Rising Stars: Meet Tip Frank

Today we’d like to introduce you to Tip Frank.

Hi Tip, so excited to have you on the platform. So before we get into questions about your work-life, maybe you can bring our readers up to speed on your story and how you got to where you are today.
I’ve been in Nashville for about seven years. I was mainly touring as a guitar player for most of those. I’d just wrapped a summer tour and was in London with my Wife for our first anniversary, and we were dreaming up what the next few years of our life looked like. I’ve been very fortunate to make a career in the music industry, but I knew I didn’t always want to rely on leaving home for work. So, we kept talking and dreaming, which led to her commenting that I could work on one of my clothing ideas.

There’s always been a desire to work in fashion leading up to living in Nashville. I’d worked as a store manager on different retail stores’ floors and as a mall’s marketing director. So the space was somewhat familiar, but I’d never started a business, didn’t know how to sew, and knew it was a long shot. I reached out to a friend, Drew Kellum, to help turn many of my art ideas into reality. He’s played a role in helping Spiritual World Tour grow and has given it fresh life while we’ve grown.

My first step was going through the legal steps to create an LLC, and next, I took to google to learn the manufacturing vocabulary and find my first source to create a brand. I found my manufacturer, took about 1,500 dollars, and said, If I can cover my cost, I’ll do the next thing. That was February 2020; Spiritual World Tour is finishing up its second year as a company “covering its costs.” Two and a half years later, we’re on our way to hopefully make Spiritual World Tour a part of the Nashville community and the fashion community as a whole.

We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Smooth feels like a relative term. I’ve learned how the internet works from those who had gone before and had the opportunity. See what’s been successful and what’s a pitfall in this industry. But overall, I feel like it’s been trending upward. With each release, I learn more about the manufacturing process. I learn more about the design process and how just because one fabric works with this cut doesn’t mean another fabric will. Bandwidth has been the biggest struggle over the last two and a half years. Navigating this at the beginning of 2020 and then returning into a full-time touring situation. It can feel like the time and financial resources I’d like to put into it haven’t always been available, but that’s part of the growing pains of starting anything new.

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your work?
Currently, I’m the owner and founder of Spiritual World Tour, which specializes in cutting & sew garments that reflect a more quality over quantity-based mentality. We started with fifty hoodies and have scaled to full collection releases over the last two years. I have grown from one to five international manufacturers to one domestic in Nashville.

I’m most proud of the community SWT has built. Starting, it was a small circle of friends who knew what I was doing that generously bought a hoodie that allowed me to keep growing the business. This stemmed into more releases, and it would be cool to get a text from a friend saying, “Oh, I saw your hat at this bar, at this party, or Whole Foods!.” And, I think that tribe/community mentality is very close to me. The two brand mottos have been: “Trust your tase” and “an Invitation to the conversation.” I’d hope that as we grow, those mantras always remain authentic to us and that they would stem into the daily lives of those invested in growing SWT.

I think one of the things that set Spiritual World Tour apart is the process. We’re not sourcing blank t-shirts or hats and printing our logos on them. I’m not saying that we’re the only ones doing that at all, but it was important to me early on that if I was going to put my heart into creating something, it had to be authentic. And in my head, the definition of starting a fashion brand was producing and manufacturing the garments. Not everyone cares about that or even wants to do that, which is why I think fashion is special. Anyone can put their perspective and vision into the world, and people get to decide on that.

Any big plans?
Since the beginning of the start, SWT has been self-funded. There are tons of dreams and plans for the future. Any amount of money that’s been made has been circulated back into the brand in some way, shape, or form. So at the moment, the dreams are limited by the reality of money that’s available.

We’re prepping to release new garments for the late Summer and prepping samples for the Fall when we’re putting out our first bag. It’s a leather book bag that I’m proud of. It’s the first non-clothing item I’ve gotten to work on, and I’m excited to see what people think. We’ve also just started some conversations with shoe manufacturers. I’d love to see in the next 2-3 years for the brand to grow from a local/regional thing to being able to play a part in representing Nashville as a legitimate space for fashion. As a city, Nashville has a lock on music, and with more and more people moving here, I’d love to add that to the resume it can offer, and it would be special to get to be one of the brands to help shape that.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.spiritualworldtour.com
• Instagram: @spiritualworldtour

Image Credits
Photographs by Nolan Knight and Tristan Cusick