#manready

Meet Travis Weaver, A Teller of Stories

Walking door to door in the Houston summer heat selling fax lines is no small feat. Do this in a suit and you, too, would be looking for a new direction in life. Travis Weaver, owner of Manready Mercantile, @manreadymercantile, the purveyor of quality goods both handpicked and handmade, has experienced this first hand. Many years before Harvey hit Houston and with no shortage of hard work, he started that new direction — which became Manready — in his apartment, accepting American Express from the beginning. This is his story.

Coming from Zephyr, Texas, a town in the literal heart of Texas with a graduating class of 22 people, Travis Weaver lives the American dream. He graduated from Texas State University in San Marcos, Texas with an advertising degree that was never put to use. While selling those T1 fax lines under the Texas heat, he learned valuable lessons about not succumbing to failure and learning to be creative in his sales approach.

Welcome to Manready Mercantile

Step right up, there are goods for everyone.

It is the attention to detail that grounds the Manready story. Everything matters.

 With $100 dollars, Travis started making candles in his apartment. “Why were candles only for women?” Focusing on products that were sold in a gender specific market, he found an open market that could be capitalized on. “I didn’t invent anything. I just learned how to market it.”

With candles cooking on a stove, Travis built the Manready Mercantile website on his phone with photos edited using Instagram filters. Once the candles were selling, he kept expanding the product line along the same concept.  It was all “stuff I wanted or needed.”

Growing up, Travis spent much of his weekends attending flea markets and picking antiques with his grandparents long before it was “cool.” It was only natural that while selling these new products in flea markets he found items that would find a home in the online store.

Now with a brick and mortar store in Houston Heights , you can find all of these items and an ever-expanding product line of other makers under one roof. With a drive to share stories, “I am able to not only share mine, but the story of others.”This is the motivation and inspiration that keeps him going each day. Housed in a building that has seen countless storms, Manready weathered Hurricane Harvey with good fortune, unlike many. Once the weather passed, they came to the aid of Houstonians in need by opening the doors to receive donations of goods which were dispersed around town to shelters in need. The employees delivered them once the van could no longer hold even a sock and then went a little further by dontaining their own time and effort in the shelters. “I wish we could do more” Travis told me.

“We made an art gallery of sorts. Our art is quality, ”  Travis explains. “ Everything has a story, we give those stories to people to ensure the customer leaves with an appreciation for what they’re buying. It’s an investment, not just a purchase.”

Even as the brand grows, Travis refuses to remain idle. “’If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’ is the worst saying ever!” He says that you must constantly adapt, looking forward to where you are going. Change is constantly taking place, but convincing others this is necessary remains one of his largest roadblocks.

 Never fear, Travis is not shying away or lowering his level of expectations. People come to Manready with the understanding that “if it’s good enough for me, customers know it’s the best. I won’t sacrifice!”

The latest rendition of candles from Manready.

What Travis lacks in big business presence, he more than makes up for with quality and a story that others will share for them. “I do just what my granddad would have done in the pre-internet days.”

 When his customers come to take those stories and goods home, American Express is there to help keep the dream alive. Since it’s so easy to use Amex’s online merchant portal, Travis is able to spend more time telling those stories than hovering over a computer. Did you know that in 2016, over 1,000 more clothing locations in the Houston area started accepting American Express cards? Manready was well ahead of that curve, but it’s never too late to start.

Travis shares stories of the products with an employee to pass on to customers.

TX pride comes in many forms.

Although he is always hustling, Travis still finds time to leave the shop for a few hobbies. Junking and picking, camping, hunting and fishing remain at the top of his list with leather working being the favorite.

With a new interest in photography who knows where Travis may end up next. “I made my hobbies into a business and put my favorites in a store.”  Whether you visit online or come through the door, it’s inevitable you will feel the truth behind Travis’s mantra of Manready, “Work Hard, Live Well.”

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