Episode 32 // State Forty Eight Cofounder Mike Spangenberg on Arizona-inspired Products

Speaker 1: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios in Phoenix, Arizona. It’s time for Phoenix Business Radio, spotlighting the city’s best businesses and the people who lead them.

Mike Jones: Welcome, everybody to another episode of AZ Brandcast, where we talk about all sorts of awesome people and power of brand, and how we’re building great brands in the remarkable state of Arizona. I’m your cohost, Mike Jones and…

Male: Chris Stadler.

Mike Jones: Yeah. I’m really excited about today because we’ve got State Forty Eight on the show. I think for me this has been, I don’t know if it’s a long time coming, you’ve always been in my radar. We’ve got Mike Spangenberg, one of the co-founders, right?

M Spangenberg: Yup.

Mike Jones: And co-owner of the brand and you guys have this awesome apparel line that you’ve put together that highlights and celebrates everything about Arizona. I can’t wait to dig in more and talk more about some of this fun really cool stuff you guys are doing. Just a little bit more about the brand from this little write up they’ve got, which I think is a really helpful way to summarize who they are.

Mike Jones: “State Forty Eight apparel was born out of a shared passion and appreciation for the great state of Arizona,” which got me immediately. “More than just an apparel line, State Forty Eight represents a life style, a sense of community, and is an expression of pride. From sports fans and outdoor explorers to the more fashion-forward, the home-grown brand offers gear for all that is both stylish and comfortable. And above all else though, State Forty Eight is about redefining the status-quo, and inspiring others to rise up, and stand for something they believe in.” Mike, you’re the co-founder, you started this thing with your two other co-founders, right?

M Spangenberg: Yup, yup.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. We’ll dig into that and the history, and your history here in Arizona, I’m excited to talk more about that. But first, I thought we would do a little shout out for our sponsor, Conscious Capitalism Arizona. Chris, you want to do our call out?

Male: Of course. Yeah, Conscious Capitalism are our pals.

Mike Jones: They are.

Male: This local association is on a mission to share with the whole world how doing good in your business is just good business. This local chapter of Conscious Capitalism Incorporated hosts tons of local events and provides resources for business leaders to instill a higher purpose in their company and engage all their stakeholders. Want to be conscious? Don’t know how? Get in touch at consciouscapitalismaz.com. Mike, are you involved in CCAZ?

Mike Jones: Yeah, a little bit. Yeah, they sucked me in recently, so I’m now on the leadership team of theirs on a chapter.

Male: Yeah. I act I don’t know but [crosstalk 00:02:38], I totally know.

Mike Jones: Yeah, you totally know. You’re in the know, Chris.

Male: Yes, totally.

Mike Jones: Yeah, so now that’s been awesome. I think, I’ve been involved in the chapter for now three years almost? As a member, as a corporate sponsor, and now one of the leaders on the team, and on the board. I’m really excited for the next chapter of the chapter as we work on planning out the next 12-18 months of what we’re going to be doing from events and hopefully some really cool initiatives to really spread the word about Conscious Capitalism here in the state of Arizona and how businesses really can think about their business beyond just profit and money.

Mike Jones: Really think about how they can have an impact on all their stakeholders and really make it a win, win, win. Not just for the ownership or the shareholders but really for employees, and staff, and vendors, and ultimately customers. Making sure that everybody is feeling the love through business.

Male: Yeah and after the big annual conference, I feel we’re all kind of like-

Mike Jones: We’re all energized.

Male: Yeah, we’re energized and ready to get that going again, so exciting stuff.

Mike Jones: Yeah. We’ve got a lot of cool stuff coming up that will be getting announced very soon. Definitely hop on the website consciouscapitalismaz.com and find out more about what’s coming. Get signed up on the newsletter, it’s a great way to stay in the loop. Mike, you’re the main reason why we’re all here, so I wanted to swing it back to you. Yeah, thanks for coming on the show today. I’m really excited that you’re here.

M Spangenberg: Yeah, it’s always an honor to be here and talk about the brand.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. I think Chris has… you have an icebreaker-

Speaker 1: I do have an icebreaker.

Mike Jones: … to get us going and then we’ll jump into some of your history, the story behind State Forty Eight and what you guys are working on, so.

Male: State Forty Eight is an apparel brand, right?

M Spangenberg: Correct.

Mike Jones: That’s the category you put it in?

Male: So, what is everybody including Mike and me and the sound engineer, she wants to speak to this, your favorite wardrobe malfunction?

M Spangenberg: That’s a great question.

Male: Can anybody hear her laughing and you might hear the sound engineer laughing.

M Spangenberg: I don’t even know if I have one.

Male: I got one-

Mike Jones: Okay. Go Chris.

Male: And, maybe it’ll inspire you guys

Mike Jones: Start us off. You’ve got me coughing with that one, it’s was too funny.

Male: All right. In Oregon, there’s this Umpqua River and at the summer time they dam up the north and anybody who has a house on that part of the Umpqua River has basically a lake river. It’s slow moving and so my buddy, Toby, had a boat. We’d take the tube out, right? The tube and you’d hold on to it and he would try with all his might to scrape you off of it with the water, right? And, I would try with all my might to hold on and not let him scrape me off, you know. One time he was doing an awesome job. I was doing an awesome job holding on. My shorts, however, and underwear.

Mike Jones: Oh no.

Male: Didn’t do such a great job of holding on. So I was upside down, being dragged upside down. I felt it go off my toe, that last little hold that it could have and it got lost in the [inaudible 00:05:49] River. Luckily, we got back to Toby’s house and he brought me out some old pairs of cutoffs and so I was able to-

Mike Jones: Very stylish, yeah.

Male: I was able to arrive home with my… What do you call it, that you lose when something that happens? Whatever it was it was intact.

Mike Jones: Your pride?

Male: Pride, let’s go with that.

Mike Jones: Your sense of-

Male: Sure, my pride was-

Mike Jones: Piety? I don’t know.

Male: And sense of piety, yeah. Now that you mentioned. I haven’t thought of it that way before. All right, who else has one now, who is inspired by my story?

M Spangenberg: I don’t think I have one. I remember in elementary school when Criss Cross was popular?

Male: Yeah.

M Spangenberg: I was wearing the outfit backwards but besides, I don’t think I had a malfunction.

