Ep. 6: Bobby Hundreds

In Episode 6 of Probably Nothing TZ (@TZhongg) and Alexis Ohanian (@alexisohanian) chat with with Bobby Hundreds (@bobbyhundreds), founder of streetwear brand The Hundreds. Bobby is also the creator of the Adam Bomb Squad, an NFT project consisting of 25,000 pieces each related to the history of the Hundreds company. In this episode you’ll hear about the similarities and differences of building a streetwear company versus an NFT project. You’ll also learn about why community and durability are so important to building a brand, and whether Bobby considers The Hundreds to be a successful brand after 18 years in existence.

- Links and References Mentioned in This Episode -

• About the Hundreds
• What NFTs Can Learn From Streetwear
• The Hundreds Blog
• This is Not a T-Shirt by Bobby Hundreds
• Beeple Sale
• The Robots

- Timestamps -

2:00: Who is Bobby Hundreds?
04:50: How did Bobby move a web2 company into the web3 space?
09:09: What is most important for the Hundreds?
12:40: Community and its importance to brand building.
17:00: How did Bobby first get into NFTs and what helped him understand them?
22:00: How does building the Hundreds compare to Adam Bomb Squad?
26:05: Why projects become cash grabs.
32:34: How will The Hundreds maintain a brand quality in a decentralized world?
39:50: Desert Island NFT

- Mentions -

• Trevor McFedries (@whatdotcd)
• Dee Goens (@dg_goens)

- Highlights -

*Web2 and Community*

“I didn’t want to be in the stage, I wanted to be on the floor, in the mosh pit with everyone else, and the microphone gets passed around.”

• Bobby didn’t have the tech knowledge at that point on how everyone could participate and rise up together. So he was doing it from within their brand and other brands trying to establish their community.

“If there is any web2 company that I feel is sympathetic to what is happening in web3 and decentralized, but really embodies that spirit. I think it’s us”

• Bobby literally wrote a book on building brands around community.
• What really makes The Hundreds function is the community. Their entire company is based on community.

“In telling someone else a story we are telling a little bit of ours”

• It was never about The Hundreds being the winner. It was about telling the story, which is why they invested so heavily in collaborations.
• Their mindset was that they were all part of this ecosystem together.

“As the tide rises, we lift all the boats together.”

• They were doing it in the industry and now they are doing it through the community.
• A lot of established brands are looking at web3 and are scared because they have a lot to lose but for Bobby it’s inspiring.

“To think that every single day I might lose this company entirely to the community is electrifying”

• Bobby wants to get to a point where he can completely lose himself to the community and everything is entirely decentralized.

“All signs point in that direction. They’ve tried so hard to make it the other way for the last 10-15 years and it caused a lot of distressed and made me unhappy.”

• Bobby has lived with this guilt because he has been convincing young people that they aren’t enough unless they have a product.
• A simple consumer to business brand never sat right with Bobby even when he was a kid. He felt like he was a walking billboard for someones company.

*Community and Ownership*

“We’ve always endowed upon the community this sense of ownership, they’ve always felt like they own this brand.”

• People buy brands for community, identity, and because they have a sense of ownership.

“When young people are getting our logo tattooed on them, it’s not that they are a fan of me, th...