How this Party Started

After spending his formative years as an infantry officer in the U.S. Army, Nick found himself at graduate school studying business. He found this to be a monumentally boring task with very little sense of purpose, so he, as a lifelong Jiu-Jitsu and Judo guy, volunteered to teach the ROTC students mixed martial arts. Over the span of the two years that he taught this course he developed good relationships with a small core of guys that were really committed – enter Brad.

Brad grew up on the hard streets of PA and found himself at a university that while not as absurdly liberal as some, certainly was not pro-military. An anti-establishment, button-pusher by trade, with a penchant for fine spirits (like Old Crow), hilarity often ensued. As part of his continuous efforts to harangue the majority of the student body, Brad took to developing some hilarious, and often politically-incorrect, t-shirts. As a thank-you for Nick’s efforts, he delivered four of these t-shirts to him.

At a party, a few days later, Brad and Nick found themselves in a hot tub with five nursing students and one of Nick’s old Army buddies trying to solve the world’s problems over some wing-giving energy drinks mixed with vodka, when the discussion of military clothing came up. Brad asked why Nick didn’t wear a lot of military t-shirts. Basically it boiled down to the fact that other than unit specific t-shirts, the only shirts that were ever cool enough to wear were the ones Nick was given when deployed, or a sweet one he was given by a domestic beer company when he graduated Ranger School.

Suddenly, it happened – a drunk girl ran outside with her top off! Later though, when they had a chance to think about that topic further, they both thought, “Why don’t we team up and make some t-shirts that guys would really enjoy wearing?” So they tracked down a couple of guys that Brad met during the infantry officer basic course that had some actual artistic skill, and Ranger Up was born.

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