In the fine tradition of, uhm, Bill Simmons, we’d like to share the origin story of At Large.

Naming is both more and less important than you think it is. For us, without a name, we have a hard time moving forward. It isn’t real until it’s been named, and naming is something we take a lot of pride in, as evidenced by the very fond feelings we still have for our former selves, Full Stop and United Pixelworkers, as well as our current incarnation, Cotton Bureau.

You’re probably familiar with the finer points of naming. A name should be easy to spell, memorable, meaningful, and, most importantly, somewhat available wherever you intend for it to reside. It doesn’t have to tick all of the boxes, but typically the more of them it can cross off the list, the better. In addition to those criteria, there’s one other that we’re guilty of incorporating more often than not: our favorite names are usually puns. Our first company blog was Full Disclosure. We even had a second, now defunct alter ego blog called “Full Exposure”. The Cotton Bureau Tumblr is Tumble Dry and the designer interview series, “Freshly Laundered”. It’s very possible we take our puns to unhealthy levels. If you need more of that, you’ll love us on Twitter.

So, why “At Large”? First, Medium publications require names, and, as with Tumblr, we thought playing off the host’s name made sense. Second, sizing is an essential part of t-shirt buying. When you combine those two, you can see how we ended up where we are. We think the name is a good… fit. Now that we all have our groans out of the way, there are a few other aspects of the name that appealed to us. It wasn’t too obvious. (As much as we love a good play on words, we prefer them to stay out of the way, if possible.) It’s easy to spell, remember, share, etc. And, bringing it full circle, “at large” is a common designation for someone in the publishing industry that contributes in an irregular, loosely defined way. That suits us, as we like our editorial freedom.

Before you go, we thought you might enjoy some of the names that didn’t make the cut. Some of these are better or more completely fleshed out than others.

• Thread / Threadbare
• Fabric
• Weave
• 100% Cotton
• Blend
• Fit
• Fiber
• Fit & Fiber
• Extra Large / Extra Small
• Ravel / Unraveled
• Bleach / Unbleached
• Raw
• Cloth
• Whole Cloth
• Raw Cloth
• Textile
• Unbleached Raw
• Off the Cuff
• Back of the Drawer

Anyway, welcome to At Large!

Please bear with me. It’s been a while since I’ve written anything substantial, anything that presumes to represent the company I co-founded. I am therefore falling back on the old crutch of writers everywhere: writing about the process of writing. I wish there was another way.

We (Jay and I) hold our writing to a high standard, an impossible standard, really. We sweat every word; and not just the words themselves but, more importantly, the meaning behind them and their reason for existing in the first place. Is what we’re writing contrary to something we’ve previously written? Will it still be true this time next year? How will it be received by our friends? Will anyone care? Should anyone care? Does it all hang together? Does it move the perception of Cotton Bureau forward? Was it worth our time? Has someone else already written the same thing but better? Do we even know that what we’re writing is true? These are paralyzing yet indispensable questions. It’s frighteningly easy to puke out quasi-profound aphorisms; hollow, unoriginal, immature, often dangerous advice.

For too long, however, it’s held us back. We have a lot to say. It’s time we started saying it.

To whet your appetite for At Large writing to come, let me start by confessing one more thing: Business is a struggle.

I don’t know how else to put it. Despite being together for 6.5 years, Jay and I still look at each other every day and wonder why we do it, whether we’ve overlooked some essential detail that would double our revenue and halve our expenses. We live and work in Pittsburgh when it seems like the rest of the world is in Brooklyn or Austin or San Francisco or Portland. We used to make money by selling websites. Now we sell t-shirts. We shuttered two successful businesses to work on one marginally more successful business. We watch as startup owners and wannabe startup owners congratulate each other on selling out their users, or, in laughably rare circumstances, their customers. We disagree constantly, about everything. We take turns worrying that whatever mysterious phenomenon has kept us in business this long will just as mysteriously disappear tomorrow. We stare at the list of features we want to add to the site, the bugs that stick out like sore thumbs. We shudder at the endless grind of owner-operatorship.

As hopeless (and ridiculous) as that all sounds, however, we’re still here and still love what we do for one simple reason: our satisfaction is derived from meeting internal not external objectives. Success for us—and we think this is something every company should be required to state publicly—is building a sustainable company that helps designers and communities meet their financial, practical, and creative needs (at least when it comes to selling t-shirts and other odds and ends). It means aligning our business model and values. It means prioritizing people, promoting exceptional graphic design, and speaking up even when we know it won’t be possible to please everyone. It means nurturing and cultivating our relationships with you and, just as important, your relationships with each other. It means soberly evaluating our role in contributing to your fear of missing out and the constant stream of distractions that keep us all from the vast majority of moments in our lives that are infinitely more important than finding the perfectly designed tee. We can (and will) do a better job in all of those areas. That—and not an illustory pot of gold at the end of the rainbow or crushing it or winning—is what motivates us.

We’re not perfect, and Cotton Bureau is very much a work in progress. But we plan on sticking around for a while and making ourselves useful, so you may as well get comfortable.