Meet Kris Farr | Owner Roadhouse Merch

We had the good fortune of connecting with Kris Farr and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Kris, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
When Roadhouse Merch was born I had been playing in bands for the better half of my life and spent many years working in E-Commerce and Marketing. The music industry had changed dramatically over that time from the physical sell of your music to almost exclusively streaming. Now, yes- streaming has made it easier to have fans across any conceivable corner of the planet but in reality your only making a fraction of a cent per stream now. Your music has literally just become a less viable source of funding your art in any meaningful way until you’ve hit a certain level of success. The path of A&R agents, record label deals and managers is mostly a thing of the past. It’s just the sad reality. So, at this point as a band you need to be your own own social media manager, your own SEO/Web tech, your own graphic designer, your own booking agent, your own licensing agent, your own marketing manager and well, essentially your own company. Instead of fighting those realities, I created a marketplace that can compliment a bands social media and streaming presence so they can make money where the market has shifted- to merchandise. Bands can create their own merch table online, open 24/7, available around the world and without physically having to house any of that merch. You create your store, virtually upload your graphic art to a multitude of products that suits your music and we’ll sell it, print it, ship it & pay you. This year is exciting because we will be implementing some new software that will help streamline the entire process for on-boarding artists and scaling from local to national and beyond. I believe this company will be a solution to many of the difficulties musicians face these days. The idea is really just to help musicians get back to focusing on what they’re good at- being artists.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I’d like to say I’m an musician first and entrepreneur second. But in today’s world, I believe they’re one in the same to many degrees. I’ve been playing music over half my life and committed to it in ways that have made my life both unbelievably challenging, degrading at times but also immensely rewarding. Music gave me purpose which in my mind is the greatest gift to have been bestowed. It’s a direction to run with confidence, a reason to not play it safe and hopefully the ability to look back one day on a life well-realized. I desperately needed that when I was younger. That’s not to say it’s been easy because it has been anything but- especially in those early days. I moved across the country without saving much beforehand, no job and few people locally I knew well enough to bother about it. I found myself sleeping in my car, having to shower at the public beach showers and lets say.. other strange arrangements up until I found work and could get on my feet. It was a wild time. I’m proud I was naive enough to think I could make that work and stubborn enough to keep from turning tail & running when things were at their worst. This city has a reputation for eating people alive for a reason. That being said, I’d do it all over again.

As far as the music, I think all of that young animosity I had feed into what I’ve written over the years. Rock’n’roll bands just felt right and always has been my passion. The pandemic led to a reflection period with an obvious lack of live music. I started writing a novel, dug deeper into running Roadhouse Merch and started writing an Americana album in my free time. It feels pretty cliche but I think you just get older and evolve as an artist to explore other places- not that that I’ll ever leave rock’n’roll behind though! You also lose fear of failing. I’ve failed so much over the years at different things that I feel like anything is possible if that makes any sense. A wiser man once told me, “It only takes one.” I believe that immensely. I also started an Etsy store which consists of some graphic tees involving old country and blues artists that I revere. It was criminal that you could barely find merch for some of these artists. It’s done well, surprisingly- so I’m proud of that and helps me be creative in other ways. I reckon the story is still unfolding though and I hope to find these things I’ve invested my time into flourish further.

I really want to leave this question emphasizing that one of the most important lessons I’ve learned in music is that it’s imperative to support your local music community. The best way to support small artists is to buy their merch, go see their shows and tell your other friends about them because most big artists you listen to came from somewhere similar! This is what Roadhouse Merch is really all about. Support from the bottom up.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
There’s so many places to fire off in Los Angeles. Here’s a few of my favorite hangs: Frank’n’Hanks in Koreatown, Crawfords for cheap beers and fried chicken, HMS Bounty, Harvard & Stone, late nights at Slipper Clutch and Spring St. Bar downtown, La Cuevita in Highland Park and Grand Ole Echo on Sundays. Monday night is a great evening for free live music residencies as well. You can pretty much always catch a Dodger game or a Kings game. There’s some great camping just north of Los Angeles in the Angeles Forest like Chilao and some great beach spots in Redondo Beach like Naja’s and Tony’s. LA is full of pockets with unique and interesting places to check out in each area.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
Literally every musician in my life so far. You’ve all been incredibly inspiring. There’s no real world guide to living a life within music so community is everything. Shout out’s to Salems Bend for the opportunity to play Ripplefest this summer with them in Austin, Texas and Minutes Til Midnight for some recent opportunities recording at the legendary Sunset Sound, Thanks to all the friends in local bands that have inspired me over the years- The Morning Yell’s, Lords of Beacon House, MTN TMR, The Rare Breed, Warchief, Felon 13, Salems Bend, RVRMKR, Roast, High Priestess, The Great Electric Quest, Que Diablos, Solar Haze, Golden Tongue & many more. Also, thanks to the musicians that have backed me in my band Gypsy Crypt over the years. I’m grateful that some of those groups have helped me create proof of concept over the last few years with Roadhouse Merch as well. Lastly, to my family for their guidance, music catalogs & being some of the most hard working people I know.

Website: www.roadhousemerch.com

Instagram: @Lonestarfarr / @roadhousemerch

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/roadhousemerch

Other: https://www.etsy.com/shop/RoadhouseMerch

Image Credits
@wolfgangbrardt @tigersonopium @rvrmkrla @minutestilmidnight