Hi!
My name is Megan Smalley! I am the owner of Scarlet & Gold. Before we get started talking about custom merch, I want to share my story with you. I think it’s important for you to know who I am and what my experience is.
2013
I started this business out of my guest bedroom in 2013.
I was in full time pharmaceutical sales at the time, and I never dreamed this would be more than a creative outlet. Fast forward a few months, I got laid off from my job unexpectedly. Isn’t that how it always happens? I had a few months of severance, so Blake and I decided that I would look for other jobs while also trying to grow this business.
2014
In the Spring of 2014, we partnered with the winner of The Bachelor, Catherine Lowe, on an exclusive collection. This partnership really put us on the map.
We traveled to Birmingham and to Seattle to host launch parties for her collection! These parties are some of my favorite S&G memories.
Since then, we have been featured on the Today Show, in Glamour magazine and have had so many celebrities photographed with our products. Look at all these fun pictures!
These super exciting times of travel and glamorous events were all before I had kids. In fact, these events all happened when I was in the middle of a heartbreaking four year journey through infertility.
2015
After a devastating failed first attempt at IVF, my right hand at the time, Koral Dean, decided to take action. She put together the Give Grace campaign to help us raise the money we needed to do IVF one more time. Once the money was raised, we headed out to CCRM in Lone Tree, Colorado for our final IVF attempt.
2016
My second IVF attempt was successful! Miracle twins!
So what does any of this have to do with Scarlet & Gold? Well, when I was seven months pregnant with my miracle twins, I decided to shut the business down. We subleased our beautiful space, laid off our team and closed our doors. We had no idea if this would be for a season or forever, but I knew I had to listen to the leading of the Lord.
2017
2017 was filled with lots of diaper changes, cleaning up spit up, sleepless nights and the most full heart. I was truly living in the days that I prayed for, hard and all.
2018
In the Spring of 2018, I decided to pick the business back up in an online only capacity. From there, I grew the business again with a small, but mighty full remote team. To date, we had only outsourced production for all of our products.
2019
2020
Like many of you, I was a customer of print shops all over the country. I was consistently frustrated by the turn around time, the lack of communication, the way I was treated, the lack of excellence in the work, the hard and crunchy feel of the ink, etc. The final straw for me was when I went to pick up an order and our best selling Aubie Head design was SEWN ON THE NECKLINE OF THE SWEATSHIRT! I wish I was kidding…
In that moment, I decided to bring production in house. I had no idea what I was doing, what machines, staff or space I needed or how I was going to fund it. But, I was determined to make it happen.
2021
In January of 2021, we opened our doors to the custom side of our business. Originally, we called it Ink & Thread (until we realized that was confusing), even though it’s always been under one business entity. We grew from 5 to 25 employees overnight. We had machines delivered that we had no idea how to work. We had to learn how to create for other clients because we had always just created for ourselves (via e-commerce and retail). We built a sales team, a receiving team, a production team and a fulfillment team.
That first year was really hard. I went from a part time job to a more than full time job. I had two four year olds and a one year old at home. And by the time I got home every day, I had nothing left.
2022
In 2022, we still outsourced the production on our online products. However, we were once again frustrated with the quality and decided to bring this piece of the business in house. We learned how to print on demand (order, receive, produce and ship the garments one at a time as they are ordered off the website), which was so much larger of an undertaking than I ever imagined.
2023
In 2023, we moved into a brand new, beautiful space in Auburn that is double the size of our original space. We added 10 new machines in 2023 and installed a fulfillment software to help automate the print on demand process.
