EPISODE 45 :: Adrienne Antonson of State the Label - Scrappiness, making mistakes, and scaling a business

Summary: In Episode 45, I spoke to Adrienne Antonson of State the Label. Following on my interest in production and where that’s led me in terms of guest  lately, I wanted to speak to Adrienne about how she began and continues to run her clothing label, State. So part of this curiosity for me is how a person gets interested in and finds themselves working in fiber and clothing production. Adrienne talks me through her entire journey of working with fiber and clothing-making - beginning as a middle schooler sewing simple clothing, to working on an alpaca farm and sewing garments and felting by night, to putting into place some of the bones of State as we know it today.Adrienne shares the process of growing and scaling the business, from figuring out how to work with a factory to hiring a small team to support production, locally. Her approach is and has always been scrappy, and many parts of her process are not scalable. She revels in the small details and talks me through what it’s like to design and produce a collection of surface-designed goods (spoiler: it’s a lot more logistically complex than you might imagine) Adrienne reveals an exciting upcoming launch for state, which I imagine a LOT of listeners will be very excited about. I love the arc of Adrienne’s story - how really genuine and approachable it all feels - how the pieces of State have come together over time and with a lot of effort, but also with a lot of just sticking to your gut.