Beer, Bacon, Freedom: Celebrating America

How would you like your shirts guaranteed in the event of tears, holes, loose threads, beer stains -- even blood stains from defending the American Flag from terrorists?Dan Alarik’s Grunt Style has you covered.The veteran-focused company in the Chicago suburbs has fast grown a loyal customer base and a reputation for creating distinctive, take-no-prisoners patriotic apparel. That loyalty and reputation is bolstered by commitments like Grunt Style’s “Beer Guarantee.” Whether you’re tangling with freedom’s enemies or a keg of America’s finest suds, the company ensures its shirts’ quality and durability for life. And now Alarik is building on his success in veteran apparel to offer a subscription t-shirt club called Club Grunt Style, targeted at “bacon-eating, beer-drinking, freedom-loving Americans.”The 33-year-old Army veteran-turned-entrepreneur founded Grunt Style a few years ago in the Chicago suburbs. He told the Daily Herald that his company has “a very military-like culture,” and compared its corporate structure to that of an infantry unit. “I had zero training going into this, so I read a lot about business and realized there are more similarities with the military,” Alarik said. It may explain how he’s grown Grunt Style into a $36 million business: it’s with the help and dedication of his over 150 employees - mostly veterans - who create one-of-a-kind apparel geared towards fellow veterans, and those who support them.

“I had my own challenges with fitting into office culture right out of the Army,” Alarik told We Are Mighty this summer. “From the beginning, one of my goals was to make Grunt Style feel familiar to vet employees.”Club Grunt Style is part of a trend toward subscription business models that keep consumers stocked up with the latest and best gear. Think similar services that send members shaving supplies or curated boxes every month.Pretty easy way to get “your monthly dose of freedom,” as Grunt Style calls it.

Club Grunt Style sees itself as “America’s fraternity,” and its strong social media presence bolsters that image. Over 3,000 people follow its Instagram page, which often features its happy, patriotic members. On Facebook, the Club has nearly 15,000 fans and several popular videos describing its services and lifestyle. Members can now even follow the fraternity’s shenanigans on Snapchat.

But Alarik’s Grunt Style isn’t just concerned with selling shirts. The company took a leading role in helping Dallas recover from the deadly sniper shootings on July 7.“We have a close relationship with a couple guys down there…and started calling around to them, telling them ‘Hey, we have a shirt in design in the works, would you be interested in us doing a fundraiser for you?” Travis Noparstak, Grunt Style’s sales chief, told American Grit last month. The company’s designers went to work on a Dallas-themed shirt, which includes a silhouette of the city’s skyline, police, and rapid transit badges, as well as names of the fallen police officers.Noparstak said they originally planned to make about 100 of the shirts, but it soon went viral and they’ve now sold thousands, with $10 from the sale of every shirt going to the Dallas Fallen Officers Foundation. In total, Grunt Style’s shirt raised over $200,000 for the cause.The fundraiser is just one more piece of Alarik’s mission to support veterans and offers a home for those who served as well as those seeking a patriotic lifestyle brand.“A paycheck is important, but for vets, a job is more than that,” he explained to We Are The Mighty. “They joined the military, for the most part, to be part of something bigger than themselves, something of consequence. That’s how we want them to feel about Grunt Style.”The Club is a way to bring that same level of engagement to Grunt Style’s already-loyal customers, with an exclusive way to celebrate freedom, service and, of course, America.If that sounds like what you’ve been looking for, remember to sign up soon so you can your first month with Club Grunt Style for just $1.