Male: That was a wardrobe misappropriation.

M Spangenberg: You definitely had to drop everything to go to the restroom but besides that, I don’t think there was a malfunction.

Mike Jones: That was a sacrifice you had to make to, you know.

M Spangenberg: To be cool.

Male: I guess with skill and practice you could do number two a little easier. If you got good at it.

M Spangenberg: I guess so.

Male: I may be crossing the line. Okay, let’s move on.

Mike Jones: You got the signal, didn’t you.

Male: I think our sound engineer is the only adult here.

Mike Jones: I don’t know if I have an epic malfunction. I have embarrassing moments or moments of like, maybe that wasn’t the best choice.

Male: Let’s just go with that.

Mike Jones: Mike has just reminded me of my obsession with wearing ridiculous stuff. Especially freshman year of high school when you’re like, you’re the low man on the totem pole just trying to make a statement, show your own colors. I did all sorts of stupid things. I bought big ol orange parachute pants and wore those for three months straight.

Male: Nice.

Mike Jones: But I think my favorite was a friend of, my parents gave them a suit. A three piece gray, a really nice gray pinstripe suit and they gave it down to me. Sort of like, “Michael needs a suit,” and the guy that loaned it was just a hair shorter than me. I was like, “Screw it, I’m doing it,” and I wore that thing for a whole week straight with red converse shoes every day to school. I was the only kid campus wearing a suit.

Male: You were in Napoleon Dynamite.

Mike Jones: I was totally Napoleon Dynamite.

Male: Awesome.

Mike Jones: Without the dance moves. I don’t know if that makes me any-

Male: Do you have pictures?

Mike Jones: Probably not. I’m sure I burned those. It was pre-digital era, so.

Male: Darn it.

Mike Jones: Yeah. Make sure that stuff never sees the light of day.

Male: Understandable.

Mike Jones: I’m still wearing red shoes though.

Male: Yeah, you are.

Mike Jones: I can’t get way.

Male: Our first real question though.

M Spangenberg: Yeah.

Male: A real question. The other ones are real. Why did you start the company and would it have worked with State Forty Seven?

M Spangenberg: It’s funny you bring up State Forty Seven because I literally just had to respond to something I saw on the Internet yesterday of someone saying, “State Forty Eight is wrong. It actually is State Forty Seven,” which is not a fact but it was pretty interesting.

Mike Jones: That’s interesting.

M Spangenberg: But to your original question, I was born and raised here in Arizona, Chandler specifically and my other partners, who are two younger brothers, are two brothers were big sports fans. Stephen and I, My dad was our Tee-ball coach. I never thought we’d be in business together but we had the share of passion of sports and obviously in Arizona. We used to go to Cardinal Games at Sun Devil Stadium and most of the fans were the opposing fans and that used to drive me crazy. Tying into sports, it was just like, “Why do we not have anything out here representing Arizona in a cool way? I mean, there’s a reason why so many people live here. It’s very diverse, we have so many people from all over.”

M Spangenberg: The only thing back then was the three for 10, excuse my French but crappy Walgreens shirts and that was not my definition of supporting Arizona in a positive and fashionable way. I always loved clothes. I think my favorite part about the summertime was going back to school shopping. I was picking out my clothes, I always had… and deep down, not to be corny or anything, but I always knew I was meant to be on his planet to do something special.

M Spangenberg: Years later, it all came to fruition with the help of my two business partners but that was the whole goal. It’s just to represent Arizona in a positive, fashionable way that something at that time I would be proud to be wearing. A comfortable T-shirt back then, it was an afterthought to put a designed on a quality T-shirt and now it’s cool to see that’s the trend.

Mike Jones: Yeah. That’s awesome. Do you feel that sense of accomplishment and just seeing your shirts, and your designs out there, and your brand being represented?

M Spangenberg: It’s unbelievable. I mean, with the partnerships we’ve landed. I mean seeing decals, being out in public and seeing people wear your shirts and you’re that creepy guy sometimes, “Hey, nice shirt,” and they’re like, “Who are you?” There’s so much love for everyone who supports it but it’s also tough being an entrepreneur. You never want to become complacent or… So, it’s always like, “This is awesome but what’s the next 10 things we’re going to do?” That’s one thing that I need to be better at. It’s just slowing down and appreciating everything but it’s an incredible, it’s a dream come true.

M Spangenberg: Honestly, I mean going to Cardinal games, again Sun Devil Stadium and all our sports teams and like, “I wonder what it would be like to work with a team or be on that level.” Now it’s the relationships we’ve built. You could talk to Torey Levullo and Steve Conn has become a good friend. That’s not to brag but it’s just to show it’s so much more than T-shirts and hats for us, and it’s really about representing your community in a positive way. Life is all about who you know and you build these incredible relationships with so many people.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. That’s really cool.

Male: But back to the original question.

Mike Jones: Yeah. Chris won’t let you escape.

Male: [crosstalk 00:11:38] Wouldn’t it have sucked if you were in New Mexico?

M Spangenberg: Yeah. I mean there’s things, I mean for probably more reasons than the name probably. No offense but yeah, I mean. Stephen, who’s my friend and business partner came out of the restroom and this is true story of how it officially started. I was writing down names in a notebook probably for a year of a clothing brand, nothing ever made sense or was like the aha moment. We were living together at the time. I was in the hotel industry, Stephanie was working with me in the hotel industry and he knew I wanted to start something.

M Spangenberg: He literally came out of the restroom brushing his teeth one day and I remember sitting at my desk and he says, “State Forty Eight,” and I’m here born and raised in Arizona, die-hard Arizona Fan, got Arizona tattoos and I’m like, “What’s State Forty Eight?” He was like, “Arizona is the 48th state.” It was like as soon as he said that, it was the aha moment, where it’s bam. We submitted for a trademark right away. His younger brother is a self-taught graphic designer and then we all just decided to start the company.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome.

M Spangenberg: It was pretty cool.

Mike Jones: That’s really cool how an idea can percolate for that long, right? You were stewing on it for at least a year just trying to come up with the name and then all of a sudden, it’s like that Aha moment that puts it all together and then you’re off to the races.

