The Best Memory of the Worst Day.

On the 5 Year Anniversary of my memoir, a warm anecdote that validated everything I'd written about the power of building a brand around community.

Today is the 5 year anniversary of my first book and memoir, This Is Not a T-Shirt!

In the Summer of 2019, TINATS immediately became a national bestseller selling over 6,000 copies on Publishing Day. On Amazon, the book has over 1,000 reviews and its rating stands just shy of 5 stars. More people approach me as fans of TINATS than The Hundreds these days, which is staggering. This book changed my life, anchored my career, and has become my proudest accomplishment. What’s most rewarding is knowing how many people TINATS has touched and helped as well.

Upon the book’s release, I embarked on a sold-out, global book tour that took me from Paris to Chicago, London to Miami. We filled bookstores, warehouses, and university halls with earnest discussions about brand-building, culture, and connection. Nobody had an inkling as to what was about to hit us 6 months later. The COVID-19 pandemic separated us in a time where we were already socially and politically torn apart. It turns out the world needed TINATS more than ever, as the enduring message of the book is one of valuing community - of its magical properties in powering movements, inciting trends, and inspiring positive change.

[The below excerpt is part of the opener to the paperback edition of This Is Not a T-Shirt]

Further evidence of community power shone in the midst of one particularly trying leg of my book tour.

My journey began before sunrise at LAX. Considering the airport construction, I’d built in generous time to catch my morning flight to New York. But, the baggage attendant sent me to the wrong side of the airport either out of miscommunication or Monday. Forty minutes later, I was alone in a hollow metal shuttle, careening around the International terminal for South African Airways. By the time I’d realized my mistake and hightailed it back to the curb where my Lyft had dropped me off, I missed my departure by sheer minutes.

“Traveling this week? Bad idea. Don’t you know mercury is in retrograde?” Brenda, one of our designers and resident office astrologist scolded me before I left for my book tour. As the days went on and my travel woes accumulated, I went from scoffing at her to calling my mom for my birth time as I downloaded zodiac apps. My next flight was on Wednesday from New York to Chicago. I was alert and sharp for this one. That sinking feeling as I entered the terminal, however, plummeted all over the floor once I saw that my plane was delayed. By six hours.

I was supposed to have the full day, but my plane touched down in Chicago near midnight. Nevertheless, over the week, I had such a rewarding time in the city that I almost forgot my travel travails. I stuffed them down with oily deep-dish pizza at Lou Malnati’s, Virgil’s exhibition at the MCA, and multiple book events at the Pitchfork Festival and ComplexCon. Chicago was the final book tour stop of that leg. My next destination was Maui where I’d be reuniting with my family for a much-needed vacation. I’d been running on fumes all summer with the book release and I could almost taste the warm salt in the ocean, feel the grains of sand crunch between my toes as the stress unwound between my shoulders. I just had to get from Chicago to Hawaii with a short layover in the Bay Area.

The morning of my Hawaii trip was especially crisp and blue. There were no red letters on the Departures monitors at O’Hare. Just sequences of “Now Boarding” and “On Time” status updates blinking happily. I boarded with the first group, kicked my feet up and exhaled as the plane pulled out of the airport. Before I could take a smiling selfie to gloat back at Brenda (“Mercury Gatorade, ha!”), the cabin shuddered with a jolting halt and the turbines whimpered. Then, the aircraft crawled the walk-of-shame back to the gate. After an hour of maintenance crews hammering and pounding in the bowels beneath us, the pilot informed us that the flight was cancelled. The passengers howled a synchronized “Fuck!” and charged back into the airport like Braveheart, bloodthirsty for customer service. It was pointless. Due to bad weather and mercury in retrograde, the next plane wasn’t departing Chicago for six hours.

I didn’t eat the entire day in the airport. I barely looked at my phone. I was wired. My flight from Chicago to Hawaii had a healthy layover in San Francisco, but the longer I stayed at O’Hare, I knew that window was shrinking. There was still a remote chance that I could get into SF to make the last Maui connection of the night, but for the time being, I was stuck in stormy Chicago, fingers crossed, at the mercy of the travel gods.

By early evening, my flight finally left Chicago and headed to Northern California. I’d done the math, I calculated this thing out like Russell Crowe in A Beautiful Mind. We were scheduled to land at 7:15pm and my connecting flight to Maui was embarking at 7:20pm. Five minutes isn’t enough to make a transfer in an international airport, but the flight attendants comforted the few of us who were anxiously watching the live map on our headsets.

“There are six of you who are making that Hawaii connection. They are aware that you’re coming and will wait for you. It’s the last flight of the night and they can spare to be delayed. Trust me, they don’t want to lose your money.”

Everyone cheered, but after a week of flying fails, I remained skeptical. Like the ticket said, we got into SFO at 7:15pm. The attendant asked the rest of the cabin to stay seated so the Hawaiian-bound six could exit first. She unhatched the door and yelled, “Go!” like she was dropping the starting gate.

