CHARLES TOWN, W.Va. (AP) - You could call him the Entrepreneur Guy. You might nickname him Mr. Social Fitness. Some people call him simply The Guy with the Beard.
But lately, Kevin Brackens is setting out to become the Zeitgeist Boss of Charles Town and Jefferson County.
A serial entrepreneur bearing a signature John Brown-style beard, Brackens recently opened a custom silk screen shop, his fourth business or nonprofit venture in Jefferson County. Through the shop on North Charles Street eponymously called Brackentees, he hopes you’ll soon be wearing one of his own catchy casual T-shirt creations with hyper-local branding and peppy slogans, much of it capturing affinities for the city and state.
“It’s Charles Town (Not Charleston)” states one his most popular T-shirts. Another with a more straightforward but just as effective message: “Charles Town Is My Town.” Yet another of his pithy designs sports a heart symbol inside an outline of the Mountain State’s borders: “All Heart. All West Virginia.”
People or businesses can use the shop to put their own customized logos and slogans not just on shirts, but also hats, coffee mugs or bags.
“There’s opportunity everywhere,” Brackens said. “Screen printing in this community seems to be a pain point. People are having a hard time getting screened shirts affordably in small batch. We specialize in small batch.”
In addition to fulfilling custom shirt and merchandise orders, the shop is focusing on producing small batches of shirt lines for particular customers with niche interest - for locals, tourists, race runners, history buffs - particularly related to Charles Town or a single event. And the particular entrepreneurial niche opportunity of Brackentees is providing smartly devised and locally minded merchandise won’t be available anywhere else.
“I have to come up with what is trending and capitalize on it through social media and make it a situation, like, ’I got to get that T-shirt,’” Brackens said. “I want to put shirts on everybody’s backs, and to do that I have to create the branding.”
During the next local election, he might pump out a few “I voted” T-shirts, just to spark some awareness, he said. Those customers wearing his casual shirts around town will help create the interest he’s seeking.
“Capitalize on the events that nobody is thinking of and we find the right budget to make the shirts happen and get them into the field,” he said. “You get it fast. It’s immediate. It’s there. And then it fades away.”
“This is all kind of an experiment, as any business would be,” he added.
His shop’s shirts sell for $10 to $35, depending on how upscale the fabric of the shirt.
Open seven days a week, Brackentees employs three people, not counting himself, to run the shop and operate three screen printing machines.
As the shop’s vision-seer, and not just its proprietor, Brackens plans to serve as the shop’s creative driver of local memes and messages. Often while cruising social media, he’ll help not only serve but create and feed demand for shirts with timely logos and snappy, customized messages for the local marketplace.
“I come up with whatever I think is clever, then I make it,” he said. “It seems to come naturally right now.”
A considerable part of the shop’s success will be its timeliness with local knowledge and attitude, Brackens explained. Get a Brackentees shirt now - they could be part of a limited batch and could sell out soon. They could even become a local collector’s item. At least that’s part of the idea and the hope and dream behind the screen printing shop. And that’s part of the continual buzz and fun Brackens plans to generate around it.
“We capitalize on it in social media so you see it innately in your social media feeds,” he said, “and this is the place to get it, you can’t get it anywhere else.”
Choosing just the right hashtag at just the right time is part of his success model, too. Brackens is streaming all the time, and locally networked. Even with online ordering to come, foot traffic in downtown Charles Town will also be an important part of the shop’s success, he said.
“This will be a retail store where you can come in and actually see what is for sale,” he said.
Originally from Arlington, Virginia, Brackens, a 41-year-old Army veteran, landed in Jefferson County eight years ago to follow a lady who became his wife, now Jennie Brackens, and established a painting business, which in turn led to him starting seasonal snow removal business.
An avid runner who holds a graduate degree in sports and recreation administration from Temple University, Brackens started a nonprofit social and fitness club three years ago called Bros & Bras, a venture that organizes affordable and accessible running events. Associated with the Two Rivers Treads running store in Ranson, the club is operated primarily through social media. (Two Rivers Treads is operated by Jefferson County physician Mark Cucuzzella who sponsors local half and full marathons as fundraisers for promoting healthier lifestyles.)
One of the fitness club’s most prominent highlights for the year was a 5K footrace Bracken organized for WV Fest last weekend in Charles Town, and his shop was in the middle of the festival’s action on North Charles Street.
The fitness club provided the inspiration and impetus for Brackentees. Through the running club and his general businesses presence around town, some of the shop’s sales will be driven by Brackens’ local visibility and reputation, he said.
“I’m pretty well networked due to my affiliation with Bros & Bras, the Chamber of Commerce, Rotary,” he said. “So I’m dialed in to some extent. People either know me as Brackens or the Guy with the Beard.”
Brackens sees more energy percolating and momentum building in Charles Town’s downtown business district. More people, more shops and restaurants, more events are happening, he said. He appreciates the city’s Third Thursday evening events, where the street closes right in front of his shop on North Charles Street for bands and community activities.
Brackens is considering doing decorations for people to purchase, merchandise that wouldn’t duplicate what is already offered downtown but could be promoted with thrift stores and other similar businesses there.
“If we’re all working together to promote each other, if we’re all backing each other, that’s what’s going to make the town work,” he said.
Everything connects for Brackens, even the personal. Seeing business ideas and branding possibilities everywhere, he is contemplating adding beard grooming products to his shop’s wares.
“I just haven’t ironed out which ones I want to carry,” he said. (His shop’s logo also plays off of Brackens’ beard.)
With four businesses to run as a “self-diagnosed workaholic” working 75 hours a week, Brackens admits he enjoys the creativity and always-on adrenaline boost of an entrepreneur’s life.