M Spangenberg: For sure and I just think that’s important in any industry or any business that you’re wanting to start. It’s like, “Okay, what problem are you solving?” And, at that time it was to represent Arizona with a clothing brand and also like what is… I would ask friends and family, I was like, “What do you think about this name?” And it was like, “It’s cool, you know.” But when you would say, “State Forty Eight,” it was like bam, you knew you had something special, so I think that’s just any advice to give to anyone. Make sure it really feels special and good.

Male: Yeah. We threw around this idea around the office when we were talking about names and stuff for different things and there’s a different… It gets floated around in a lot of branding circles around this idea of the 33, which is a reference to Rolling Rock, the beer company. They have a number 33 that’s on their labels. It’s just in the corner, this little badge.

Male: The whole thing is that that became this conversation point for a lot of people who were drinking Rolling Rock. Like “Oh, what’s that 33? What does that mean?” And come to find out, it means nothing. It’s just this sense of magic that you can instill and you can almost feel it when you say that name like, “State Forty Eight,” and there’s like, “Ooh, what’s that? I wanted to know more.” There’s the magic to it, there’s a little bit of appeal and a little mystery and you’re like, “I want to unpack that.”

M Spangenberg: Yeah. I mean, we’ve been in business six years and remember when we first started, we’d sell anywhere possible, whether it’s events on Mill Avenue or first Fridays before it was cool and it was always like… and you still get that today, where people see the logo on a shirt. They have that dazed look or confused look like, “Man, that’s really cool.” Well, what is it? It’s so powerful word of mouth and starting conversations. Like you said that’s the goal. It’s like “Wait, when I’m going on vacation I’m packing State Forty Eight or my Cardinals gear or Suns gear because I’m proud to represent where I’m from.”

M Spangenberg: I think it just become such a conversation starter. Literally, I hear this all the time, where people all around the world in our shirts and on vacations or whatever, and you’re in another airport and someone is like, “Hey, where…” and then it starts a conversation, “Oh yeah, I’m from Arizona.” That’s what’s beautiful about starting something and really having meaning behind it.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. That’s really cool.

Male: When I see State Forty Eight, I don’t think like Silicon Valley. I mean, I don’t think anything that’s related to… I’m not thinking Polish, I’m thinking a jeep. I’m just thinking like, what comes to mind? It’s Arizona stuff, stuff that I love most about Arizona. It feels rugged and maybe it’s just because of who I’ve seen it on and the vehicle I’ve seen the sticker on and stuff that, but to me it’s inspiring in that way. We’re always wondering, “What is Arizona’s brand?” You know and it starts to feel like it takes shape a little bit around that, which is, yeah.

M Spangenberg: Well, our brand message is Clothing for all inspired by Arizona and that’s pretty straight forward. We want whether we’d make [inaudible 00:16:05], our grandparents. Whoever wears it. We support everyone and that’s what our biggest messages is. It’s like we really do want to showcase love in a positive way. Unfortunately, there’s so much negativity in this world and we just want to stay positive and support everyone as much as possible and literally anyone can wear our shirts or hats.

Mike Jones: Yeah. Unless you’re from State Forty Seven.

M Spangenberg: Yeah, [crosstalk 00:16:26].

Mike Jones: Yeah, we can’t have that.

M Spangenberg: We welcome everyone though, so.

Male: You can defect to Arizona.

M Spangenberg: It’s true. I mean, my family was born and raised in New York. They came out to go to ASU and I was born here. My dad is a die-hard Diamondback fan and it just happens and so many people that do move here really love where they’re from now and call this their new home. I think that’s part of our demo. The cool part is now you have generations growing up here, finally but now you have so many people that have been here 10 plus years and are like, “ This is home. You know, I’m going to represent where I’m from.”

Mike Jones: Yeah. That’s awesome. What’s the next one.

Male: It’s about community. What does community mean to State Forty Eight because you guys talk a lot about how that’s important to you and I think especially in the context of Arizona?

M Spangenberg: Yeah. I think it goes back to again, what we want people to know about our brand, it’s just much more than T-shirts and hats. We don’t want to be that brand. Of course, we’re a for-profit business, we have to sell products but we don’t want to be known as just pushing products on people’s face. The reason for that is like… or to answer your question about community, it’s so rewarding to be involved in our community and what separates us from any different clothing brand. There could be a million better designers or business people than us but I think, what I know is our niche and what we take pride on is relationships.

M Spangenberg: Prime examples are the collaborations that if you check out our social media, you’ll see almost every other post is about a collaboration with a different organization, non-profit, a brewery, a sports team and that’s just… With our ultimate goal to be that recognized brand of Arizona, it’s been incredible that so many organizations want to be a part of what we’re doing and they want to make team shirts for their… Like Taco Bell, for example, they just did 600 shirts to bring to their conference in California for everyone here in Arizona to show off that sense of pride.

Mike Jones: That’s so awesome.

M Spangenberg: I think it’s just so cool that people want to be associated with our brand big brand, small brand, it doesn’t matter. That’s what community means to us and we do so many tie backs and Arizona Humane Society. We work with them, where $5 per shirt goes back to the foundation. We work with Luis Gonzalez and his Hometown Heroes, which helps or supports first responders in Arizona.

M Spangenberg: There’s so many different causes we do and unfortunately, we can’t donate all the money we want to but with revenue sharing model that we have on some of these shirts it allows us to. Even bigger than that, it’s about the awareness part and social and anyone who works with us, we’re going to promote them in any possible way. Again, it’s just educating people on different causes and just showing love.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. Do you have maybe one or two stories from that of a brand that you guys got to work with that really just made a deep impact for you?

M Spangenberg: 100%. Our first big collaboration and game changer for our brand was working with Bruce Ariens. The former Cardinals head coach, which we still work with today. How that came about is a relationship. We did Phoenix Fashion Week. It was an emerging designer bootcamp. Long Story Short, the executive director connected us with Jake Arians, who was Bruce Arians’s son. Again, we’ve always wanted to make sports designs and so on and at that time 2014, it was like the year into NBA was first here and he’s really becoming that popular coach and that cool guy and so, we wanted to make a designed for him.

M Spangenberg: We did a silhouette of BA. The next thing, they absolutely love the shirt. The cardinals went [inaudible 00:20:08], we couldn’t keep the shirts in stock. Again, we’re still working with him today because again, it’s so much more than… Even though he is with Tampa now but the foundation that it benefits is the Ariens Family Foundation, which helps neglected children. Everyone deserves a good upbringing and it’s so much more powerful than again selling products.

