A Breath of Fresh Air: with Alex Tan and Abraham Campillo of Mouthwash Studio

Front and Center

The episode explores the organic evolution of Mouthwash Studio from a group of Instagram-connected friends into a multi-faceted creative eco

Key takeaways

• Mouthwash Studio began as a side project in 2019 rooted in Instagram's 'suggested users' community.
• The studio's first major client break came from a tweet by Macklemore regarding his brand, Daddy.

Main topics

• Creative Agency Origins
• Brand Ecosystems

Notable quotes

The strategy in life is doing cool shit with the homies.

Conclusion

A profound look at how authenticity and relationship-driven design can

Transcript preview

Speaker 1 (0:00) All right, Kevin, big time guest alert. Mouthwash Studio is a design studio centered on new ideas and defining experiences, partnering with our generation's leading brands and innovators to influence culture. You've probably seen their work for clients like Nike, Ramoa, Seed, The North Face, Airco, and many, many more. They also run an all-day cafe in Los Angeles called Cafe Tondo, Mouthwash Magazine, and a newsletter called Findings. Welcome to Front Center. Alex and Abraham from Mouthwash. Yeah, I mean, 2018 is, it feels like yesterday, but it's really, now it's Speaker 3 (0:42) eight years ago. Eight years ago, yeah. When Speaker 1 (0:44) did you guys start, 2019? June Speaker 3 (0:45) 2019, yeah. Speaker 1 (0:46) But we were putting out like... Speaker 3 (0:47) But it was the side project before the studio. Well, that's the thing Speaker 1 (0:51) that I'm super fascinated by. So there's four of you guys, right? Four partners, yeah. Speaker 3 (0:54) How did you guys meet? So Abe's from Dallas, Texas. I'm from Columbus, Ohio. God's country. Yeah. Speaker 1 (1:01) Mackenzie... Kevin's from Ohio, so... Yeah, yeah, we were talking about that. Speaker 3 (1:04) And Mackenzie's from Chicago and then Ben's from Salt Lake City. So we're not coastal people. Like we grew up in middle America. And so I think like really all we had was the internet growing up. And so there was a point in time, this is like a funny origin story, but there's like, there was a point in time where Instagram, it was only like people like photographers and designers that were on Instagram. And the. Instagram, when it was a very small company, less than 10 people, they did a really great job of recognizing the creative community on their platform. What's the platform? Speaker 1 (1:39) Instagram? I've heard of this. What is that? Speaker 3 (1:42) What happened to them? I don't know. They would recognize creative contributors to the platform by giving them what they called a suggested user. If you were to go on and sign up for Instagram today, there was a list of people. Cristiano Ronaldo or Selena Gomez. And then they would be like Abraham, like on the list. And if you were on the suggested users list, you would like gain like, I don't know, 50,000 followers in like three weeks. So you mean literally Speaker 1 (2:09) when you sign up for the app, cause they're like, Hey, you might want to follow these other people. Yeah. Speaker 3 (2:13) So they would mix you with like people from the community with like celebrities, Chris Speaker 2 (2:18) Rock, Chris Speaker 3 (2:18) Rock, literally Will Smith. Speaker 2 (2:20) Before Instagram booty models. Like Speaker 3 (2:22) very much so like creative community. Um, and so what happened like over time is like the suggested users of the world, like kind of found each other and like became friends online. Wait, I'm telling you, it's real. I swear to God, I'm telling you it's real. And when you get suggested, you would then like Instagram would reach out to you and be like, Hey, like who are like a few other people that you would recommend to be the next suggested users? Um, So Abe was suggested, McKenzie was suggested. I tried everything I could possibly do to get suggested and never did. Speaker 2 (2:53) But you also were like 10 years old. Speaker 3 (2:56) I was like a few years younger than everybody else was. But I found those people and we all kind of became friends. And that's kind of where it started. But we were just like online friends. Hey, man, nice shot. Good lighting. Love your work. That was like the interaction. And as we graduated university, we got jobs at agencies out in L.A. far away from family because like we don't have any family in the coast so Speaker 1 (3:17) you guys all knew each other from the internet from instagram from suggested users and then all moved to la and Speaker 3 (3:27) then Speaker 1 (3:28) high pulse met each Speaker 3 (3:30) other yeah yeah yeah went to a house and started Speaker 1 (3:32) dancing well Speaker 3 (3:33) we didn't we didn't have any friends or family out there so like the only people like we were like there working this job but different jobs different jobs and then it was just kind of like i don't know anyone like do you want Speaker 2 (3:43) to Speaker 3 (3:43) hang out? And then we just started hanging out. And Speaker 1 (3:45) then Speaker 3 (3:45) we hung Speaker 2 (3:45) out and I was like, hey, do you want to do this tomorrow? Speaker 3 (3:48) Yeah, do you want Speaker 1 (3:48) to Speaker 3 (3:48) hang out again tomorrow? That's beautiful. That Speaker 1 (3:51) is a beautiful story. And so you guys