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Definitely, working on a more accurate risks section now!

Trey, I'm not saying there are no risks -- there are. I promise there will be hiccups along the way, anything you mentioned could happen. As an entrepreneur, I work as hard as I can to mitigate these risks by having multiple mills, sewing contractors, etc. but shit WILL happen. What I meant is that, no matter what happens, I'm going to make and deliver high quality shirts. Small hiccups will happen, but the only thing that makes us fail is me giving up, and that isn't going to happen.

I've been preparing for this Kickstarter campaign for six months. I'm doing it because I'm truly passionate about fixing a very broken retail/apparel manufacturing model that hasn't changed much in 50 years. I think there is a truly better way to make and sell the best men's clothes, and that is why I'm building this company. Kickstarter happens to be an incredibly efficient way to gain the resources required to continue down this path.

I think an enforced cap and the exclusivity of an offer is a great idea, I'd love to use that in the future.

One of the exciting things about building companies now is that everyone has a voice. We appreciate the candid critique.

Really appreciate your angle/suggestions here. Working on re-writing the Risks/Challenges section now!

Let me preface by saying that I'm by no means a Kickstarter expert.

I think Kickstarter is fully focused on creative projects that do actually create things. Each project has to have a clear end point and well-defined creation. It definitely isn't made to clear out old inventory -- so in that sense, it isn't a store, but for those of us that need resources and scale to manufacture a product, it is hugely important, and a lot of their focus.

I do think there are a lot of ideas like categorization and tiering that could help people better understand Kickstarter, and I think they'll continue to refine the concept, of course.

Hey all, I started the company formerly known as From Holden (we're renaming), and wrote all the copy for the Kickstarter campaign. I posted a reply on Dan's blog, would love to answer any other questions or hear any other thoughts there or here!

http://www.danshapiro.com/blog/2012/11/this-is-why-im-not-ba...

Thanks so much Matt, will check these out. Any ones you like?

Definitely will!

AFKAH

I'd really like to stay with a name associated with where we grew up - there have been some great ideas here that I wouldn't have ever thought of!

Awesome, thanks man! Will check it out.

Venice has a lot of cool geo-names close as well. Abbot Kinney is a rad name in itself. Any other ideas down that path?

This could be a perfect application for Google Consumer Surveys. Emailed you.

Holbrook was also the middle school next to ours.

Awesome ideas guys! Keep 'em coming!

Ah, no not at all! It was our fault, HN saved us a bunch of time and money -- I'm glad we are making the change now versus six months down the road after we made print collateral, labels, etc.

We definitely should have spent more time looking at it; they do graphic tees but mostly snowboarding jackets. We don't plan to do either.

Either way, the change is under way now, any ideas for names? :)

Those are some great ideas - any you like specifically?

Another sign that they have some great guys running their company as well. They definitely could have been much more forceful.

Definitely will, great suggestion.

We tossed around Caulfield -- we like it as well. Another LA designed did a line called 'caulfield preparatory'. Still in the running, for sure - what do you guys think?

Thank you for the support guys. It is definitely a hard thing to experience -- the first reaction was definitely profoundly 'fuck' followed by 'this sucksssss'.

but at the end of the day, these guys have spent a long time building an incredible company, their designs are really awesome, and everything from their videos to their site design just screams 'rad'.

We're really stoked to build a company the way we want to.. making the decisions we feel are right. Yvon Chouinard wrote a book called 'Let My People Go Surfing' that was really inspirational to us.

Awesome, reading now. Love the new name.

Hey man, would love any ideas on how to get the word out!

Thank you so much! So awesome to have so many people genuinely supportive of what we're working on!

Great Q/A! We're big fans of James Perse and a bunch of the other brands listed. Biggest complaint for JP is that nothing they make is athletic fit and downsizing doesn't work well with length.

You know a lot about cotton; want to chat? :)

I definitely agree -- needing a logo on your shirt to make a statement is a statement in itself.