The Great PNW launches retail collaboration with the Seahawks

A Spokane-based apparel company is expanding its collection of Northwest-themed clothing designs to include the Seattle Seahawks.

The Great PNW launched a retail clothing collaboration with the Seattle Seahawks Pro Shop last week.

The collection features T-shirts, hoodies, sweatshirts, hats and a sticker pack in the football team’s signature colors of college navy, action green and wolf gray.

“We’re just really excited about the collaboration. It’s an extremely natural fit. Our team worked with their team seamlessly, and it’s just been a really fun project,” Great PNW founder Joel Barbour said. “We’re excited to see it out there in the world.”

The Seahawks reached out to the Great PNW nearly 10 months ago for a potential collaboration. It took about four months to design the collection, Barbour said.

“The great thing with the Seahawks is they wanted to bring both brands together with imagery, marketing, photo and video,” Barbour said. “It was a really fun process. They didn’t put us in a box. They said, ‘Do your thing’ and we did, and it worked out really well.”

Some of the T-shirt designs include trees, mountains and the Space Needle inside of the Seahawks logo, and the SquatchBack, which depicts a sasquatch sprinting toward a touchdown in a Seahawks jersey.

“It’s very Northwest and a fun graphic,” Barbour said.

The collection is available on the Great PNW’s website and the Seattle Seahawks Pro Shop during the football season.

Sales have been brisk since the clothing line’s launch, Barbour said.

“Our consumers are really drawn to the collection, which is great,” he said. “It makes perfect sense because the Seahawks are such a staple of the Northwest.”

The idea to collaborate with the Great PNW was sparked after the NFL last year allowed teams to sign licensing deals with local designers and artists to create products unique to their markets, said Doug Orwiler, managing director of consumer experience for the Seahawks.

The football team’s marketing, creative and retail departments then worked together to find a licensing partner to capture the style and energy of the Northwest, he said.

“The Great PNW stood out right away to us,” Orwiler said. “It was just an overall look and feel that separated itself from traditional NFL offerings, and doing further research, they had experience with collaborations and did an excellent job of creating excitement for their brand.”

The Great PNW was founded by Barbour in 2013 to express his love for the Pacific Northwest through bright, unique designs, some of which include mountains, trees and lakes.

“The Great PNW will be a tremendous fit for helping people celebrate this area and the Seahawks,” Orwiler said. “Joel and his team have been tremendous partners the whole way through. From the minute we reached out with ideas, his team was very excited and brought a lot of energy and creativity to the process.”

Barbour hopes the Seahawks collaboration will lead to other partnerships.

“I think it will open the doors to do some really fun projects with Northwest sports teams,” he said.