are basically just, yeah, a friend group that went from the internet to IRL. That was the three of us. And then I worked at Speaker 2 (3:59) Basic Agency in San Diego and that's where I met Ben. And then it was the same thing, but it was just like, hey, do you want to keep working on stuff together? It was just like, that walk-up project did pretty good. Let's run that back. Okay. yeah it was Speaker 1 (4:12) just like more Speaker 2 (4:13) more of that so Speaker 1 (4:14) before the work though there was the magazine right yeah that's the story so it happens yeah so mouthwash wasn't the name of an agency it was the name of a magazine yeah Speaker 3 (4:22) so yeah me abe and mckenzie um you know before agency job like in the morning and then in the evening like we would just like kind of hang around and just talk about okay like what if we made something that wasn't just gonna post on instagram like what if we like made something that people could like hold and touch yeah And so we just started working on this print project and this print magazine. Got up, gathered up all our money, which wasn't a whole lot at the time. Spent it all on like a printer that probably overcharged us. And then we spent like 17 grand on Speaker 2 (4:52) merch. Wow. Speaker 3 (4:54) Huge mistake. Speaker 1 (4:55) No, not a huge mistake. I want to tell you why. Speaker 2 (4:57) We sold out. We sold whatever we could. We were like, this was not what we thought. It would be like, you Speaker 1 (5:02) know how I found out about the margins. How Speaker 2 (5:04) did you just, Speaker 1 (5:04) the sick case. Speaker 3 (5:05) Oh, yeah, the Cigar Case, yeah. That is how I knew about Mouthwash. Well, it's funny because we would sit outside of this coffee shop on Sunset Neck, Woodcat, and we just literally smoked cigarettes to, like, curb the appetite because we didn't have enough money to buy three meals a day. Speaker 1 (5:20) But so the magazine, who named it Mouthwash? Who gets credit for that? Was Speaker 3 (5:24) it Speaker 1 (5:24) McKenzie? I Speaker 3 (5:24) think it was McKenzie. It was, like, a list of really, really horrible names. Speaker 3 (5:30) The idea was like, how do we make something that feels different or like a breath of fresh air? Speaker 2 (5:34) It's a fucking Speaker 3 (5:35) great name. It's Speaker 2 (5:36) funny that Speaker 3 (5:37) you say that because, I mean, we feel like it's a good name now. If you were to present it to a Speaker 1 (5:42) client, they'd be like, oh, fuck no. Speaker 3 (5:44) It Speaker 1 (5:44) works so well for a studio, for a magazine. I just, I always instantly thought that's a fucking great name. How did you guys not to? How did you guys come up with Center? Speaker 2 (5:57) It's my last name. Speaker 2 (6:00) But it's great because it feels abstracted. No fucking way. Awesome question. Yeah. I Speaker 1 (6:05) love that. Yeah. It is my God given last name. And you were just like, yeah, that sounds nice. I Speaker 2 (6:11) wasn't there. Yeah. It's my company. Yeah. I Speaker 1 (6:15) looked at Brian Collins and I was like, I could make a company called center. That would be pretty. But I'm super glad that I never had to name it. Yeah. It doesn't feel like, Speaker 2 (6:25) you know, I'm very last name. It was like, okay. Speaker 1 (6:28) I'm very grateful that I never had to name it because I might not have started a company. I genuinely mean that because like naming is Speaker 3 (6:36) so fucking hard. Speaker 1 (6:37) It can be cringe if you fuck it up. And also like naming a design studio and doing anything for yourself is the hardest thing. So hard. Like anytime we do website, anytime we do merch, anything, it's super fucking annoying and hard because we're so critical. Speaker 3 (6:49) Yeah. So Speaker 1 (6:49) I. don't genuinely center exists partly because i have a fucking great last name but you're Speaker 3 (6:56) who cares about the work yeah no i was just like i Speaker 1 (6:58) was born to do this but you guys it's like mouthwash is a great name and just because it's a product and you take it out of context it's just i don't know it really fucking works and so i remember seeing it on the sick case and seeing mouthwash what the Speaker 3 (7:11) fuck is that and Speaker 1 (7:12) so for you guys it was a magazine and then You spent $17,000 just making sick cases and t-shirts? Speaker 3 (7:19) We Speaker 1 (7:19) spent some Speaker 3 (7:20) money. Speaker 1 (7:21) I Speaker 3 (7:21) guess Speaker 1 (7:21) before Speaker 3 (7:22) we get to the merch stuff, we spent some money on this print magazine and we were like, man, we need to make this money back. Speaker 2 (7:27) You know what I mean? It was Speaker 3 (7:28) like five grand or something. Because you couldn't sell the magazine. Yeah, yeah. Speaker 2 (7:31) So we were like, okay. No, Speaker 3 (7:33) we Speaker 2 (7:33) sold out the Speaker 3 (7:33) magazine. Speaker 2 (7:33) We did sell out the magazine, Speaker 3 (7:34) but the first like... strategy was like was like okay like how do we build an audience who would be interested in this magazine when we release it so then we started doing a podcast just pre Speaker 2 (7:45) joe rogan yeah Speaker 1 (7:47) we Speaker 2 (7:48) we Speaker 3 (7:48) walked so joe rogan Speaker 2 (7:49) could yeah you're in the pre-joe rogan era podcasting