By KATHLEEN O’CONNOR/YachatsNews
One of the best vacation souvenirs is a T-shirt or sweatshirt that you keep wearing long after the trip is over because it’s so comfortable, unique and brings back memories.
Tania and Kevin Lewis of Seal Rock, owners of PNW Life, have set out to create those kinds of T-shirts and sweatshirts for central Oregon coast visitors – and anyone who lives here.
Both are retired from careers in law enforcement with the Alameda (Calif.) County Sheriff’s Office. Tania Lewis knew she wanted to be very close to the ocean after she retired in 2018, and Kevin Lewis wanted to be able to easily access outdoor activities. They found a home big enough for their extended family in Seal Rock in 2020, and Tania moved then. Kevin travelled back and forth to California for two years, moving permanently to Oregon in 2022 when he retired.
Tania Lewis has had a T-shirt exchange with her brother in Ohio for many years. When the Lewises moved to the coast they found it hard to find enough unusual, fun, funky T-shirts to continue that tradition. So, they decided to create some.
Tania Lewis has always been drawn to mystic paranormal entities like mermaids, ghosts and Bigfoot so decided their shirts could be created with those whimsical depictions.
Kevin Lewis learned graphic design, a friend helped with screen printing, and they found clothing suppliers. Their first venture was a booth at the 2021 Beachcomber Days in Waldport, and then the Waldport farmer’s market every Wednesday that summer.
The business grew and by 2023 they had a shop in the Nye Beach area of Newport.
Question: What were the steps from one local farmer’s market in 2021 to your own shop in 2023?
Answer: That first year in Waldport we only offered three designs, and we only had adult shirts in three colors, no shirts for children. It went well, so in the summer of 2022 we went to as many farmer’s markets and festivals as we could, traveling four or five days a week from Tillamook to Brookings. That worked, too, but it was hard to be on the road all the time, and to continually pack and repack our inventory. After a lot of list-making and discussion of pros and cons we decided to open a shop and found a spot in Seal Rock. The shop opened in September 2022, and although it was a great space there’s just not much foot traffic in Seal Rock, so we closed that in May 2023. By then we had decided to move the shop to Newport. We found a space right in the heart of Nye Beach, but it wasn’t available right away, so we rented a space at the far west end of the Newport waterfront while we waited. Although it wasn’t right in the middle of the waterfront area it still got a lot more foot traffic than the Seal Rock location, so we were encouraged. We were really happy to be able to move into our Nye Beach shop last October.
Q: What designs have been the most successful over the last three years and how were they created?
A: The most popular design is called “Out for a Walk”. It’s a picture of Bigfoot walking an octopus on a leash. Other popular designs are the Skeleton Surfer, the Mythic PNW Tree Octopus, the Nye Beach Hippo, and the Skeleton Whale Meeting a Mermaid. We have created about 30 designs so far. Over time we’ll retire some and create three to five new designs each year.
We always start with one of Tania’s ideas, and then purchase vector images as our starting point. Kevin uses a graphic design program to modify, merge and customize those images until they match the picture in Tania’s imagination … or at least come close.
Q: How do you manage your inventory?
A: Our designs are all printed using heat transfer paper. We do all the screen printing ourselves, so we order shirts as we need them. Our suppliers can ship them to us within two to five days. There’s no formula for knowing how many of each size/design to print, so we’re grateful for that short turnaround time. It makes it relatively easy to keep everything available in the store.
We don’t print every design in every color, and we don’t print every design on every type of shirt. Sometimes people are disappointed that the design they want isn’t available in the color they want, but we try to provide the colors that most people like.
Q: What else do you have in your store besides T-shirts and sweatshirts?
A: We have many small items that make good souvenirs, too, and about 75 percent of these are made by local or West Coast artists. One very popular item is a small octopus printed on a 3D printer made by an artist in Waldport. We have jewelry, soaps, scrubs, small toys, books, coffee mugs and hats. We also have other clothing items besides T-shirts and sweatshirts for adults and children … shorts and sweatpants, and this year we’ll have crop T-shirts.
Q: What are the next steps for your business?
A: We are looking forward to seeing how the tourist season goes in our new space. We plan to have a life-size skeleton pirate and a life-size skeleton mermaid on the sidewalk to create photo ops for our customers and introduce them to the store. Before long we’d like to increase the size of our store, but we don’t know when that will be. We also need to upgrade our heat press before too long. It will occupy our dining room, too, just like the one we have now. We’re hoping that eventually we’ll get our dining room back. We are sponsors for the Ghost Festival in Seaside again this year. We’ve been vendors/sponsors there for the past three years, and it’s our favorite festival.
Tell us a secret.
We love animals. Right now, we have two dogs and two cats of our own and two visiting dogs because our son recently moved in with us. If we hadn’t started this business we’d have a hobby farm. Tania would love to have a big greenhouse and as many interesting animals as possible, maybe llamas, emus, peacocks, and goats.
- PNW Life: 314 N.W. Coast St, Newport; Phone: 541-264-8100; Email: pnwlife2021@gmail.com; Website: pnwlifesr.com; Intstagram: @pnwlifesr; Facebook: pnw life