M Spangenberg: Even today, I think we’ve raised over $50,000 not only in dollars but product and to give back to that. It has been our most successful collaboration but they’re like family now. I was just at his son’s wedding in Georgia. That’s just the beauty of it all and that’s probably the best takeaway story so far. It’s just the impact you can make with kids’ lives or whatever the cause is by selling T-shirts.

Mike Jones: Yeah. That’s really cool.

Male: So you guys, I’ve been chomping at the bit to get to this question because what I really want to know, we’re always trying to find out is, well what is Arizona? What makes Arizona special or is it just a cheaper place to live, or is it just a place with just more sunshine? You guys talked about making a difference through Arizona inspired products. Does that mean that it’s like, “Well, we happen to be from Arizona, therefore we’re just going to?” Like Arizona will be the anchor or is there more to it later? What things about Arizona inspire clothing or a logo’s design?

M Spangenberg: It’s a great question and I think for me, it’s just like having the underdog mentality. Again, tying in sports it was weird to be an Arizona sports fan, right? And it drove me nuts and like, “Why are we not proud of where we’re from?” I think a lot of that is because, especially growing up here with so many transplants, which I think is a great thing but to… I mean really to answer your question, I think it wasn’t really fashionable and what drove me crazy too is that people would graduate college or high school and like, “I’m going to LA, I’m going to New York to go pursue my whatever I want to do,” fashion or…

M Spangenberg: It what doesn’t matter the industry. It was just people were leaving here to go do something because they didn’t feel like this was the state of opportunity and I think now it’s evident that… I mean, look how many big organizations and Fortune 500 companies are moving to Arizona and yes, pricing comes in but I just think it’s… I’m biased but it’s the place to be. It’s affordable, you’re surrounded by so many gray states. You can be in the valley and kind of have a city and then you can go up north and be … Everything is at your fingertips.

M Spangenberg: The biggest part of it is just a genuine passion, where I felt I was like the underdog representing Arizona and that just drove me crazy. I know there was other like-minded people like myself that wanted that same thing, and it was just cool to get ahead of the curve of local is very valuable and strong, and it’s only going to become stronger the more people are growing up here.

Male: The underdog thing struck me as kind of, out of what you said. There are a lot of things other place would share like you can go to big city, you can go to the mountains there are a lot of places that. The one thing that you said that struck me as really different from a lot of other places is that underdog mentality. It’s like “We’re from Arizona.” “I don’t know, where’s that?”

M Spangenberg: It wasn’t cool to be from Arizona back then. Not to interrupt, sorry but that’s where it all came from. It’s like California was cool and New York was cool like all this great… and don’t get me wrong nothing about just but it’s like, “This is where I’m from, so I want to make it cool.”

Male: Even when I moved here I was like, “Well, it’s close enough to California without actually being in California.”

M Spangenberg: That’s the thing. I mean, you go to San Diego in the summer time you see ASU shirts and you have A shirts everywhere. It is Arizona’s second home but I think that’s a beautiful thing. You’ve got Mexico and Colorado, I mean you’ve just got everything surrounding you, hop on a quick flight or drive. If you are itching at those other needs and water and all that good stuff you have but you have everything here in my opinion.

Male: Tell me more about that underdog thing though because I think there’s truth to that and when I heard that I was like, “No, there’s something there and I don’t know what it is yet but Mike is going to tell us.”

M Spangenberg: Yeah, I don’t know if… Again, I just think that.

Male: We can at least talk about it and we can play around with it a little bit.

M Spangenberg: Yeah. I mean I think it’s pretty straight forward. Again growing up here, when I was in high school and people would ask, “How many are from Arizona?” I’d be that one dude in the back raising my hand. I’d go speak to kids or whoever and like you got majority of the class and I think that’s something special. Now people really love being here because it’s also expanded so much. Don’t get me wrong, it probably wasn’t really that cool. I was just being biased of where I was from but now you see cities just developing. Downtown Phoenix used to be an afterthought.

M Spangenberg: You’d go there for a Sun’s game and even on the weekends it was a ghost mine, right? Seeing how much of that is developing and Chandler, where I grew up. That was definitely not the place to be and now that’s skyrocketing in real estate, and development downtown [inaudible 00:25:24]. I mean just everywhere is becoming so cool and you have just different pockets where you can experience different cultures and styles and whatever your interests are.

M Spangenberg: So yeah, I don’t know what else to really say about more of the underdog. It’s just like sports was a big part of it. Cardinals, for example, were the laughingstock and then to see it go to where it was and really establish a loyal following and customer. That’s what we took pride on and just representing that and not being like… Well, it wasn’t a trendy thing to do to represent your sports teams in your city here.

Male: Because a lot of times underdogs… Sorry, a faced away from the mic. A lot of times the underdogs are like, there’s something that it does to you. There’s qualities that come out when you’re the underdog. I’m thinking of sports teams and stuff, right? I like being the underdog, I like being the one who’s like… If I’m expected to win, it’s like, “Eh crap.” Like, “Now where do I go?” Right?

M Spangenberg: Yeah.

Male: If they’re like, yeah, you’re going to get killed you know. It’s like, “No, I’m actually not going to get killed,” and then it’s a lot of fun to go out there and prove things, right?

M Spangenberg: Yeah. I mean, I’ve been a season ticket holder since the last year at Sun Devil, where the cardinals played and then that year when the Cardinals went to Super Bowl, I still remember to this day. I mean I still get chills talking about it but being at the NFC championship game, where the Cardinals beat the Eagles to go to Super Bowl. It’s crazy what sports can do to you, but it just brings so much passion and so much energy out.

M Spangenberg: People that know me are like, “Do you have enough pulse?” Because I’m very calm with work or. But when I’m at a sports game, it’s a whole new me because it’s just so much more inside and I might sound corny but it’s just I think anyone that’s a sports fan can relate to it. Again and that’s not just about sports, it’s just about Arizona in general. Like seen so much happening here, it brings a sense of pride to you.

Male: It’s almost like you guys need to do a line of shirts that’s underdog themed. Seriously, I mean think about it. What you’re saying rings true and it’s almost like there is this and I’m wondering if there is this feeling out there with business, with people just like, “Yeah, we’re kind of like the sleeping. Like we’re waiting for our time,” and with businesses growing and finding new opportunities here and stuff. It’s almost like there’s this… I don’t know if there’s a scrappiness that comes with that that’s actually happening or if that’s just something that, you know?

