When was the company founded?
June 9, 2009
Names of founders and ages?
Jon Caballero, 24
Justin Mody, 24
Paolo Sagullo, 25
Asif Razvi, 24
Jillian Fortin, 23
URL:
3KingsClothing
Tell us about the company:
A streetwear brand based out of Houston, Texas, 3Kings is focused on creating products with uncompromising style and quality. The label aims to distinguish itself from other brands through simple, clever designs conveying its core values – Pride, Power, and Prestige. 3Kings tirelessly strives to become a leader and influential player in local and global streetwear culture. The founders firmly believe that a talented team can accomplish vastly more than the individual. Strength lies not only in numbers, but in the ability to unite the best talent toward a common goal. Divided we fall. United three stand.
Currently 3Kings’ main products are premium t-shirts. Consumers can visit the company’s website at 3kingsclothing to make purchases online. The 3Kings team also maintains a blog, the purpose of which, according to them, is to help their consumers keep up with “all kinds of cool stuff related to fashion, sneakers, music, art, film and TV, food, water, potpourri, baby seals, and life in general.”
What makes the company unique in the clothing industry?
3Kings can be best classified as a streetwear brand. That being said, we feel that there are a few key elements that make 3Kings unique within the more streetwear fashion niche.
A major distinguishing factor is our approach to this venture as an actual business, and every step we take is a calculated business move. From our experience, it seems as though many of the start-up street wear brands lose sight of being a business and often times neglect managing the business side of things. Given our team’s background in various fields, we’re already trying to manage our books, pay taxes accordingly, etc. in preparation for the day that 3Kings Clothing is a full fledged business.
From a design standpoint, we believe our designs are original, and not terribly “gimmicky”. There is substance and a story behind each design. One of our goals in designing for shirts is making sure they have longevity. Trends will come and go and it’s easy to ride those waves…but a year or so from now, we want everyone who buys our shirts to be able to find it in their closet and say, “Damn this shirt is still fresh” (and of course go out and wear it!). Especially with t-shirts, that can be difficult because they are not cut and sewn, but we really feel we put forth the effort in creating shirts not just so they will sell, but also so that they will last.
Furthermore, our designs appeal to a larger audience than the typical streetwear enthusiast. Though we look up to the heavyweight brands in the streetwear game like The Hundreds, 10.Deep, Crooks and Castles, Undefeated, etc., and try to cater to the same market that these brands do, we do believe a broader audience can relate to our clothing and find it appealing. This statement is made from the feedback we’ve gotten since our website went live in early December. We have people into the streetwear culture buying our stuff, but we also have a lot of people that have no idea what street culture is still making purchases. We think that says a lot about the appeal of 3Kings.
Finally, there is the attention to detail. When we first started 3Kings Clothing, we wanted to make sure we did things right. Despite just being a t-shirt, there are several decisions that need to be made. It’s very easy in this current state of the economy to cut corners and get away with using inferior products. That being said, we feel that everything about our shirts, from the material and fit, to the print quality, and even the tags, is of very good quality. We don’t claim to be super high-end fashion, but we are very proud of the product we offer.
What are 3Kings future plans?
3Kings currently offers men’s t-shirts and will continue to do so, but in the near future we would like to add t-shirt’s for females. We also plan on having fitted baseball caps. Ultimately, our goal is to get in to the world of cut and sewn garments so that we can offer a whole line of clothing. From t-shirts to button-downs, pants to shoes, one day we hope 3Kings has the product line that most premium brands offer.
We also have plans to host an event this summer called KingCamp. KingCamp is a leadership camp geared towards youth between the ages of 9-15, focused on providing attendees with the resources needed to reach their goals in music, dance and media, as well as introduce them to mentor figures who have found significant success in those areas. 3Kings is currently in talks with prominent, upcoming companies in these particular fields and hopes to be able to release more information soon.
What was the start-up budget?
10,000 USD
