As soon as I saw Will and Bear, I felt transported into a nostalgic adventure. Growing up in Portland, OR I loved the smell of trees and the sound of the music coming on in a car full of friends. Will and Bear is an Australian hat brand created for ‘the wanders and the authentic’. Each hat is handmade and for every hat purchased, 10 trees are planted. We sat down with ‘Chief Will’, Lauren Williams, to chat all things adventure, launching a brand and doing what you love now.
Meet Will & Bear…
Where are you in the world?
Melbourne, Australia.
How do you follow your bliss?
Jump in the van, hit the road and see where it takes us.
Could you tell us the story of Will & Bear and how it first came about?
The inspiration for our brand came from life on the road (most of our good ideas come to us when we’re in our van!). We are both nature lovers and wanted to build a community that helps give back to the places we play.
As a male & female team we saw a void for a unisex hat brand that catered for all types and tried to build our range to be accessible for everyone.
What steps did you need to take to go from having an idea to launching a brand?
A lot of coffee and late nights! Haha. We spent a good year sampling styles, visiting our factories, working on our brand story and building our community.
The most instrumental part of this was the community we built online before launching, we learnt so much from everyone that jumped on board and they have helped shape Will & Bear to what it is today more than they probably know.
If fear ever shows up in your life, how do you move past it?
We made a rule very early on at Will & Bear to take everything as a learning experience and not to pretend to be experts. We are constantly learning and making mistakes, this rule has given us the confidence to give things ago and not let fear be the reason for failure. We also learnt to leverage the networks around us when it comes to things we need guidance on.
Why do you love what you do?
Will & Bear gives us the opportunity to meet so many new people and this is by far our favourite part of the adventure. We love that we might meet someone through Will & Bear one week that could take our lives in a different direction the next.
What do you think has been the key to your success so far?
We believe success is a personal thing and as long as we’re enjoying the journey we feel successful (and thankful!). A few key points would be, listening to our customers and people around us, surrounding ourselves with people that inspire us to build a better future and trusting our gut.
What advice could you give to someone who knows what they would love to do, but haven’t gone for it.
Be willing to grow and learn on the fly. Be flexible and willing to not have all the answers. Don’t let the little things get to you down. Find your community early and get involved.
Follow their journey on Instagram x
Robbie
Lauren is a beautiful young Woman so naturally, that transpires into her quality products!
olivia
Totally! 🙂