M Spangenberg: Yeah. No, I’d say that was totally real. I mean, especially talking and getting to know a lot of our community and running our social media. You feel that same sense of passion and I think that’s why our community has become so strong, especially State Forty Eight community. The people that are supporting us is that they feel that passion from us and they also want to show off that pride. It’s that competition with other states.

M Spangenberg: It’s just friendly like, “Hey, my state is better than yours,” and just like when you see musicians and stuff representing in like a Jersey or whatever, you’re like, “Man, that’s cool.” It would never have been thought of, of someone representing a Sun’s jersey or a [inaudible 00:28:44] jersey and now you just see it more and more. I’ve been hearing more people, especially moving here for summer home or not summer homes but just off season homes and such. Like there’s just so much cool stuff going on.

Male: It’s like the cowboy mentality, I feel like coming out, like individual. Even the cactus in the desert, they look they’re giving you the middle finger.

M Spangenberg: Yeah. It’s funny you say that.

Male: It’s just like, “We’re going to survive anyway.”

M Spangenberg: It’s true. My aunt, the first time she visited here, she was like, “Why are they all flipping me off?” And people go nuts for cactus too on shirts or hats or whatever it is but it’s funny.

Mike Jones: It’s interesting thinking back the history of Arizona and we’re the last of the continental United States like states to be admitted into the union. The only two states younger than Arizona are Alaska and Hawaii. We are intrinsically, I think just as a community we’re younger, especially if you talk about the Phoenix Metro area. Phoenix hasn’t been around anywhere near as long as like New York or a lot of East Coast cities or even in LA or San Francisco. I think there is this kind of underdog. Some of that might be, “Hey, we just haven’t been around as long and.”

M Spangenberg: 100%. I mean that’s, again to your question of like what’s the… So many people knock Arizona for being fair weather fans but it’s like okay will compare us to a New York or a Chicago whatever. When you had all this history of generation of like, “This is where I’m from.” Like of course but even I think it’s even more alarming and more awesome to know that all these people from all these great cities are moving here because they want to live here and enjoy the weather, and enjoy the cost of living and just everything going on here. I think that says a lot about who we are and how diverse we are now, open we are and yup.

Mike Jones: Well and the idea of fair weather fans when it’s like a hundred and whatever degrees has a totally different meaning [inaudible 00:30:48].

M Spangenberg: At least Chase Field has nice AC.

Mike Jones: Yes.

Male: Yeah.

Mike Jones: It’s true.

Male: How many other baseball parks have air conditioning, need air conditioning and football, we have air conditioning where they Cardinals play.

M Spangenberg: Yeah. I mean, I think it’s more of a trend now but a lot of them, this is the best time of year for weather, so they get to enjoy that where us it’s the exact opposite.

Mike Jones: Well, I think that was one of the cool things about Chase Stadium was, or back when it was Bank One Ballpark and they originally designed it to have that retractable roof, and that was a big deal because it’s like, “Hey, you can enjoy a game of baseball here year round if you have that set up.”

M Spangenberg: Yeah, you better have a roof on it’s all for the team. Although, this summer has been by far the best summer-

Mike Jones: It’s been pretty easy.

Male: I know.

M Spangenberg: … since I’ve lived here.

Male: It’s right on and eased into summer, just it’s been okay.

M Spangenberg: I mean, it’s was low hundreds today.

Mike Jones: That’s crazy. It was actually nice out this morning when I left at like 7:00 so it’s cool.

Male: My family was here from Florida and my dad was like, “Yeah, how was it yesterday? Like hundred and whatever?” And I’m like, “I don’t know. I just like I assume it’s going to be in the triple digits,” and I get in my car and I drive to work and then I drive back. I mean, I don’t know.

M Spangenberg: Yeah, once it’s over 100 it’s all the same stuff. You don’t even care about looking at the 108, 109 whatever it might be.

Male: Yeah. It’s just hot.

Mike Jones: You just find air conditioning or find a pool, you could.

Male: Totally. Cool Yeah, so you talked about making a difference. I mean, we’ve talked a little bit about that already but how do you see that happening through the brand, and how are you guys maybe thinking about doing that as you grow?

M Spangenberg: Yeah. I think the biggest part again is just utilizing our platform. Not obviously all our collaborations are tiebacks but what we give the opportunity to is… so any co-branded design we do, it’s a lot of business to business transaction and hopefully, it turns into a longtime relationship but they buy a minimum of 100 shirts from us after we create a co-branding design, and the cool part about that is it allows them… The wholesale price we sell to them allows them to resell it and make much more of a profit than we are, so a lot of non-profits usually utilize that, schools. It gives them the option to do that and I think not only on the financial side is how we’re able to make a difference but just the awareness on social media.

M Spangenberg: I mean, for example, we started community impact days that we’re trying to do every month and that’s partnering with another local organization. We just had a very successful event with United Food Bank, which they did order some collaboration shirts, but the biggest focus was to get volunteers and we had over 250 volunteers for one day. Their goal was to pack 4,800 emergency bags, especially this time of year in summer when people need food every single day. The goal was to have two four-hour shifts with everyone we got there. Each shift only ended up being an hour. I mean that just goes-

Mike Jones: That’s awesome.

M Spangenberg: … such a long way and it’s just, again, that prime example of why it’s much more than just shirts and hats. It’s like, “Hey, use your platform, use your resources to really educate people,” because I think there’s so many people… Speaking of volunteering, there’s so many people who want to do good but they just don’t know where to get started and because they trust our brand we put it out there. “Hey, we have this great day,” [inaudible 00:34:20] Pizzeria, for example, they came in as a partner of ours and donate a bunch of pizza for everyone to eat and it was just an awesome day. That it was impactful and that you know you’re helping people. That’s just one example and that’s the goal, it’s just to be able to promote love.

Mike Jones: It’s awesome. You guys have a love shirt yet?

M Spangenberg: I know, I keep saying that. I don’t want to compete with #LoveUP.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. I know we’ve got one more question on the discussion guide, but I think there’s a couple of other things I wanted to ask and dig into. I want to hear a little bit more of how you guys got started. You’ve got two partners with you, you guys co-founded the company. How did that happened, what was the genesis for that? And then maybe, tell me a little bit about the trajectory, how has it gone? Like I’m sure it’s had ups and downs.

