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Patchogue clothing company gets some ink from Inc. Magazine

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Photo 2: James Skidmore and Dexter Dible in Patchogue Village. (Credit: Michael White)

A clothing company founded just last year in Patchogue has managed to get itself some national recognition.

Fathom Clothing, described as an alternative clothing company whose slogan is “Be Your Own Revolution,” was written up in inc.com last month. The NYC-based Inc. Magazine is best known for its annual list of the 500 fastest-growing private companies in the U.S., called the “Inc. 500.”

Fathom hasn’t quite landed on that list just yet, but being published on the website was a huge thrill for owners James Skidmore, who came up with the concept, and Dexter Dible, who designs the clothing.

Dible also created the website that helped get the brand noticed.

He had bought the domain name, www.fathom.clothing, through a company called Name.Kitchen, which sells domain names that end in words, like .clothing or .coffee or .fish, as opposed to .com, .net or .biz.

Dible said Name.Kitchen favored Fathom as a client, and thereby, tossed some marketing muscle behind the Patchogue startup.

Name.Kitchen reps even came to Long Island from Chicago, and commissioned a marketing video for Fathom.

It all eventually led to the lengthy write-up on inc.com.

“We inadvertently became the poster children for their company,” Skidmore said.

“We felt Fathom Clothing was representative of the ‘not-com’ movement,” said Jeff Davidoff, Name.Kitchen’s chief marketing officer. “The company is forward-thinking and breaking the status quo. With more than 800 new ‘not-com’ options giving businesses the opportunity to create unique online identities, Fathom Clothing is getting in on the ground floor of an Internet revolution.”

As for the company’s concept, Skidmore and Dible said that through Fathom, they hope to encourage and help people tap into their inner creativities, so that they might effect real and meaningful changes in their communities and beyond.

Exactly how designs on t-shirts, hoodies and hats will help achieve the company’s lofty goals, Skidmore says it’s all about initiating conversations.

“It’s kind of a billboard,” he said of clothing. “People take notice of what you’re wearing. What it says on your clothing, it’s a form of communication without having to speak. So people will take notice of a sharp design, a sharp look, a sharp logo, a sharp motto, even when they don’t know what you’re about.

“When they see ‘Be your own revolution,’ they may not have the same idea in their head that I do,” he continued. “But they’ll usually give that a thought. So something that’s sharp and appealing, if that exchanges a smile we’ve done some pretty good stuff. If we’ve exchanged some thoughts, then we’ve done even better.”

Photo: Fathom Clothing co-founders James Skidmore and Dexter Dible in Patchogue Village. (Michael White)

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