Dapper + Dash, a local company that repurposes vintage fabrics into new bow ties and other accessories, is celebrating its first anniversary this Friday.
The company will be holding a party from 7 to 11 p.m. at Hanny’s, a downtown restaurant that was once a historic men’s clothing store.
“I’m just excited to be around the people who have supported the company,” said Aaron Kimberlin, owner and founder of Dapper + Dash. “Right now, it’s really less about me. It’s more about them.”
Kimberlin was driven to create Dapper + Dash in honor of his grandfather, who owned a large collection of old neckties. However, while he was crafting the company, he was worried about how Phoenix would accept his product.
“We live in a state where the state tie is a bolo tie,” he said. “I was nervous to see how the city and metropolitan area would receive a bow tie.”
A year later, those fears are long gone, as Kimberlin and Dapper + Dash have become some of Phoenix’s most recognizable figures in new business. While the company’s merchandise is primarily sold online, four Phoenix and Tempe businesses permanently carry Dapper + Dash products, including central Phoenix’s Frances Vintage and Mercantile salon.
“Not a lot of local places try to invent a whole product,” said Shauna Thibault, one of Mercantile’s owners. “It’s such a new idea, a lot of people come in wanting one for themselves or their boyfriends or husbands.”
Kimberlin has also collaborated with many other Phoenix businesses and organizations, including Short Leash Hotdogs and the Epilepsy Foundation of Arizona.
Dapper + Dash’s success is spreading as it gains an increasing presence nationally.
“We sell more product out of state than in-state,” Kimberlin said. International sales are also increasing, he said.
Urban Outfitters contacted Dapper + Dash in December, leading to a temporary, “pop-up” store in the downtown Phoenix location of the national clothing chain.
“It’s been a great, crazy ride of a first year,” Kimberlin said.
The first anniversary party at Hanny’s will feature a pop-up store featuring Dapper + Dash merchandise, the reveal of their new line of neckties, and the premiere of a video by Phoenix graphic designer and filmmaker Safwat Saleem.
Saleem’s video will promote Dapper + Dash’s upcoming campaign on Kickstarter, a website that allows projects to be crowdsource funded. In this case, Dapper + Dash aims to start a monthly subscription service, delivering a new bow tie each month by mail to a subscriber’s door.
“Aaron had liked the videos I had already done,” Saleem said. “He would let me do essentially anything that I wanted. I’m excited to see what Aaron does with the project.”
Saleem said that the video will feature a pitch from a unique but Dapper + Dash-appropriate figure and voice.
Kimberlin’s use of technology and partnership with other Phoenix locals has come to define Dapper + Dash and its success.
Despite his product being deeply tied to the past, Kimberlin embraces promoting his merchandise “through the power of social media, utilizing the Instagram, the Facebooks, the Twitters.”
And by collaborating with other businesses and engaging in their focus points, Kimberlin has found a way “to expose each other to different clientele.”
But more than anything, Dapper + Dash has found a way to join the growing number of young start-ups coming to define downtown and the people with whom he forms partnerships notice this trend.
“It’s great. I’ve been living and working outside the downtown core for 11 years now, and I’m really excited about the direction where it’s going,” Thibault said.
Saleem was able to see the growth in both the business and the graphic design communities of Phoenix, aided mutually by collaboration such as that going on between himself and Kimberlin.
“In the past few months and past couple of years, a lot has been happening,” Saleem said. “All of these things are coming up and it’s great for me, because I get to work with such cool people, and it’s great for creators.”
Kimberlin said he’s excited not only to see his supporters from the past year, but to see what he can continue doing for downtown Phoenix.
“The company is great. I love the company, but ultimately it’s about putting a good stamp on Phoenix,” he said. “It’s made here; it’s manufactured here; it’s going to give Phoenix another good name.”
Contact the reporter at alexandra.scoville@asu.edu