like yeah a long time ago Speaker 1 (7:54) at that time did you have any thoughts of creating an agency i think i'd always dreamt of Speaker 2 (7:59) doing something but it was more so like traditional advertising yeah we talked about like production company but we didn't Like I wanted to do commercials. I had to come from like advertising, see Mad Men twice, you know, it was like, Speaker 3 (8:11) that's what I wanted to do. That's Speaker 2 (8:12) all Speaker 3 (8:12) it takes. And Abe and I were both working in like image video as art directors at agencies before. Got it. Speaker 1 (8:18) So you weren't working at like traditional design shops. My goal was Speaker 2 (8:22) to be a director, not like a creative director, like, you know, do design. Like it was, it was more so Speaker 1 (8:27) like. I want to do commercials. I want to do Super Bowl spots. No, that makes a lot of sense. And so you start the print magazine. And then you guys did an event and 600 people showed up, I saw, or something like that. How did a poster go viral? That was one of my questions. I don't know because Speaker 3 (8:44) it Speaker 1 (8:44) wasn't Speaker 3 (8:45) very well designed. Do we do it on Facebook? I think we put it on Eventbrite and the algorithm did its Speaker 2 (8:52) thing. Twitter, do your thing. Speaker 3 (8:53) That kind of thing. But I don't know. I think like... people want a reason to gather and they want a reason to celebrate stuff and i just moved to la but we went back to chicago to do it because that's where we had the most friends and like where the most connections were and perhaps like because it was it's such a traditional advertising city that like people were just like really wanting something new and fresh and i don't know i guess it just worked out but that was the first moment like when all those people were there we're like man like maybe we could keep doing this or something like this. Speaker 2 (9:22) Our history is entire. Like since the beginning, we've always evolved. Yeah. Like I think we've seen what it was to go from like doing campaign to then web to now we do predominantly brand. Yeah. And like that's because also COVID happened. So then people were like, hey, I want a website. And that I think really influenced just like the output. But now it's like, I would say Speaker 1 (9:45) predominantly we do brand. One of the things that I really admire about you guys is that you guys are in that rare category where you've gone from like cool design studio, but really the entire creative ecosystem of things that you guys do. But it makes perfect sense because it starts with the things and then became a studio. So you guys do print magazine, then merch, then a podcast. And then you're like, okay, let's pool together. Or sort of like, basically you could, did you quit your jobs too? Speaker 3 (10:11) Well, Abe Speaker 1 (10:12) met. Speaker 3 (10:12) been down at basic while like we were still kind of doing this passion project and i think that's i mean i didn't even know what design was at the time really and i don't think i mean you were learning Speaker 2 (10:21) i i like remember seeing their like 2016 this is for the old heads like their uh 2016 their 2016 like year in review website and i was just like that's what a website could be i was like i didn't know i don't know how to do that i want to learn and so like i i started reaching out to them and then they hired me for freelance and then they were like hey do you want a full-time job yeah Speaker 3 (10:41) that's Speaker 2 (10:42) how that started but it was just like i was like like really just like curious about that world and i was like i don't think this like social media thing and this digital thing's Speaker 3 (10:52) a Speaker 2 (10:52) trend like i like i think i really need to like pony up and like try to learn this thing and i'm like you're not gonna learn that in school at the time like you were if you were to take a social media class or something like that was a joke um because it just takes that long to make a textbook right yeah so i i went to learn there and it was like really transformational in the sense of like just i think they were doing like beats by dre my first day like we were working on the google pitch to like be like their largest agency of record so learned a lot of that and i think just also just like really hit it off with ben in the same way they had hit it off with alex and mckenzie and um also ben is like i don't know the easiest guy to get along with probably um a very mild-mannered talented designer Speaker 3 (11:37) they would like do passion projects outside of work and that's like we're waka waka Speaker 1 (11:40) Got it. So Waka Waka was a project that was not a mouthwash thing at first or it was like sort of just like a. Yeah, it was kind of like, yeah, you guys kind of did it yourself and then Speaker 3 (11:49) kind of adopted it. Speaker 1 (11:51) Self Speaker 2 (11:51) -initiated. But I mean, all of our stuff was self-initiated. Yeah. Yeah. Speaker 1 (11:54) That's kind of how it works. Like you have to have. not have to, but you could like start a company and be like, we're now open for business. But the way that most, and same for me, was like start taking on some projects, some things, and it's like sort of freelance. And then it's like, oh,