In 2013, I left a secure job at Nike to pursue freelance work. Nike is a great place to work, but I was young and wanted to design everything, not just printable apparel.
At the start of my freelance career, I had been using the teeth icon we now associate with Chomp. I whipped it up because I wanted an assisting graphic to promote my work-for-hire business.
The teeth really had no meaning at all; I just thought fangs were cool—because I have the brain and maturity of a teenager.
In 2015, a friend, who was a buyer at a big box retailer, told me, “If you start a brand, I’ll buy tees from it.” If someone offers you this deal, you take it.
I created the whole brand story over the weekend.
At this time, I’d been drawing lots of food-related graphics. But I didn’t want to name an apparel company something specific to food—or specific to anything, really.
I wanted an onomatopoeia—a word that represents a sound. BANG, BOOM, POW. Like the comic books.
I probably wrote fifty possible names. But actually, my wife actually came up with CHOMP, which perfectly fit the teeth logo I’d been using. I did a quick Google search for trademarks and similar names, and it seemed like we were in the clear. (We are sometimes mistaken for a beef jerky brand called CHOMPS).
Cut to 9 years later, and we’ve sold over a million and a half tees with this logo and wordmark.