You know that scene in Home Alone where the family’s running maniacally through the airport? And whenever you see that happening in real life, you’re like, “Oh shit. Sucks to be him?” That was us, frantic, tearing through the terminal like we were set on fire. One of the younger women was sobbing and hyperventilating. “You don’t understand. I can’t miss this flight. I’m supposed to be at a family reunion dinner tonight. I can’t miss it!” I grabbed her bag for her and pushed her on ahead.

Of course, the Chicago and Hawaii gates were as far apart as Chicago and Hawaii. After a day of cross-country travel with shot nerves and three duffel bags on my back, my legs were gummy like rubber bands. I ran out of breath and choked on my dry spit. There was no way that this plane was gonna wait for us.

“There it is! Gate 58!” I heard the girl shout. She snatched her luggage from my shoulders, waved her ticket in the attendant’s face and disappeared down the tunnel celebrating like a Price is Right contestant. The other passengers did the same, high-fiving, hugging, and thanking the airline workers for their altruism. I couldn’t believe it. I un-crumpled my boarding pass, flashed it in the air, and jetted through the doors.

“Last call for Honolulu!” the woman announced over the loudspeaker. It didn’t even register until I was halfway down the corridor when she said it the second time, “Anyone else for Honolulu, Hawaii?”

I pumped the brakes. Honolulu? Oahu? I looked at my ticket. No. I was supposed to fly to Maui. I turned around and said, “You mean Maui?”

“No… Hon, this is the flight for Honolulu. The Maui flight is over there.” She pointed four doors down at another United Airlines employee who was slowly closing the door on Gate 62. Above the doorway, the monitor read, “Kahului, Maui. Gate Closed.”

“WAIT! PLEASE! WAIT!”

Through the window, I could see the Maui airplane was still attached to its umbilical cord. I ran across the hall and faced the attendant. “Ma’am. Please. I’m supposed to be on this flight. You have to let me on.”

“Sorry. Plane’s left already.”

“No, it hasn’t! It’s right there!” I signaled outside as night fell sharply across the plane’s tail. “My Chicago flight was delayed six hours in getting me here. You have no idea…I’m begging you.”

“Either way, you’re not on this flight! I just counted myself. Everyone made it on this plane. Can I see your ticket?”

She closed the door shut and locked it. I stared hopelessly out onto the tarmac as the airplane fired up its engines.

“Kim? I don’t see a Kim…?” She banged loudly on the keyboard, biting her lip. “Oh. I see what happened here. We pushed you to tomorrow.”

“What? Why would you do that?!”

“We figured you wouldn’t make the connection. So, we put you on tomorrow morning’s flight.”

I was dumbstruck. “But, I made it. I’m here. And my seat is right there.” Except it wasn’t. I looked up and the plane vanished like a David Copperfield finale.

“You can take it up with Customer Service. They’re just down the hall.”

“Just down the hall” wasn’t far from where I had gotten off my Chicago flight, so I shuffled the long and depressing trip down memory lane. There’s the moving walkway where I helped that girl with her bag. There’s that custodian who I almost steamrolled, still eating his wings by the neck pillow stand thing.

“You gave away my seat.” I tossed my backpack against the wall of the customer service center and the rest of the travelers split the line like I was Moses.

“Sir?”

“My seat. You changed my flight without my permission and now I’m stuck in San Francisco tonight when I should be in Hawaii. Just get my bags please and tell me where the hotel shuttle is? You are accommodating me a hotel room, right?”

The man behind the counter had thick, round glasses and beads of sweat trickling past his hairline. “Sure. Lemme check on those bags for you…” After a few minutes, he called over a supervisor who whispered something in his ear and then turned to me apologetically.

“Mr. Kim, Hi.” She looked like Phyllis from The Office. “I’m sorry to hear about your long day. I have some bad news for you. For some reason, your bags made it on that flight to Maui…”

My luggage, my toiletries, all my clothes and comforts were going on vacation without me. I walked outside the customer service center, raised my hand to the United Airlines sign and flipped a robust and girthy bird. Then, I took a photo of it.

I collected myself. What did I have left? Stranded in the Bay on a chilly, grey night, I was dressed for Hawaii in a T-shirt and colorful shorts. At this point, all I wanted was to take a warm shower and brush my teeth, but I didn’t even have a change of underwear. What I did have, however, was my community. I set my bags down and posted the photo of me flipping off the United sign to Instagram. In my caption, I wrote:

#FUCKUNITED for an especially painful travel week of delays and cancellations. Then, giving away my seat and sending off my luggage! So, today was a bad day for me. But it doesn’t have to be for you. Here’s where we get to reframe the narrative. Come visit me at the luxurious – and spacious – Courtyard San Bruno where they’re storing me for the night. I’ll be in the lobby at 9pm. I’ll give you free advice, I’ll listen to you, let’s hang out and make friends. Someone bring me an XL T-shirt if you have a cool brand. Does anyone make socks?…

The hotel shuttle was 20 minutes behind schedule in picking me up, but what else was new? As we drove past a Chili’s and curled into the sleepy suburban neighborhood of San Bruno, I refreshed my Instagram page and the post had over 10,000 Likes and 600 comments.