.
But lately, Kevin Brackens is setting out to become the Zeitgeist Boss of Charles Town and Jefferson County.
A serial entrepreneur bearing a signature John Brown-style beard, Brackens recently opened a custom silk screen shop, his fourth business or nonprofit venture in Jefferson County. Through the shop on North Charles Street eponymously called Brackentees, he hopes you’ll soon be wearing one of his own catchy casual T-shirt creations with hyper-local branding and peppy slogans, much of it capturing affinities for the city and state.
“It’s Charles Town (Not Charleston)” states one his most popular T-shirts. Another with a more straightforward but just as effective message: “Charles Town Is My Town.” Yet another of his pithy designs sports a heart symbol inside an outline of the Mountain State’s borders: “All Heart. All West Virginia.”
People or businesses can use the shop to put their own customized logos and slogans not just on shirts, but also hats, coffee mugs or bags.
“There’s opportunity everywhere,” Brackens said. “Screen printing in this community seems to be a pain point. People are having a hard time getting screened shirts affordably in small batch. We specialize in small batch.”
In addition to fulfilling custom shirt and merchandise orders, the shop is focusing on producing small batches of shirt lines for particular customers with niche interest - for locals, tourists, race runners, history buffs - particularly related to Charles Town or a single event. And the particular entrepreneurial niche opportunity of Brackentees is providing smartly devised and locally minded merchandise won’t be available anywhere else.
“I have to come up with what is trending and capitalize on it through social media and make it a situation, like, ’I got to get that T-shirt,’” Brackens said. “I want to put shirts on everybody’s backs, and to do that I have to create the branding.”
During the next local election, he might pump out a few “I voted” T-shirts, just to spark some awareness, he said. Those customers wearing his casual shirts around town will help create the interest he’s seeking.
“Capitalize on the events that nobody is thinking of and we find the right budget to make the shirts happen and get them into the field,” he said. “You get it fast. It’s immediate. It’s there. And then it fades away.”
“This is all kind of an experiment, as any business would be,” he added.
His shop’s shirts sell for $10 to $35, depending on how upscale the fabric of the shirt.
Open seven days a week, Brackentees employs three people, not counting himself, to run the shop and operate three screen printing machines.
As the shop’s vision-seer, and not just its proprietor, Brackens plans to serve as the shop’s creative driver of local memes and messages. Often while cruising social media, he’ll help not only serve but create and feed demand for shirts with timely logos and snappy, customized messages for the local marketplace.
“I come up with whatever I think is clever, then I make it,” he said. “It seems to come naturally right now.”
A considerable part of the shop’s success will be its timeliness with local knowledge and attitude, Brackens explained. Get a Brackentees shirt now - they could be part of a limited batch and could sell out soon. They could even become a local collector’s item. At least that’s part of the idea and the hope and dream behind the screen printing shop. And that’s part of the continual buzz and fun Brackens plans to generate around it.
“We capitalize on it in social media so you see it innately in your social media feeds,” he said, “and this is the place to get it, you can’t get it anywhere else.”
Choosing just the right hashtag at just the right time is part of his success model, too. Brackens is streaming all the time, and locally networked. Even with online ordering to come, foot traffic in downtown Charles Town will also be an important part of the shop’s success, he said.
“This will be a retail store where you can come in and actually see what is for sale,” he said.
Originally from Arlington, Virginia, Brackens, a 41-year-old Army veteran, landed in Jefferson County eight years ago to follow a lady who became his wife, now Jennie Brackens, and established a painting business, which in turn led to him starting seasonal snow removal business.
An avid runner who holds a graduate degree in sports and recreation administration from Temple University, Brackens started a nonprofit social and fitness club three years ago called Bros & Bras, a venture that organizes affordable and accessible running events. Associated with the Two Rivers Treads running store in Ranson, the club is operated primarily through social media. (Two Rivers Treads is operated by Jefferson County physician Mark Cucuzzella who sponsors local half and full marathons as fundraisers for promoting healthier lifestyles.)
One of the fitness club’s most prominent highlights for the year was a 5K footrace Bracken organized for WV Fest last weekend in Charles Town, and his shop was in the middle of the festival’s action on North Charles Street.
The fitness club provided the inspiration and impetus for Brackentees. Through the running club and his general businesses presence around town, some of the shop’s sales will be driven by Brackens’ local visibility and reputation, he said.
“I’m pretty well networked due to my affiliation with Bros & Bras, the Chamber of Commerce, Rotary,” he said. “So I’m dialed in to some extent. People either know me as Brackens or the Guy with the Beard.”
Brackens sees more energy percolating and momentum building in Charles Town’s downtown business district. More people, more shops and restaurants, more events are happening, he said. He appreciates the city’s Third Thursday evening events, where the street closes right in front of his shop on North Charles Street for bands and community activities.
Brackens is considering doing decorations for people to purchase, merchandise that wouldn’t duplicate what is already offered downtown but could be promoted with thrift stores and other similar businesses there.
“If we’re all working together to promote each other, if we’re all backing each other, that’s what’s going to make the town work,” he said.
Everything connects for Brackens, even the personal. Seeing business ideas and branding possibilities everywhere, he is contemplating adding beard grooming products to his shop’s wares.
“I just haven’t ironed out which ones I want to carry,” he said. (His shop’s logo also plays off of Brackens’ beard.)
With four businesses to run as a “self-diagnosed workaholic” working 75 hours a week, Brackens admits he enjoys the creativity and always-on adrenaline boost of an entrepreneur’s life.
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