Started by four college roommates at Mississippi State, Burlaep originally designed and sold T-shirts to raise money for a children's mission in Honduras. The company has evolved over the years but has always remained cause-based at its core - now supporting climbing-related projects.
Burlaep first became an outdoor apparel retail store in Starkville, Mississippi, featuring 36 local vendors. Now, it's a coffee shop and screenprinting business in Chattanooga.
Since owner Cleat Morris spent 90% of weekends climbing in Chattanooga, he decided to close the shop and move to the climbing mecca. "I decided to give up the dream job for the dream location," he says.
He first started selling his shirts at the Chattanooga Market in 2015, and realized the Scenic City was a better demographic for his business than Starkville, he says. Burlaep (pronounced like burlap) prints shirts for all of the climbing gyms and coalitions in town, sometimes giving a percentage of proceeds for cause-based endeavors, says Morris.
Jacob Nelson, a coffee vendor at the Starkville shop, now co-owns the business, which opened its local shop last month.
The new shop is in an old warehouse on East 11th Street, where they offer Counter Culture Coffee and local craft beer on tap, as well as packaged foods from Vibrant Meals and, of course, their outdoorsy-themed T-shirts.
Burlaep is among the only eco-conscious screen-printing businesses, in that it uses only water-based inks and reusable cloths rather than paper towels, the business owners say.
Check them out at burlaep.com.
A rock solid partnership
Burlaep has partnered with the Southeastern Climbers Coalition to print its members’ T-shirts at a discount of greater than 50%, and the goal is to eventually do that at no charge, Morris says. The coalition then sells the shirts to help support their causes. In the past Burlaep has donated a percentage of sales to the coalition, and Morris says he hopes to start doing so again in the future. In addition to its partnership with the nonprofit, the clothing company also offers limited edition T-shirts sold to support specific causes, such as one this past fall that Burlaep created in partnership with High Point climbing gym to benefit SCC and WeClimb, a local organization that uses rock climbing as a tool to promote diversity and introduce underserved populations to the outdoors.