At 8:55pm, I stepped out of the shower in my dank room at the Courtyard San Bruno. Airport hotels are funny because nobody actually wants to be there, yet we’re all forced to cohabitate for a night. They’re like fishing nets that have trapped lonely business people, families reuniting with relatives but wouldn’t dream of staying with them, and cast aways like me. I put on a good face and re-wore the same outfit from the Worst Day Ever. And walked downstairs.

There were two people waiting for me in the lobby. I can spot my fans from a mile away. Brown kids, rare sneakers, some type of headwear with some proud logos, and a friendly smile.

“Hi, I’m Ryan.”

“I’m Sam. Wow, I didn’t know if you’d actually be here.”

“Well, I didn’t know if you’d be here either,” I replied. “Let’s take a seat somewhere.”

I pulled up a couple loose chairs into the corner of the room just as a boyfriend and girlfriend entered the sliding doors.

“Bobby? Hey, I’m Taz and this is my girlfriend Tyler. So, like, what do we do?”

I laughed. “I’m not sure! This is my first time too. So, find somewhere to sit and let’s introduce ourselves.”

But, the introductions never ended. A steady trickle of people continued to stream into both the front and rear entrances of the hotel. We needed more space, so we pushed all the furniture to the edges and sat on the floor. It was hilarious to see guys and girls stepping into the lobby with trepidation, especially if they came alone. Nobody knew what to expect, if they’d look stupid or desperate by showing up, and what’s more, none of us knew the agenda for a gathering like this. I loudly welcomed newcomers to “Bible Study.” I mimicked Chris Hansen from “To Catch a Predator” when an especially nervous guy poked his head into the room. “Son, why don’t you have a seat…”

For three and a half hours, we shared and listened. One girl was developing her own women’s footwear line and I asked her to sell it to the crowd, Shark Tank style. A couple guys showed up in lowriders and so we had an impromptu car show in the parking lot. I bought everyone drinks and we cleared out the bar. There was only one person working the weeknight shift at the Courtyard San Bruno front desk. She’d never seen anything like this in her hotel and was more than happy to top off our glasses. She asked if I was a celebrity and I said, “No, I’m their friend.”

More like they were my friends. A stockier Filpino in basketball shorts and a hoodie told me he was down the street smoking weed by himself in the car when my post popped up. He told himself, “If Bobby replies to my Comment on this post, I’ll take it as a sign to go.” And I did. So he came.

One girl showed up by herself carrying a grease-stained In-N-Out bag. She walked into the middle of the lobby and interrupted a conversation we were having about streetwear trends.

“Um, excuse me, sorry… Bobby? This is awkward. I have no idea who you are…”

Everybody laughed.

“…but, my boyfriend is a big fan of yours. He couldn’t come because he’s stuck at the office so he called me and told me to bring you dinner. He said you must be hungry. I hope you like hamburgers?”

She raised the bag in the air.

“And if you don’t, that’s fine. But, I haven’t eaten dinner either, so do you mind if I eat?”

“Of course not! But, can we eat dinner together? Here, come sit at this table with me.”

While the dialogue circled around the room, I sat down with the girlfriend and shared French fries. Most everyone had their own brand and sought advice. Whenever my mouth was full, other people chimed in with lessons and anecdotes from their own entrepreneurial journey. If someone felt discouraged by their lack of progress, others would reassure them with stories of how they overcame similar failures. Another woman raised her hand and admitted that she had no idea who I was. She was a nurse in the area, had recently come across my book at the local bookstore, and just so happened to read my Instagram post that night. She kept apologizing for not knowing who I was, but when I asked if anyone else was also unfamiliar with me outside of the book, ten other people raised their hands.

There must’ve been at least 50-75 people who showed up throughout that late Sunday night, which is even more amazing when you consider they came on an hour’s notice. Plus, every single one of them heeded the call and bore gifts. 3-packs of boxers, mint toothpaste, of course T-shirts. One kid curated some used books he thought I’d like. One girl brought me one of her paintings, another a handcrafted flower as a keepsake. I was leveled by the generosity. My heart was full. How many brand owners can attest to community action like this? And to know that this could have happened anywhere in the world and the same results would’ve followed. When you build a brand centered on people over product, you are reminded time and again of the strength of these personal bonds. This is not a T-shirt, it’s a conversation, it’s a piece of advice, it’s a fast food sandwich, it’s a relationship. This is the most important thing, the greatest of all.

A couple weeks later, I was roped into a late-night DM group chat with strangers. I accepted the message and immediately recognized some of the faces from our San Bruno meet-up in the photos. Rewind to that night at the Courtyard hotel, after I had retired to bed, more than half the attendees stayed downstairs, carrying on their discussions about life and streetwear or whatever. Many exchanged contact information and vowed to stay in touch and this is what I was looking at in the text chain. Five familiar faces, each one a stranger to the others just days before, sitting around an Awesome Blossom at Chili’s, forging a different future with the help of new friends. All because of the Worst Day Ever.

Still, FUCKUNITED!