expand Cronik from “volos” to other clothing as well as longboards and skating gear. He said his dream is for every mall to have a Cronik stand or store with him taking a more managerial role. With the latest development he may be well on his way. “This weekend I dropped off volos at a store called DNA Galleries and a couple hours later people were texting me and telling me how awesome it is to see my stuff in stores, which is pretty cool and is a good start for us,” Tomlin said.
Posted on: Wed, 05 Mar 2014 07:24:35 +0000
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