Sean Dowdell - Brand Renegades

Sean and Thora are simply the best at what they do. When I wanted the best in their field I sent my team out to get them and didnt stop until we made a deal with them. They are great people and great business leaders!

BOB PARSONS, FOUNDER OF GODADDY

In the time that I have known Sean and Thora, I have been impressed with their business acumen, entrepreneurial spirit, and integrity. While it is no small feat to be successful and trustworthy like Sean and Thora, it is something special.

TOM WHALLEY, CHIEF LABEL EXECUTIVE OF CONCORD RECORDS AND FORMER CEO OF WARNER BROS.

Sean and Thora Dowdell are the true definition of business disruptors. Brand Renegades is an eye-opening, page-turning book that will give you the inspiration and courage to step outside of the norm and make a big impact in your industry. I highly recommend this book to anyone thats ready to take their business to the next level of success!

DEBBIE ALLEN, BUSINESS MENTOR AND BESTSELLING AUTHOR OF SUCCESS IS EASY

OUR FEARLESS PATH
FROM STARTUP TO
GLOBAL BRAND

SEAN AND THORA DOWDELL

Entrepreneur Press

Entrepreneur Press, Publisher

Cover Design: Andrew Welyczko

Production and Composition: Eliot House Productions

2021 by Entrepreneur Media, Inc.

All rights reserved.

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ISBN 978-1-64201-122-7 (paperback) | ISBN 978-1-61308-443-4 (ebook)

Printed in the United States of America

W e are entrepreneurs who currently own 13 successful businesses. We have been in business since 1995 and currently have more than 100 employees. Our largest company is Club Tattoo, a luxury tattoo and piercing studio chain that grosses more than $12 million annually and continues to expand. We have retail locations in some of the most successful and sought-after properties in the U.S., such as the Grand Canal Shoppes at The Venetian Resort, Miracle Mile Shops at the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino, The LINQ Hotel + Experience, and the 5th Avenue shopping district in Scottsdale, Arizona, just to name a few. We have done global business collaborations with brands such as Caesars Entertainment, Sole Technology/Etnies shoes, Jarden/Oster, Bicycle Playing Cards, and many more. This is just a sample of our business resume, but it gives you an idea of who we are and how we got here.

After 23 years of marriage (as of 2021), two children, several homes, 13 companies, and well over 100 employees, it is a wonderful feeling to share our story with other entrepreneurs. We have been quite successful and will share some of those successes with you throughout this book. However, we believe the more interesting parts of our story are told through our failures, our challenges, and how we dealt with them. Sometimes our reactions were intuitive; other times they were emotional and ended up not working out so well. In any case, we hope you find our story inspiring, uplifting, and at least interesting.

We both grew up in the 1970s under the Jimmy Carter administration, during one of the worst economic climates the United States has ever seen. Both of us had parents who worked full time and were what was then known as latchkey children. We learned at a young age to be independent thinkers and understood that if we wanted something, we had to create the opportunity to get it. We chose the entrepreneurs path of going out and creating it for ourselves. Through hard work and perseverance, we would create businesses worth tens of millions of dollars, employ thousands of people over the years, and make a meaningful impact not only on our industry, but on our community as well.

THORA:I grew up in a small town called Price, Utah. It was a small coal mining community with a population of about 8,500, in which the haves and the have nots were completely segregated. Although my extended family was quite large, with many cousins, uncles, aunts, etc., my nuclear family was small. It was just me, my mother Willie Lue, my father Geno, and my brother Jason.

My mother and father divorced when I was 7 years old, and my brother and I were given a choice of which parentwe wanted to live with. It seemed like a cruel choice to give a child, but I understand that at the time they were doing what they thought was best. After all, back then there were not as many resources to help people cope with difficult situations. I chose my mother, and Jason chose our father.

Once our families were separated, my mother struggled to provide for us throughout my upbringing. While holding down a full-time job, she also worked as a waitress on the side to help support us. We lived in a low-income housing development just outside town that was nicknamed Divorce Alley, due to the many single women with children who lived there. She did her best, and I became the person I am today through many of the tough lessons I had to go through while growing up under those circumstances. I believe my drive to succeed was created through watching my mothers sheer determination to never give up and always get up and try again.

SEAN:I also grew up in a blue-collar family with two hardworking parents, Kip and Kathy, along with my brother Kelly, and sister Shannan, in Phoenix, Arizona. I had a small extended family, limited to a few cousins, one aunt, and two uncles. My strongest family bonding memories are with my grandparents. My grandmothers, Lois and Editha, along with my grandfather, Russell, were hugely influential in my upbringing and helped create what would become my determination to build special things.

Both my mother and father demonstrated the importance of a strong work ethic when I was growing up. I think I only saw them take four or five sick days (this is probably an exaggeration, but its how I remember them) over my entire childhood. They worked hard every day and provided for us children the best they could.

We still struggled financially during my childhood, especially when my father left his job and went back to college to get his degree. I admire the courage it must have taken for my parents to tackle a challenge like that in the late 1970s and early 1980s. I always had a feeling of missing out on things as a child, whether it was the vacations my friends were going on, the clothes we couldnt afford, or the coolest new stereo to play our cassette tapes on. However, as I look back, we were always fed, clothed, and had a solid roof over our heads, along with parents who cared enough to push their children forward