How I got hired by Abercrombie & Fitch

I got my first “real” design job back in 2002 by taking a wild chance:

A guy came in to the print shop I worked at to pick up something for a marketing agency he co-founded. While he waited for it, I chatted with him about the agency— his name was Chase Jarvis, and at the time he was mostly just known as a ski photographer.

I said “fk it,” picked up the phone and asked him for a job. And to make a long story short, I ended up working at his old agency doing projects for Nike, Nintendo, Red Bull etc.

The choice to pick up the phone that day changed the course of my life forever. It got my design career started and set everything else in motion for me.

(years later I also ended up working at his startup, CreativeLive)

Maybe I would have found another way in… but maybe not.

Who knows where my life would have gone if I didn’t make that phone call?

And it happened again in 2009:

I was working at a design agency in Cincinnati and I needed to reboot my life for a lot of reasons I won’t get into here.

My job search was going nowhere, so I just randomly tweeted: “I need a new job. I’m a graphic designer, can anyone help?”

Honestly, it was pure desperation and I didn’t expect anything to come of it.

I only had 850 followers or something from a small blog I was doing at the time, but someone replied: “I can get you in at Abercrombie.”

My inner voice said, “Some random dude on Twitter is just gonna get me a job at the #1 mall apparel brand because he likes my blog? No way…”

But a few months later, to my absolute shock— he did. And I spent the next 4 years doing design and marketing for Abercrombie & Fitch including a lot of wild experiences like 5+ trips where I spent months at factories in China.

(shoutout to Shawn Khemsurov, check out his agency Feel)

And again, what if I didn’t make that random tweet? What if I listened to that voice that told me it was cringe?

→ Here’s the point:

You can completely change everything in a single meeting, phone call or DM. All it takes is reaching the right person at the right moment ONE SINGLE TIME.

It could be a 2 minute conversation, but it might open a door that was closed to you for years and land that one big client, hire, project, etc.

But you’ve gotta put yourself out there.

Which is what a lot of people DON’T do. They stay in their comfort zone, hoping that somehow things will change - like that dream client is going to magically appear out of nowhere, ready to send over the Docusign.

That’s why marketing HAS TO be a priority.

And by marketing I don't necessarily mean a new logo or a website or any of those other superficial things- they may be helpful, but they’re probably not the missing ingredient.

I mean it in the much larger sense:

You need the right people to know who you are and what you do, and you need to regularly get in front of them in an authentic, non-spammy way.

Every time they see your name or face, that's a chance for something amazing to happen.

So get started NOW. Make it a part of your daily operating system to do SOMETHING, even if it’s small and imperfect.

I promise it WILL pay off! It's literally just a matter of time.

PS - If you like my emails, reply to this one and say hi. Or pick a time on my calendar for a Zoom call- I always love meeting new people!

PPS - this is a perfect example of what I'm talking about in this email. I let anybody put time on my calendar and I trust that it's going to turn into cool things (and it does!)