Boston. The city that we grew up in, and have called home our entire lives. The city is a special place for us and one that fits (and helped form) the Neon Bandits lifestyle.
As a young business, we’ve had our fair share of trying to figure out just who we wanted to be. We made some mistakes (as everyone does) that first year, and tried to be everything to everyone. While we were able to get points of distribution and develop great partnerships all across the country, we have spent the past few months getting back to the basics and focusing on developing ties with fellow Boston-brands to help build the Neon Bandits name while introducing some new types of socks to the market.
Over the course of the next several months, you will see what we consider to be our most exciting projects come to life thanks to us teaming up with fellow Bostonians. We looked within our home city to connect with some of the most exciting brands and businesses across the lifestyle and performance spaces to develop these new and custom socks.
Here’s a sneak peek of three projects that are just about to (or already have) dropped.
The Heartbreak Hill Running Company x Neon Bandits performance running sock
You read that right. And as you may have seen, we’re thrilled to be adding performance running socks to our portfolio. Go for a run in Boston and it’s hard not to notice runners wearing the iconic “broken heart” logo for the Heartbreak Hill Running Company. With three locations throughout the city (including one at Mile 20 of the Boston Marathon, where Heartbreak Hill starts to take its toll on runners) this specialty running store possesses the strongest brand among the Boston running community.
We were pumped when co-founders agreed to meet with us months ago, and were even more excited when they agreed we team-up to develop a performance running sock together. Over the course of the past few months, we have been working hand-in-hand with Dan and Justin to develop what we all consider to be a top of the line performance running sock. We combined their experience in the running space with our knowledge of socks to develop this unique new product. With three exclusive “Heartbreak” deigns set to drop in time for this holiday season (and more on the way for the Spring), you better run (pun intended) to #grabapair of these socks before they are gone.
Parlor Skis x Neon Bandits performance ski sock
Parlor Skis set out to change the way people order custom ski’s and well let’s just say that they have done just that. Also based out of Boston, founder Mark Wallace and his team have been blowing up the New England Ski scene with individually designed and crafted skis. With ski season just about here, Parlor wanted to be able to offer customers the ability to #grabapair of ski socks when they picked up their fresh skis for the season.
But they didn’t want an ordinary off-the-shelf ski sock. Since many of Parlor’s customers are performance skiers, we worked with them to build a streamlined and functional Thermalite ski sock to keep shredders comfortable on the slopes.
Roxy’s Grilled Cheese x Neon Bandits
As one of the first food trucks to take to the streets in Boston years ago, James Sabatino of Roxy’s Grilled Cheese has turned his grilled cheese truck into an iconic staple of the Boston food scene. Now with four brick and mortar locations, in addition to many food trucks, Roxy’s has a following that simply needed some swag. We teamed up with James and his team to create a special edition grilled cheese sock. Yup, you read that right, a grilled cheese sock. One downside? Neon Bandits socks are not edible…
More details on where you can #grabapair of Roxy’s limited-edition socks to come. A portion of proceeds from these socks will be donated to support local schools.
We could not be more excited about these projects, as we’ve been able to work alongside experts in various spaces, and develop/ diversify our product offerings. What’s cooler? This is just the start to us “owning” Boston and we can’t wait to share some other local collaborations, as those continue to take flight. (Hint: “a flight” has something to do with an upcoming custom sock…)
Stay tuned to our blog and Instagram to keep up to date on our latest projects!