Meet Reginald Bond: Founder of All Things Retro
The following was written by Shoutout LA:
We had the good fortune of connecting with Reginald Bond and we’ve shared our conversation below.
Hi Reginald, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
My thought process behind starting my own brand/business was that mainly I just wanted something I could call my own. I have a passion for sneakers and I just wanted to bring my brand to life through that passion. End game is I just want to show our youth that we can just be regular people and still get to heights unimaginable if we put the grind in. The streets have such a negative impact on our youth and I just somehow want our youth to look at me and say to themselves… “if he can do it, I can do it” I overall just want to be a positive role model and use my brand as a staple to help provide positivity on our youth!
What should our readers know about your business?
Originally All Things Retro started out as a merch brand in 2018. But I had visions of being so much bigger than just making dope merch. I wanted to build this empire under the ATR umbrella. I created The R.E.T.R.O (Really Excited to Reach Out) Foundation. The foundation was created to assist parents with helping to keep their kids involved in sports and other positive programs. I would donate money from my merch sales to help pay for things like registration fees, cleats, hooping shoes, uniforms, etc. It was my way of giving back but mainly with so much violence and negativity happening in the community, I just wanted to help out where I could and keep as many kids active in sports as possible! Basketball saved my life growing up and sports overall can save a lot of lives, kids just need the opportunity but there are lots of parents that just can’t afford it! So from there 3 years later we created the ATR Retro Rebels Youth Organization! When I tell you this is the most exciting thing I’ve ever did in my life! We plan on building a full blown community center but we have to keep grinding for that. We will get there though, I promise you that! I won’t dare tell you any of this was easy and I overcame all the challenges by finally just believing in myself. Once I had that I CAN REALLY DO THIS mind frame, it was a wrap from there!!! The main lesson, BELIEVE IN YOURSELF! That’s it that’s all, that’s the main lesson BELIEVE IN YOURSELF!!! All I want the world to know about me is that I’m the same person as people we may know, meaning, I’m a black man, I grew up in the hood, I’ve seen everything that goes on out there in the streets, but I chose a different path… and I’m doing everything that I can to help provide a safer and positive path to the young ones behind me. Always pay attention to our youth… Educate, Encourage and Inspire… because Integrity, Character and Ethics always matter!