Ducking Realitea

From Mushrooms to Onesies: Gavin’s Wild Ride into Retail

• Siobhan • Season 2 • Episode 41

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He’s back in the pond! My dear friend Gavin—founder of The Chaga Company and self-proclaimed Onesie King—is kicking off a new chapter, and we’re bringing you along for the ride. After nearly a decade of slinging adaptogenic mushroom magic across the Bay, Gavin is opening the first-ever onesie store in San Francisco. Yep, you read that right.

This isn’t just a store—it’s a whole experience. Mushroom-dyed onesies, locally made art, Chaga-infused chocolates, breathwork, booty yoga, and yes… Filipino food. It’s fashion meets wellness meets community, with Gavin’s signature sparkle and sass.

In this episode, we catch up on his journey, the creative chaos of launching a brick-and-mortar, and what it means to build something joyful in the heart of downtown SF. Spoiler alert: there’s a onesie for every mood.

This is the first in a mini-series where we follow Gavin’s leap into retail in real time. If you’ve ever dreamed of doing something bold, weird, or wildly you—this one’s for you.

Come for the mushrooms, stay for the magic.

🎧 Listen now wherever you get your pods
🛍️ Follow the journey @onesieking.sf and @thechagaco

Siobhan:

Yeah, okay. Hi everyone, and welcome to this week's episode of Ducking reality. This is going to be a special episode. It's going to be a couple parter. We have our returning guest Gavin from Chaga here.

Gavin:

Hello. Hi everyone. How are you guys? Thank you, Siobhan, for having me. I

Siobhan:

am so you're welcome. I'm so excited to have you back, and I'm so excited to be a small part of the next adventure and the expansion of the chaga kingdom,

Gavin:

right? It's I'm actually really excited. I don't know what to say. It's coming, and there's a lot of things that are coming and new challenges and things that I've learned in the past that I'm regurgitating. So it's really, really interesting. What's

Siobhan:

going on? Yeah, well, let's catch everyone up. You started a company called the chaga company almost nine years ago, correct? And Chaga is a mushroom that you discovered when you were up in Alaska, yes. And it does amazing. It has a ton of the adaptogens and is really great for inflammation. And you have a whole brand out of different types of Chaga,

Gavin:

correct. I sell it in all over the Bay Area, in farmer's markets and online too as well. So I sell Chaga and adaptogenic and functional mushrooms that incorporate in coffee, tea, chocolates, tinctures, powders, salts and snacks. The

Siobhan:

salts are still some of my favorites, but everything is good. Thank you. Please keep on taking it. Yes, and you can subscribe so you can get monthly Chaga deliveries right to your house, so you don't have to worry about running out correct.

Gavin:

So we have a thing called Chaga VIP in which that you can actually order my Chaga products online. You can go to the chaga co.com or chagacharge.com it will lead you to my website and just type in the subscribe button and subscribe to any one of my products, or you could try it out, you know. So, yeah,

Siobhan:

yeah, that's amazing. Thank you so much. And then, in addition to your Chaga you have been wearing onesies since 2005 Yes, we went over the story of how you became a onesie wearer in the last episode. Yes, but just in case anyone hasn't listened to that one yet, you had a design. You had a friend give you a flight suit, right? Correct? My friend jump started it.

Gavin:

Yes. My friend Paul sheets actually gave me a flight suit when I was living in Las Vegas to dress up as Jennifer Lopez from Jenny on the block for a Halloween party, and once I zipped that flight suit on, I never looked back.

Siobhan:

So you have onesies for every day of the week, every kind of occasion, yes, and you kind of got inspired by a friend who asked you to design him a onesie, right?

