- May 19, 2011
Waterloo.
- @brilliantcrank
- CMO / Partner
A month ago, after drinking a few Sundowns in celebration of turning forty years of age, I bought myself a pair of Old Gringos. They are a worn-in light brown and are adorned with a fierce phoenix stitched in the front of each boot.
For those who know me, they’re thinking that this purchase was completely influenced by a tequila fueled mid-life crisis, but they would be mostly wrong. For you see, I acquired this tall footwear after being advised that you can’t do business in Texas without a pair of cowboy boots.
And that’s going to be important because Happy Cog West is moving to Austin, Texas.
We are going to Austin and I could not be happier. This will be a slow transition which only means that I’ll have to book the marching band multiple times. Later this month, Ryan and his family will be the first to arrive on the scene. Kevin will migrate down from Philadelphia a few months after. Come October, Helenita, Stephen and I will leave sunny San Francisco in time to attend the Gowalla Halloween Party. Most of us will finally be working and consuming tamales under the same roof and that’s the best part of all.
Centrally located in the U.S., beautiful, friendly, warm-weathered Austin will serve as the perfect base of operations for us to continue serving our clients on the West coast while exploring opportunities in the middle of the country, from Minneapolis to Houston. Even more exciting is the opportunity to make new relationships with many of the thousands of companies, non-profits, and universities located in our soon-to-be backyard. All is within constant olfactory range of smoked meat.
More importantly, I can not wait for Happy Cog to become active members of the the Austin design and development community featuring: Trent Walton and the boys from Paravel. Alamofire Alumni Josh Williams and Keegan Jones. Gowalla wonderkid Tim Van Damme. The amazingly talented Shyama Golden. Developer extraordinaire Manton Reece. Austin Center for Design founder Jon Kolko. The hip folks at Public School (who we don’t know from Adam yet, but love their work). Hive Five’n Christopher Schmitt. Dan Benjamin and the 5by5 Broadcast System. Method & Craft’s Phil Coffman. Last but not least, you don’t know him but you’ll love him, William “Bad Billy” Hankey. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg!
Austin, we’re on our way and we’ll be home soon.