A design Francisco Reyes Jr. made out of boredom got away from him. The American flag, redrawn as a circus tent. It sat in his head for months, he drew it in an afternoon, and now it is on Etsy under other people’s names.

That is where part two starts, and it turns into the clearest account of how a creative career actually compounds that I have had on this show.

The LA Galaxy passed on him because his lettering read as cholo. That no led to LAFC, which led to the Kings, which led to Manchester City, which led to the Seattle Sounders — every one of them because somebody saw the last.

He walks through how a Chargers and Pepsi fee became the number he has negotiated from ever since, how donating shirt money put him in the room with CHIRLA, why the fastest way to not get a collaboration is to ask for one, and the part his parents played — the same people who signed him up for art school and then told him at 25 to go learn welding.

It ends on why he refused to print a t-shirt for two years, and what happened to his work once big-box retail started writing the brief.

CHAPTERS
0:00 Cold open
0:34 Intro, and Part 1 Recap
01:57 Why the work feels dark right now
04:44 The flag art everyone is stealing
07:51 Where the circus flag art idea came from
10:19 Collaborating with the Seattle Sounders
10:39 Post your work you never know who’s looking
11:51 The Sports Team that said No
13:03 Clippers, Chargers, LAFC, Kings, Man City
15:41 That’s my new baseline
16:40 Pricing a poster versus a collection
17:29 Designing CHIRLA’s 40th anniversary
19:58 Immigrant parents and permission to make art
24:14 How much does it pay
25:09 From band dad to wearing every hat
26:50 What makes a collaboration worth doing
28:54 The fastest way to not get a collab
31:16 Why he runs the collab contest
32:11 Joe's Art Submission
33:09 Hiring creatives and getting out of their way
36:20 Logo fixes and design influencers
40:02 Quark, five undos, and the old days
41:26 Don’t burn the spot analogy
42:20 Don't start a brand selling T-shirts
43:08 What retailers do to your brand
46:10 Next week Preview on Mark It 2 Me

GUEST INFO*
Francisco Reyes Jr. is a Los Angeles artist and designer working as Never Made. After eleven years at Shepard Fairey's Studio Number One he went independent, and now splits his time between Never Made and his design agency, Design Bedroom.

Website - https://nevermade.com/
Peace & Unity Tee as seen on Joe
https://nevermade.com/collections/shirts/products/peace-unity-tee-1

https://www.instagram.com/nevermade

*Host*
Joe Baron
Website https://www.brandedbaron.com/

If your brand still looks like everyone else in your category, that is usually a sourcing problem before it is a design problem.
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