M Spangenberg: Oh yeah. Yeah, we could talk about that forever. So yeah, so the ultimate, the original idea was I wanted to create some of my own. I was stuck with names. Like I said, I shared with Stephan, who was… My dad was our tee ball coach, right? Never thought we’d have been in business together. He was working for me at the hotel actually. When he came up with the name, “Okay, perfect. Instead of, let’s just go do this together,” and then like, “Okay, we need a graphic designer.” Then Nick, who is a self-taught graphic originally wasn’t part of the plan. I really didn’t even get to know Nick.

M Spangenberg: Obviously, I knew Nick from hanging out with Stephen here and there, but never really got to know Nick until we went to business together, but we submitted our trademark and did everything the right way. Once we got that official in March of 2013, we had a buddy of mine who was doing screen printing and I got our main logo in 10 different color combinations. We probably got our first order of 100 shirts and our neighbors probably thought we were drug dealers because people kept coming inside in and out of our house.

M Spangenberg: Which is obviously it wasn’t true but were selling shirts everywhere and it was just so cool that people took a passion for it and we were doing. Our first launch event was at the old Tavern on Mill Avenue and we had literally hundreds of people there. The whole Mill Avenue was wearing State Forty Eight and we were like, “Okay, we have something special.” We all worked full-time jobs the first two years into it. That’s one thing I think people don’t realize is how much hard work and sacrifice, and capital it takes. We each invested $500 in this business and we’ve sold almost $4 million in shirts.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome.

M Spangenberg: You can do anything you put your mind to and takes a lot of [inaudible 00:36:49] the first two years, we didn’t take a dollar. We staggered how we went full-time, almost three years into it. Stephen went full-time, then Nick went full-time, then I went full-time. When you’re comfortable in your career or you’re making what you’re making, it’s much harder to go start from the bottom. We had to be smart about it and then we just kept growing and celebrating wins as we went.

M Spangenberg: Social was a big help for us. Like I mentioned earlier, we went through Phoenix Fashion Week which really taught us the business of fashion. Then we started to get into the retailers. I mean our first retailer that gave us a shot was here on the corner on Mill Avenue, which is no longer there. Right off Mill Avenue and then it’s just all relationships and again, I mentioned Bruce Ariens was a huge help. Gave us a ton of credibility. I mean our shirts ended up on Monday Night Football and just you were at a Cardinal games, I was with a Cardinal shirt.

M Spangenberg: Then the D-backs took notice and we we’re working with the Suns and it just keeps getting better and better and obviously, it takes a lot of hard work and you need people around you to help you. I think a big help from us at the beginning when you don’t have money and you don’t have all these resources is… Again, I was born and raised here, so you know, people, right? Like Dave, who’s our website manager, we grew up with. A sharp guy, this is his industry. [Jenic 00:38:08], who’s was our photographer. This is her industry, her passion. You find passionate people that believe in what you’re doing and also this is what they do for a living.

M Spangenberg: At the beginning for so long, it was extra side money for them, right? And, they just believed in it and now it’s cool. It’s turning into full-time roles and having more graphic designers. But yeah, the sky is the limit. I don’t even feel like we’re scratching the surface yet. Really just the goal is just continue to get our brand there and when you actually look at our customer database compared to how many people are living in Arizona. We’re not doing anything special yet, so the goal is just to create that brand, a recognized brand of Arizona and then big picture, have different divisions underneath that and really make this a powerful thing.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome.

Male: I noticed you talked about celebrating wins and so a lot of the brands we have on the podcast, they have pretty good cultures. MAC6 around here, I mean every we… I mean, we tend to just be lucky and have a lot of friends who have great cultures. Maybe you could talk a little bit about that because you mentioned it’s about relationships, you’ve mentioned love and then you just mentioned celebrating wins. I’m wondering what kind of culture do you guys have there at State Forty Eight?

M Spangenberg: Yeah and I could actually speak on the challenges part of that too because, like I mentioned earlier, you get so wrapped up into what’s next and the hustle. It’s like, “Yeah, that’s awesome. Okay, what are the next 10 thing?” I think what has really helped us and also having two business partners that are brothers, and we all three have different styles and interests, history, and career paths and such. It’s just, I think the key to that because we have our disagreements all the time.

M Spangenberg: At the beginning, it was very much of a pride thing when you’re younger, right? I’m 34 now, Stephen is 34 and I think Nick is 30. Even younger than that, when you’re first starting you get into so many heated arguments because you want it to be about your likes or whatever. Then we quickly realized that, “Hey, it’s not about us of course.” It’s about the customers. It’s about people that are supporting us and we can’t make decisions off of opinions, and feelings, and emotions and, “Hey, let’s just go off numbers,” right?

M Spangenberg: I think the key to solving all this and why we’ve improved along the way is communication and that’s one weekly meeting, where you don’t miss that for anything and just keeping. If you have frustrations, you’re venting that out and just kind of… Otherwise, if you hold that inside, it builds up and it gets nasty or so. On culture, we try to again bring passionate people that believe in what we’re doing and just showing appreciation, genuine appreciation. That should just…

M Spangenberg: I spent 15 years in the hotel industry. I loved working with people and I worked my way up to become a GM and I think that is a big strength that I have is that leading. Just again treating people with the respect they deserve and just making sure that appreciation is in there too. “Hey man, you kill on designs,” or, “Hey great… ” Just little things that just go a long way help us keep going.

Male: It’s a shot in the arm to hear regularly someone give you genuine good feedback like a good compliment on something you’re proud of.

M Spangenberg: Yeah and I’m guilty of, like especially… You know, I’m good with that with the team but Stephen and Nick, we’re definitely all guilty of not showing each other appreciation. Like, “Hey, that’s what you’re supposed to be doing,” or it’s like, “Good job.” That’s one thing we definitely don’t do a great job between us three and it’s acknowledging of all the hard work that’s going into it because we’re nothing, not only with the team but definitely us. That’s one area of opportunity for sure.

Male: Yeah. It’s easier, I think to tell people who kind of report to you and stuff because you know it’s your responsibility and you forget the other people laterally [crosstalk 00:42:04] that as well.

