A Brand Born from Grief

A NOTE FROM 2026: I wrote this in October 2023, a few weeks after bringing Bo-Hawg® back. I had no idea what it would become. I still like that you can hear that in it, so I’ve left this story where it belongs: at the beginning.

Is that title a bummer?

I asked myself this before publishing. I kept coming to the conclusion that, yes, this version of Bo-Hawg® was conceived through grief.

I say conceived because I never thought of Bo-Hawg ® as my own. It had always belonged to my pops. He brought it into existence in the mid-'80s and managed to keep it alive for over four decades.

That's right, FOUR DECADES! He loved it!

"That logo and name are too damn tight," pops would say. "What if we did Bo-Hawg ® Seafood ™? What if we made t-shirts? What if we created a little business that was Bo-Hawg Bagels?"

I kid you not, for 36 years of my life, I heard a "what if" related to Bo-Hawg ® at least once a year—at a minimum. So when I say he loved this thing, I am not exaggerating.

When he died, I tried everything I could think of to hold on to him.

I was so terrified that, since he was no longer on this plane, he would disappear. I scanned old family photos, converted family VHS tapes to digital, took screenshots of text messages, saved voicemails, and pulled t-shirts from his closet.

I wanted immediate access to anything tangible that was evidence of the life he had lived.

A year later, I still love all of those things and cherish them deeply. But I learned that his existence extends beyond the tangible. When I spoke at pop's funeral, I said this:

"He was a person in our lives that you knew was always there. Nothing could alter his presence. My dad himself was a constant. When he transitioned to another plane last week, I thought my constant was gone. Then I remembered he would never leave me. He left pieces of himself in others and scattered throughout the universe." 

One night in October 2023, I was curled up with a t-shirt quilt that my friend Pat created for me. It’s a beautiful piece of art made by a special person using t-shirts with so much history embedded in them.

I was looking for a green Jimi Hendrix shirt that my sister gave me when I was 16 when I saw the red and blue Pig Fish, the logo for Bo-Hawg®. It was an original shirt from the '80s.

I don’t know why it jarred me so much, especially since I had the logo tattooed on me two months after Dad passed away. Maybe it was the vibrance of the colors?

Right then, I sent my friend Chase, an incredibly talented designer, an email asking if she could digitally remaster the logo. Chase didn’t skip a beat. I had it within two days.

I immediately created a TON of stickers. The stickers had my Pops' name, the logo, and text that read either “Fishing Team” or “Hawg Wild Seafood.” Both existed in different versions of Bo-Hawg®. One came from his seafood catering company and the other from the failed charter boat endeavor.

I sent stickers to my family first. They were met with surprise and usually prompted a call or text with a funny memory of Pops' love-hate relationship with Bo-Hawg®.

Next, I started sending stickers to my friends with zero context.

They were getting these stickers and would call me, saying, “Uhm. I got the sticker. It's cool, but what does it mean? What is it?”

Rewind to earlier, when I said I never thought of Bo-Hawg® as my own. It wasn’t until I got that call from a friend asking about the sticker that I realized I was the one telling the story now.

I was the one thinking, “That logo and name are too damn tight.”

When people opened those envelopes, they were either met with a wave of nostalgia or confusion and intrigue. Either way, they were holding a piece of my dad that I had shared with them.

On what would have been his 75th birthday, I launched The Bo-Hawg website. I cannot tell you how excited he is that people now have the chance to buy Bo-Hawg ® merchandise. I use the present tense because I can feel him when I talk about this. 

I have no clue if anyone will or won’t buy something, or if this thing will even catch on. 

The best part of the whole thing is if we sell only three items for the entire year, he will be proud that I kept Bo-Hawg ® alive. He’ll appreciate that it is another effort to keep him circulating throughout the cosmos.

I’m probably even more excited about the storytelling side of the brand.

It is called Pig Fish Tales™, a section of the site with my dad’s stories, my stories, and hopefully, stories about other people.

There was no greater storyteller than my Pops. Our family’s very own Big Fish.

In a way, grief served as a vehicle to help my Pops accomplish something he was never able to do while he was here: share Bo-Hawg® beyond the people who already knew it.

Like I said, he left pieces of himself scattered throughout the universe.

Bo-Hawg® is one of those pieces, and I’m molding and evolving it into something I want my dad to sit back and marvel at.

I can hear him ask while his crystal blue eyes stare at the screen and a big shit-eating grin spreads across his face. "This is on the internet where anyone can buy it? Now that is double-ball-busting-deluxe tight, Trippy!” 

For the storytelling, the Pig Fish Tales, he'd say:

“Holy shit! You’re writing again? Maybe you can use some of those stories I told you back when I thought it was a good idea to write a book.”

I'm truly excited and proud of this.

I don't know exactly what Bo-Hawg® becomes from here. I just know I don't want it to stop with merchandise.

I'm so glad you're here. So is Pops.

Stick around and get to know us.

Editors note: This story was originally published October 13, 2023

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