We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Jon Terzini a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Jon, thanks for joining us today. How do you think about vacations as a business owner? Do you take them and if so, how? If you don’t, why not?

Yes, I take a lot of vacations actually. I’ve made it part of my job really. I’m not complaining. Part of what makes HomeTown Riot work is the travel aspect. I want the designs that go on the apparel to FEEL local, and more often than not I like to experience the place I’m making a design for myself. I usually bring my sketchbook with me and make 10 minute sketches of something about that place that I like – what gives it an aura. I’ll then take that back home and work on a design.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Jon Terzini. I’m the founder and designer of HomeTown Riot. Hometown Riot is my baby. It’s a destination apparel brand with a knack for creating bold and fun designs centered around local hometown places. I like to travel a lot, and along the way I discover unique places around the country and create local designs inspired by them. I usually start with the places I’ve personally been to and left an impression. Our goal is to bring places to life with bold, nostalgic apparel that celebrates the cities, landmarks, and state and national parks people call home.

I’m what you would call ‘the creative type’. One of them artist folk. Illogical things appear logical to me, I can’t stand boring or routine, I still play with colored pencils… Really, I just like to have fun. I bring that mentality into the business. It’s one of a kind. This ain’t your average dollar store souvenir stand t-shirt shop. We want our designs to be as unique as the places we call home.! Designs are hand-drawn, often times coming directly from sketches out of my travel sketchbook during one of my many adventures around the country. You won’t find anything like it.

I’m really proud to have found a creative outlet that allows me to express myself in ways that I enjoy along with being able to connect that with so many others. Sharing these designs with people and hearing their stories about the places that mean so much to them is incredibly fulfilling. Seeing someone light up when they find a shirt that represents them means the world to me.

I want fans of the brand to know this isn’t just merch. Every design comes from a place of curiosity and love. These shirts tell stories.

Okay – so how did you figure out the manufacturing part? Did you have prior experience?

I started HomeTown Riot doing my own shirt printing. This is 2009 and like many others I found myself just out of school and knee deep in the Great Recession. The outlook was dismal for a recent graphic design grad. The only job I could find was working for the local newspaper designing weekly grocery store ads for peanuts. I just couldn’t subject myself to that mindlessness.

There was a small screen printing shop in town. They had all of their assets (equipement, customers, blank apparel, and rentable space all up for sale for $10000. Having no hopes for a meaningful job, I purchased it and that’s when I really started learning the trade. I had pretty much no idea on how screen printing worked at that time, lol! ALOT of youtube went into my training. I wasn’t really doing HomeTown Riot prints in the beginning, mostly contract work for local businesses that needed apparel. That paid the bills.

I ran my own shop for 8 years crafting my design skills along the way. Today, I now outsource production to a couple of different local makers so I can focus on design and growth. Screen printing takes up SO much time with the logistics that I needed to separate myself from it to focus on the brand. I’ve used a few vendors over the years, some better than others. Some were downright awful. The ones I stick with I do so because they stand behind their print quality and they aren’t HUGE businesses. I like doing business with smaller shops; you get to know the owners and staff well and everyone stays on the same page.

Can you talk to us about how your side-hustle turned into something more.

HomeTown Riot was the side hustle to the screen printing shop. I would do festivals several times a year selling my own designs. Mostly local designs to Indianapolis. People loved them – still do! It was around 2016 that I decided to start an e-commerce store to sell them online. It was still a side hustle at that time though. COVID 2020 tanked my contract printing sales and that’s when I decided to take HomeTown Riot seriously. Now it’s my main focus because I both love it, but it’s also scalable.

Contact Info:

• Website: hometownriot.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hometownriot/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shophometownriot
• Twitter: https://x.com/hometownriot
• Other: https://bsky.app/profile/hometownriot.bsky.social