If you love niche businesses, you're in luck – check out this wholesome community that celebrates Thai trucking culture. We also get into all things flowers – plus, the businesses to hit up on your next upstate road trip. | | 01. Film photography is making a comeback 📷. But the rise in interest has also seen a rise in prices: over the past five years, the average cost of a roll of camera film has increased by more than 50%. Malcolm Dia – formerly a designer at GQ – saw the gap and started Manual, a film photography brand that sells affordable film equipment. 'We want to democratize film photography,' he told us.
02. And that's not the only brand changing the world of film photography. Here are four more to watch. - California-based Harvey Film Lab offers affordable mail-in film development (and it just launched a drop box in Costa Mesa).
- Kacheckfilm is building a film photography community for creatives in Oman.
- Just-launched Balcony Industries uses 'dip and dunk' robotics to minimize film-processing errors.
- Brooklyn development lab Nice Film Club offers a membership model for frequent photographers.
03. Prinita Thevarajah got into glass arts as a way to decompress during a master's degree, and now she travels around the world making intricate vessels and teaching (her next workshop is in Brooklyn). | | | | TIP. Taking what you know and teaching is one way to expand your business – we've got a guide on how to go about starting an online course. | | | | | | 04. Onguza is a Namibian bike manufacturer building world-class, steel-framed bikes.
05. Hoovu is a subscription service for fresh flowers in India (which are used daily for Hindu rituals) that's cutting down on waste with a more efficient supply chain and improved packaging – and it also has a line of incense made from discarded temple flowers 🌸.
06. Bangkok's Vasohvasorum makes hilariously large (though oddly endearing) inflatable bouquets.
07. Elsewhere in Bangkok, our contributor Pam Vivatsurakit just told us about three very niche and very cool local businesses 🚚. - 'In the Ari neighborhood, a young, vibrant area of the city, MADBACON is an indie convenience store with a modern street style. It offers old-school snacks, sweets and candy that reminds you of those found in mom-and-pop shops from the past, plus art books, pre-worn fashion items, merch and a cafe corner designed to bring people together. There's also a space where artists and creatives can exhibit their work.'
- 'Baan Boon is a manufacturer and exporter of natural handicraft Japanese-style sorghum brooms. It's a 35-year-old family business. The brand and products were introduced to the Thai market during Covid when exports slowed. Its brooms are designed with both function and aesthetics in mind. It's the kind of broom you'll want to display rather than hiding it in a storage room. Recently, I saw it's even created mini broom keychains, which are very, very cute.'
- 'Trucker Culture is a page created to tell stories about trucks, truckers and truck cultures in Thailand. We're an agricultural country and we've seen old, dusty, messy trucks on the road all our lives, but never really appreciated their beauty – the love and care, the tremendous effort and the pride a person feels when owning a truck to make a living, carry goods and transport themselves and their families to different places. It also hosts events and organizes festivals.'
| | 08. Clear bags and friendship bracelet companies are blowing up thanks to Taylor Swift's stadium tour – and don't expect to see demand ending after Eras. Hair-dye company Hally Hair, for example, plans to target Beyoncé fans later this summer.
09. We've been seeing PACKBAGS everywhere. They're handmade in Amsterdam with modular components, so you can switch out straps or turn a tote into a small purse – like zip-off cargo pants, but for bags.
10. Andy Martinez sewed a cowboy boot onto Air Force 1s as a fun experiment, but his design took off. It's country, it's streetwear, it's memeable – it needs to be seen 🤠.
11. Pixel Shoe is a one-man shoe factory where designer Tidhar Zagagi live-molds polyurethane foam to the wearer's foot. He started in 2021 and has since collabed with other up-and-coming experimental designers. | | | | TRY IT. Coming up with new ideas is crucial to running a creative business, but sometimes it's hard to do on demand. Business coach Zoe Mallett advises people to try being bored. Here's why. | | | | | | 12. SAMAVAI is a brand based in LA and Tamil Nadu, India, that makes gender-affirming garments and accessories out of vintage saris.
13. This rice cooker from Korean design firm Found/Founded is a simple single-button device, but it looks like it was made by Apple.
14. Our Shanghai contributor Yaling Jiang recently spotted a similarly simple but brilliant device. 'I'm amazed [at] how companies can find the pain point and product-market fit. Take this underwear-washing machine. Chinese people have long [had] the perception that underwear needs to be washed daily and separately from their laundry (my mom certainly thinks so). At the same time, they don't always want to run a load every day, so many of them hand-wash their underwear. Here comes the savior: a small, neat-looking underwear washer. Many manufacturers have similar [products] but Daily Neaty is the one I saw that has a brand philosophy.'
15. Check out the Altar I, a wireless mechanical keyboard from hardware brand Electronic Materials Office that's made with premium, sustainable materials. It's giving Teenage Engineering (a cult Swedish music hardware maker) but for office supplies.
16. Speaking of Teenage Engineering, it just announced its latest product – a field audio recorder with a motorized tape reel, kind of like the old iPod click wheel.
17. If you can't visit the Gustaf Westman-designed wine bar in Stockholm that we mentioned a few weeks back, you can get on the waiting list to buy the wine table he created for it – it's a spill-proof masterpiece 🍷(or follow the team running the bar, LLIPS, an LGBTQ+ natural wine collective and club night).
18. Also in Stockholm: Balue is a new specialty coffee shop. Founder David You has worked on some pretty impressive pop-ups, including one in NYC with furniture maker Lichen. | | | | DIG DEEPER. Pop-ups are a good way to test a business concept before you sign a lease. Here's everything you need to know about starting one. | | | | | | 19. The Brazón family left behind the economic instability of Venezuela and ended up in Miami, where father Manuel and son Jesús set up a cafe called Caracas Bakery. It makes Venezuelan-French bread and pastries 🇻🇪.
20. Chef Ki Kim is doing big things with his restaurant, Kinn, in Koreatown, Los Angeles.
21. Josh Niland, an Australian chef who pioneered the nose-to-tail movement for fish, has a new book coming out soon, called Fish Butchery.
22. Our New York-born, LA-based editor-at-large Danny Giacopelli has noticed a trend in his home state. 'People have been packing up from bigger cities to more rural, upstate New York for a while now, but the pandemic and the possibilities of WFH really accelerated the move (fresh air, slightly cheaper prices – but not for long). Take husband-husband [duo] Jeremy King and Ken Baldwin, who have opened Little King, a design and homeware store, cafe and restaurant in Beacon, NY. Jeremy's a pastry chef who used to work at Dover Street Market's Rose Bakery in LA and Ken worked in branding in the fashion and beauty industries for years.'
23. A little further out, Enoki is an Asian pantry shop in Catskill, NY.
24. And check out Gardenheir – a shop in ski town Windham, NY, with stylish gardening gear.
25. Coming up this month, there's a big fermentation festival in Hudson Valley, featuring '30 producers of fermented products, from pickles, cured meats and chocolate, to cider, beer and wines'.
26. Finally, a PSA for anyone heading into the sun this weekend: even though tanning is making a comeback (see tanning oil brand Tanning Club), please also wear sunscreen (here's a nice reef-safe one) 😎. | | Elsewhere in Courier:
🤳 On TikTok: The best friends who started a rum brand based on their heritage.
📰 In print: What's hot in Mexico City? Pick up our latest issue to find out.
💻 Online [Partnership]: How this ceramics company went from a part-time hobby to a full-time business. | | | |
