The button supply was inspired by the incredible demand for merch during the Zohran Mamdani mayoral campaign. I volunteered on the campaign. I spoke with tons of people and the most common question I got by far was, “where can I get a some Zohran merch?”
When I was in high school some alumni came back to visit one year and had some students volunteer to help them with their button business. They made merch, including buttons, for bands around San Diego. That put me on to the idea that making buttons could easily be done by a single person.
After Mamdani won in a landslide, I decided to buy a button machine and a punch-cutter so that I could make my own buttons. That is how the Loose Collective Button Supply was born.