At 25 years of age, Anniss Seid of Thunder Bay is carving himself a nice little spot in the popular niche market of outdoor clothing. Seid’s clothing line, called Brass and Arrows, is popular in the northwest and is making inroads across Canada thanks to its visibility on Instagram and Facebook. Seid has also been working hard on a website called Outdoor Classifieds, which he hopes will become a popular spot for people who want to move products from firearms to pup tents. Early in January I dropped in on Seid at his office on the city of Thunder Bay’s south side. He greeted me with an enthusiastic handshake and a cup of Robin’s coffee. Here is part of my chat with Seid.         Â
What is your background in the outdoors?
So I grew up in Fort Frances Ontario and was introduced to fishing and hunting at a very young age. My father was a fisherman and hunter and he introduced me to that. I fell in love with it. So I know the Fort Frances area and now I am trying to figure out the stuff around Thunder Bay. That passion for the outdoors, I kinda saw that there was some opportunities there for the clothing brand, as well as the website. And it kind of sprung from there.
2. Tell me about the clothing brand, the name of it and how the idea came to be?
About the clothing brand…I was sitting on the couch one day just thinking of names for the classifieds website. That’s how it started. And I came up with Brass and Arrows. So brassandarrows.ca was initially the classifieds website. And then from there I thought, that’s a really catchy name…why don’t I make that into a clothing brand? Then the domain for outdoors classifieds was available and I made that its own entity and Brass and Arrows was born.
3. How long had Brass and Arrows been around and how did the logo design come to be?
The classifieds site started in March of 2017 and the clothing brand started a few months after that. As for the design, I’m not the best artist, but it sprouted from a sketch I did. I’ve got a friend that is in graphic design and she helped me kind of establish a logo. From that I drew a couple more designs and then we had the logo.
4. How do you sell the product and get it out there?
When I first started Brass and Arrows, I went online to look for ways to sell clothing. What came up was drop-shipping. I worked with a company out of the States. You submit your design to them, they take care of printing the product, they have a website builder and they ship it for you as well. So that worked out pretty good. I saw some sales and figured out that I wanted to take this further. I saved up my pennies, nickels and dimes, and decided I was going to invest in getting my own line. I found a company out of Toronto and the biggest thing for me was that if I was going to establish it as a premium brand I was going to have to have my logo on the neck tag. I needed something that was unique to me. So I invested with this company and they got me custom hoodies, t-shirts, tank tops, and I just got into custom hats, which I’m pretty happy about.Â
5. Who is buying your product?
The beautiful thing about social media is you can look at your metrics. So it’s primarily a male audience but anybody is buying it. Girls, guys and as for age, even my Dad’s friends are loving it and they say it is the most comfortable t-shirt they have worn. So all ages and sexes.
6. Tell me about your Outdoor Classifieds website. Where does it fit in your business plan?
Outdoor Classifieds, which was initially brassandarrows.ca, was planned and founded to connect people across Canada that were like minded in a local way. I noticed with the platforms out there…Facebook, Kijiji and stuff like that, they really didn’t have the options there to sell hunting equipment, fishing equipment and if they did it was limited. I mean you look at Cabela’s and there are so many sub-categories to fishing. Same thing with hunting. So I took that and brought it out further to make Outdoor Classifieds.
7. Who is using it?
It’s designed for anyone who loves the outdoors. There are categories for hunting, camping, hiking and all that kind of stuff. So for anybody who likes the outdoors there is a category on there for you. There is a forum as well…for trading ideas, recipes, you name it. I would like to see more people on that.
8. Are you a one-man operation?
Yes, it’s currently only me. My fiancé will help me from time to time, folding clothes and stuff like that, which I truly appreciate. But I founded the website Brass and Arrows when I was in school, and it’s been me ever since.
You can find Brass and Arrows online at: brassandarrows.ca, or at D&R Sporting Goods in Thunder Bay and Devlin’s Corner Store in Fort Frances. The Outdoors Classifieds address is: outdoorclassifieds.ca.