M Spangenberg: It’s so important too because if we’re not all on the same page, if we three who owners, if we’re not on the same page and their attitude goes a different way with someone else, than you start having issues on the culture side, right? I think it’s important for us to all be on the same page and just show that same appreciation.

Mike Jones: Yeah. I mean, kudos for making it this far. You know, six years with three owners. That’s an achievement. Not many that are able to do that.

M Spangenberg: It’s great. The more you connect with people and you’re like… I mean, I just met someone who was telling me, a very successful company that they’re buying out their brother and it just gets… business gets tricky and you got to stick with the facts. It’s harder and that’s a challenge that we face too, is that it’s hard to have honest conversations with them because there’s feelings involved. It’s easier and as my background of having those honest connections and conversations with a team member because they’re not invested in it such as an ownership, right?

Male: Yup.

M Spangenberg: Because we’re equal, it’s just like, “Okay. Yeah, I appreciate what you’re saying but I just don’t need to listen to what you’re saying,.” It could be that, so it can get a little tricky.

Male: Yeah. I was going to ask about that because that’s the hard part, right? Is knowing how to get people to say that last bit that they need to say. You feel like it’s unresolved. Like how do you get to that or is that even important? I don’t know.

M Spangenberg: Yeah. I think it’s still like to be frank, there’s still things that I don’t say that need to be said and it’s just because you’re so worried about, you have compassion and just you don’t want to. But that’s the tough part, is you’ve got to separate it in business and that’s why any advice I would give too is just make sure you’re choosing your partners correctly. That’s not saying I didn’t or anything like that but just know that it’s very, very hard to work with family and friends but it also could be very rewarding too.

Mike Jones: Yeah. I definitely, I feel that. I’ve got two business partners in my business and we were friends long before we were business partners, and I think in some ways that’s actually benefited us in that we’ve always had this friends first mentality to how we approach stuff. That no matter how bad it gets or how much we disagree with each other on maybe a decision and it’s like, “Hey, we’re going to care for each other first as people, as friends and then the business stuff we’ll figure that out, we’ll work through it.”

M Spangenberg: I think if you have their respect everything is going to work itself out but Stephen and Nick are like best friends. Stephen, we used to go to [inaudible 00:44:44]. Just being honest, we’re not friends anymore. Like it’s just become like a business relation. That is kind of sad but it’s just what the reality of what things happen. Like you work together so often or maybe you’re frustrated, it’s like I don’t… The last thing you want to do is go hang out with that person.

M Spangenberg: It’s different too, like your interests. I love business, I could talk about work 24/7, I can work seven days a week. They all have their different interests and if we’re around each other, naturally you’re going to talk about work and maybe they don’t want to hear me talk. It’s just what the reality of things happen when you work with friends and family.

Mike Jones: Yup. No, that’s tricky.

Male: You guys need to go do karaoke or something.

Mike Jones: It’s a team retreat [crosstalk 00:45:25].

Male: As long as you can’t sing. That’s the special part is where you just can’t sing and you still do Karaoke that tells you you’re cool.

M Spangenberg: It would be very much a bonding situation.

Male: Especially, if you did like, I don’t know, like the Humpty Dance. It’s like a dump song.

Mike Jones: There are some good dumb songs out there.

Male: Yeah. I’m thinking the Macarena or something. The Macarena, yes. Totally.

M Spangenberg: Some too funny.

Mike Jones: The first thing that popped in my head was that Friday song that was a huge hit. What was that like five, six years ago or something?

Male: The Friday song?

Mike Jones: Yeah, terrible like.

M Spangenberg: Sing it because I don’t know.

Mike Jones: Don’t, no. This isn’t karaoke, this a podcast. Yeah, it was just a terrible pop song. It was like a YouTube thing, it went around for a while. It’s pretty viral. It was pretty bad.

Male: Oh Man. Yeah, there were some good ones. There are some good candidates out there.

Mike Jones: I just feel like if it’s a team like a company thing, you got to sing something about the weekend, right?

Male: Yeah.

Mike Jones: That just feels appropriate. It’s what we’re all working for, right?

Male: Are we brainstorming for a retreat this weekend, Mike?

Mike Jones: No. That’s already set in stone, we are not doing karaoke. I would not subject you guys to that.

M Spangenberg: Where are you guys headed?

Mike Jones: We’re going to a little staycation type retreat here. We rented an Airbnb here in Tempe and hit the pool. We’ve got a couple of other fun activities, we’ll do some ax throwing. I’m excited to try that out.

Male: I know you were stoked when you had to [inaudible 00:46:51] waiver?

Mike Jones: You had to send a waiver that you were-

Male: Ax throwing is cool. When you have to sign a waiver it’s like, “Oh, this is going to be really cool.”

Mike Jones: And, we’ll do some work too. We’ve got some big agenda items to work through, so it’ll be good, I’m excited. It’s going to be the first time we’ve really ever done that with the entire team. I’ve done it with my partners before. We do our partner retreats but we haven’t done it with the whole team.

M Spangenberg: How big a team.

Mike Jones: This time around with everybody, I think we’ll be about eight, seven. Seven, eight.

M Spangenberg: Sweet.

Mike Jones: I mean, we’ve got a bunch of remote people too who hop in on different projects.

Male: Yeah, we’ll eventually figure that out, how to.

Mike Jones: Yeah. We haven’t quite figured out how to do the… This is more of the retreat and then we’ll figure out like an everybody remote retreat. We’ll hop on Zoom for a day or something.

Male: Yeah and we may be only eight but we do the work of 16.

Mike Jones: Yeah, there-

M Spangenberg: I feel you there. We still wear a lot of different hats, so I feel you.

Mike Jones: Yup, definitely wearing a lot of hats.

Male: What’s the ultimate vision for you guys?

M Spangenberg: Yeah, I love that. Really, it’s just first and foremost acquire more customers, people learn about us but really to be that recognized brand and then to have those different entities underneath it. I mean, a media division, a non-profit different things like that. [inaudible 00:48:12], a travel group that might be coming, where you partner with baller sports teams and you arrange these great road trips for other people.

M Spangenberg: It’s all these different opportunities and it’s just again, to build it up where you can always be much more in T-shirts and hats and on the actual apparel side, having different lines maybe it’s organic, maybe it’s more fashion forward. Just making sure we hit all the most… But yeah, just a lot of exciting things up upcoming and even different license deals. I mean, we have a co-branded credit card coming out with OneAZ.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. Yeah, I saw you guys were doing a lot with them.

