Preparing for another season in the maker leagues

York Revolution mascot DownTown

graces our tent at a pop-up market in 2021.

We’ve been in this game for a while now. We’ve seen a little bit of everything, from the big crowds and late rallies to the losing streaks and endless road trips. We play the occasional doubleheader, and we know pop-ups like the back of our hand.

And now it’s time to shake off the rust of the offseason and get ready to get at it once again.

If this sounds like life in minor league baseball, it’s not a coincidence. If you want to know what it’s like to be a maker, then the lower levels of the national pastime serve as a useful metaphor.

That’s because the path to their respective big leagues is as long, winding and unlikely for an artisan as it is for professional baseball players, only 10 percent of whom will graduate from the minors to “The Show.”

Rather than a bat, ball and glove, however, an artisan’s tools include crates and carts, tables and tents.

Welcome to the maker leagues.

Holes in our game

We started Stay Apparel Co. officially in 2017, but its origins go back to my youth and a passion for baseball and ice hockey, including their aesthetics.

Hence, asking my mother to write checks, covered by proceeds from my paper route, to purchase tees, hats and pennants of various teams.

Stay ultimately grew out of a series of blog posts I wrote for my public relations business and a desire to emulate the American-made products I occasionally featured.

We’ve been grinding our way ever since, starting with a website that I naively thought would be our be-all, end-all. Fortunately, my wife, Sara, suggested that we also consider participating in pop-up markets.

We recorded nearly $1,000 in sales at the first one, on Nov. 2, 2017. But like the starting pitcher who whiffs 10 batters in his major league debut, that initial success wasn’t indicative of the long road ahead. Neither playing baseball nor being a maker is easy.

There were holes in our game that we had to keep working on, and still do. It’s a slog, still populated by too many metaphorical 0-fers and long fly balls that die at the warning track.

Yet there have been plenty of highlights along the way — none greater than Choctoberfest on Oct. 15, 2022, when we set our single-day sales record — and we still have the passion and dedication to keep coming back.

Even though we opened a brick-and-mortar store in 2024, we continue to participate in pop-ups to augment our sales and spread the word about Stay. We attended some 30 markets in 2025 (in Hershey, Harrisburg, Camp Hill, Carlisle, Marietta, Lancaster, State College) and hosted 10 others at our store.

Every maker is a team

Of course, many talented ballplayers grind away for years in obscurity. After playing in college, Chris Coste spent 11 seasons in the minors before reaching the Philadelphia Phillies as a 33-year-old rookie.

Still, with its array of teams and leagues, baseball presents a path that’s as vibrant white as baseline chalk compared with the meandering of the maker way.

The maker leagues are more like barnstorming in baseball’s early days, traveling from town to town to play an exhibition and make extra money. Except that every maker is a team unto himself or herself, a farm system of one.

As with the lineups for any baseball team, the vendors for a given makers market come from varied backgrounds and present a wide range of talents.

Some of them appear to be naturals, budding superstars with products and branding beyond their years and those that must keep refining their games. There are wide-eyed rookies and grizzled veterans (he raises his hand).

There are makers who will keep showing up as long as they can and others who can’t or won’t fight through the challenges (both personal and external, such as the state of the economy) and will have a short career.

But while ballplayers fear being on the “wrong side of thirty,” such is their dependence on physical skills, that’s fertile ground for makers. I started Stay Apparel Co. at age 50.

Soon it will be spring. Green grass will rise, and makers will take the field once again.

It’s a new season. Hope abounds. Maker’s going to make it big.