We were lucky to catch up with Dan Abrams recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Dan thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?

I am very fortunate to be able to say I make a full-time living from my creative work. When I first started this was a hobby, then it turned into a side business, and then when I was laid off from my job it serendipitously turned into a full time job. I began by using my design skills to create artwork for other companies and private clients to sell their own products and over the last 4 years I have transitioned to now almost exclusively designing and selling my own products. Although I still design for private clients who need logo work or merchandise designs, the main focus of my business is to create cool products my customers would enjoy. I do believe experience is the best teacher and of course knowing some things I have learned may have sped me up, but truthfully I don’t believe you can speed up the process. The time when you think you are ready is extremely frustrating, but the lessons learned then set me up for my greater success when my time comes.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

I started @athletelogos as a hobby and creative outlook after working in corporate graphic design for 10 years. I originally did not expect to turn what I do into even a side business, let alone my full time lifestyle. I began by designing logos, first as a fan and then professionally for athletes both pros and amateur. Due to my passion being a baseball fan I ended up gaining a social media following of fans of my same teams in multiple sports. On the client side I design logos and merchandise designs, full illustrations of athletes that they can sell on their own, or partner with me to offer through my website. On the fan side, I have a ton of New York sports related fan products from hats, shirts, neon signs and a variety of accessories. I am now focusing on designing more nationally diverse products and plan to transition to globally soon as well. I am most proud of 2 things in my professional career; 1 that I was home for every single day of my daughter’s life in the past 5 years, and the other that I have built a community of extremely supportive fans of my work. Seeing my daugther wake up every morning, never missing a practice or a game and always being home when she gets home from school is worth more than any salary I could ever make at a regular 9-5 job. On the fan side, to have these group of people who support me so passionately and are behind me through every win or loss I have had on social media is extremely humbling. Without those people who cheer me on I would have never made it this far.

Any fun sales or marketing stories?

One of my favorite marketing stories was this year when Mets pitcher Kodai Senga came to the US to pitch with his famous “ghost forkball”. Before he even arrived for Spring Training I designed, and sent him a neon sign of a ghost fork figure. I went on to create shirts and hats with my ghost fork designs and Kodai loved them. Every new product I released I sent to him and he was so supportive and thankful, even wearing the hat in all of his post game interviews. When the season began a Twitter friend of mine asked if he could make Ghost Fork signs to bring to the games when Senga pitches. He did and the signs were seen on all of his local and national TV telecasts. My ghost fork design is now synonymous with the pitch itself and a fan favorite here in New York.

How did you build your audience on social media?

My social media audience was mainly built by two things; being true to myself and my passion, and interacting with people in a genuine way. The majority of people who follow me at this point are fans of the same teams I am, so all I did was design things about my favorite teams and players and then interact with like minded fans on Twitter and Instagram. Had I been a little broader in the beginning by designing other teams, people who rooted for my teams may not have realized how passionate I am. By staying true to just what I really loved, made people trust that I am the same as them. The second piece of this is genuinely interacting with your social media followers. I firmly believe that if someone takes the time to leave a comment on my artwork, it is the least I can do to say thank you to each and every one of them. There were days where I had 500 comments to reply to and I made sure to block out a certain amount of time to do so. I believe this is one of the main reasons why my social media following so passionately supports me.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.athletelogos.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/athletelogos
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/athletelogos/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/dan-abrams-a68418129/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/athletelogos
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvUzrGu5KDPAbKNHV9eAVFA

Image Credits
Photo of me at my desk – Newsday Photo of Senga in Hat – @Geminikeez Photo of the three Mets in The Babies shirt – @Geminikeez