Male: That’s a cool idea.

M Spangenberg: Yeah, so things like that where you can create revenue share and a revenue stream off a… Big picture, I would love to have a State Forty Eight license plate.

Mike Jones: Yeah. Now we’re talking.

M Spangenberg: [inaudible 00:49:01] work through [inaudible 00:49:03] on that one. I know there’s a lot of hurdles for that.

Mike Jones: Just a couple.

M Spangenberg: I mean that’s the thing. You just put it out there, you build it up and opportunities just keep coming. It obviously takes a lot of hard work and connections, and relationships but we’re just going to keep trucking away.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. That’s very cool.

Male: I feel like you should just totally overshoot the whole [inaudible 00:49:23] thing and just hack. Find a good hacker and just hack the signs. Just for the signs, the freeway signs?

M Spangenberg: No, no, no those are fine.

Male: But yeah, you could hack the. Can you get a digital license plate, what are you talking about Mike, are you talking-

Mike Jones: The digital license plate.

Male: … or you, yeah.

Mike Jones: That would be-

Male: They don’t have those?

Mike Jones: No.

Male: Yeah. Okay, yeah.

Mike Jones: We’re not ready for that yet.

Male: No.

Mike Jones: We can’t even get driverless cars yet. We can’t get digital license plates.

Male: Yeah. We need the flying cars first and the self-driving cars.

Mike Jones: Although, I’ve seen hover boards, so we’re getting there.

Male: Yeah.

Mike Jones: We’re getting there. Do you have any cool events or projects coming up that you want to plug or give a shout out to, let people know about?

M Spangenberg: No. I mean we always got something going on. We don’t do a ton of different events. We do more of like these partnerships and hoping to land a Cardinals player collaboration coming soon, so that would be exciting. But I would say, if anyone wants to learn more about us, check us out on social media. It’s at @StateFortyEight all spelled out, statefortyeight.com for our website but that’s where we’re very active. I mean, usually one or two a day at least on the feed and we’ve got stories, nothing again where again we’re going to annoy you. Or if you want to check us out on the newsletter too, you can join us there but that’s where we try to share everything but there’s always something going on.

Mike Jones: That’s awesome. Yeah, it seems you guys are pretty active based on everything I’ve seen and just trying to keep up and it’s awesome.

M Spangenberg: Yeah. It’s just it’s very exciting, we’re taking over the Rattlers merchandise and co-branding-

Mike Jones: That’s awesome.

M Spangenberg: Rising is doing awesome and we work with them, so sports teams are hitting on all cylinders. Obviously, we work with the Diamondbacks and so.

Male: Where does Phoenix Rising play?

M Spangenberg: Right there at Tempe, like Tempe marketplace there, right off the 202. It’s where everyone wanted to play [inaudible 00:51:12] Stadium. But yeah, hopefully that can get [inaudible 00:51:16] soon too and I think-

Male: That would be huge.

M Spangenberg: I mean the engagement and the fans, the loyalty they already get. That is an outdoor stadium in summer time and 100 less degrees and they’re selling out.

Male: Dude, that’s what I was wondering like they play in that heat?

M Spangenberg: I mean, it’s usually like 7:30 start so. I mean it gets-

Mike Jones: That still could be like 95.

M Spangenberg: Yeah, it’s true but for sure, it’s just such a fun and they’re winning they’re first place. You guys all know winning solves all those problems but it’s really become the cool place to be. I don’t know if you’ve heard-

Male: Come to my stadium, it’s 110 degrees. Like we know your home games.

M Spangenberg: I don’t know if you’ve heard of their popular dollar beer nights on Friday?

Mike Jones: No.

M Spangenberg: They’re [inaudible 00:52:00] this year with dollar beer nights and-

Male: Wait, they’re [inaudible 00:52:03] on dollar beer nights?

M Spangenberg: Yeah, every Friday. Well, every Friday they have a game they do dollar beer nights and so-

Male: But they’re [inaudible 00:52:10] and it’s correlated with dollar beer night?

M Spangenberg: Yeah.

Male: Yeah, something is going on.

M Spangenberg: They’re first place but they have like-

Mike Jones: [crosstalk 00:52:16] something in the beer.

Male: [crosstalk 00:52:17] that’s why they win. Corelation is causation.

M Spangenberg: Yeah, but I mean it’s just new partnerships always coming out and it’s just exciting to see what’s next.

Mike Jones: Yeah, that’s awesome. Cool. Thank you so much Mike. This was an awesome great conversation.

Male: Are we done already?

Mike Jones: Yeah, we’re done.

Male: What?

Mike Jones: I know, it flew by.

M Spangenberg: Yeah. Thanks for having me guys.

Male: I still want to talk more about beer and.

Mike Jones: We’re definitely going to be keeping tabs on State Forty Eight. I don’t know, I’m racking my brain, I’ve got all sorts of ideas of collaborations and I’ll talk to you later about this and we’ve got a couple, I think some might be interesting. But yeah, I just want to thank everybody for hanging out and listening to the AZ Brandcast. Where again, we delve into the makings of remarkable brands here in the great State of Arizona.

Male: Like State Forty Eight.

Mike Jones: Like State Forty Eight. I don’t know how much more Arizona you can get than that brand, it’s awesome. I want to thank everybody for joining us. If you’d like to know more about AZ Brandcast or check out any of our past episodes, check us out on AZ Brandcast remarkablecast.com or find us on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play anywhere that you like to download your podcasts we’re probably there and if we’re not, give us a shout out on the website and let us know, so we can get up wherever you like to get your podcasts.

Mike Jones: Also, sign up for our newsletter. We’ve got tons of great content on the website and we love pushing that out to people, and if you want to know more about Chris or myself, you can find out more about us on the website as well remarkablecast.com. A huge thank you and shout out to our producer Karen of Phoenix Business RadioX and of course, our gracious host at MAC6 and our awesome sponsors at Conscious Capitalism, Arizona who makes sure that this gets to happen every month. I’m really excited to partner with them on that and don’t forget everybody, you are remarkable.

Male: I thought we’d do it at the same time.

Mike Jones: You are remarkable.