Gavin:

Yes. So a lot of so I started wearing onesies because of its comfort, and I find it to be very fashionable yet utilitarian and very easy for me to convey my message as a should I say fashionista or appreciation of fashion? And I was inspired by a friend of mine from Germany who wanted a onesie for his wedding, and he wore my onesie for his wedding that I consulted and sourced it out from Lola of San Francisco in Noe Valley. It was amazing. It's like this denim with silver trimmings and hand painted metallic paint over it. It's wonderful, yeah. And from that picture, yeah, I'll send it to you, yeah. Listeners, yes,

Siobhan:

yeah. And then from there, you got a write up in the the standard, the standard about wearing onesies and being the onesie king of San Francisco,

Gavin:

yes. So I do wear onesies literally every day, and it's like my own small passion project in Instagram that I post this thing called onesie of the day, because I literally have a onesie every single day. And one day I was going with my friend Steven in the mission to find this elusive all you can eat Japanese buffet, and I was wearing my eating onesie, per se, you know, onesie that could expand the lot, and it's like, they're shorts and they're uncomfortable, so you can pass out right after you Japanese buffet. And then I saw this guy wearing a romper, and then he looked at me, and I looked at them, and he's like, Yo, I love your onesie. I'm all like, I make up. And he's like, Oh my God, you need to be profiled. And I'm like, really? And he's like, yeah, for somebody who wears onesies every day, who makes onesies, you need to be written up for. Let me send you over somebody from the San Francisco standard. And lo and behold, they were there, interviewing me, checking out and really investigating all of my onesies. And I'm like, look into my closet. There's nothing there about onesies, not even skeletons.

Siobhan:

The skeletons are deep behind

Gavin:

no such thing. You know. See, you can hide skeletons way better when onesies ran in two pieces.

Siobhan:

That's true. It keeps them all together. There. Yeah, exactly. So you and then, but that was about the same time that your onesie collection was coming out, so you started to design and start to sell some of your onesies. Yeah.

Gavin:

And the interesting part about it is that how it's like, I always want to be focused on building my own business, and with the chaga company that I've been doing it for the last nine years, I have built Chaga from scratch, and how can I take away from Chaga to go into my onesie collection? But how about marrying those two together? Is what I figured and through my intense and diligent shopping for dead stock onesies that would fit both men and women. I finally found this dead stock collection online that when I use the proper way of acid mixed with mushrooms, iron and other acids yield this amazing styrations of color, and from then on, that launched my first ready to wear line of mushroom, mushroom acid washed onesies here in San Francisco. So I find it to be like a homage to San Francisco because of the tie dyes and stuff like that. It's very like hate Street, like very local. It's all mushroom washed too, as well by the mushrooms either that I sourced out or I forage myself. And me learning how to mushroom dye by a good, a great, fine person by the name of Liz vermilion. She is literally the queen of mushroom dying here in the Bay Area, among other things, cottage Goddess is what I call her. Oh, beautiful, yes. And she has one of my onesies too, and she looks super hot in it. So between that and yeah, it's just now getting together and tying together two of these businesses and two of these passions that I have and I did not, but first, I did not have the courage to actually launch a fashion line on onesies in particular, because I'm not a fashion designer. I appreciate fashion, you know, I don't know how to stitch, and I actually asked someone to teach me how to sew for a couple of times. But it's not my thing. My thing is like, how can I make this onesie look good with the current resources that I have?

Siobhan:

Yeah, so, but you're also tying in other artists like Liz has taught you how to do your own acid watch with your Chaga mushrooms, correct? So you're, you know, you're using anything that's left over from what you're putting in your your foods and your salts and your things into exactly these acid watch so you're, you know, eliminating waste. Yes, you're up cycling different clothings. You found a dead stock brand, so you're upcycling and making it customized. And then you're, you're pulling in artists from all over it to help you design different onesies to add their kind of accouterments. And in, like, you know you have today, you you have your, your crocheted onesies.

Gavin:

This is my namaste stitches. So I she is, like, literally, my 3d printer. Yeah, she crochets mushrooms for me, and she's a local San Francisco artist. Norma made this, these, like glitter things. She is one of my seams seamstresses who actually lives in San Francisco too, as well. And then, oh my goodness, yes, you're right. And the funny part about it, there's a new collection that I'm doing with my friend darva from Burlingame, and she used to be a theatrical costume designer and owns a vintage store. She is pulling out like literally, 400 silk kimonos that we could use as applique and patches and different onesies and collaborate on that. So it's really exciting. What's coming

Siobhan:

up? Yeah, and it's an amazing way for you to like because you have such a diverse community of artists and makers and you know, so in order to kind of pull it all together and tie them into the onesies, into Chaga, you're actually opening the first ever onesie store. Yes,

Gavin:

I am. It's actually, I know it's the first ever onesie store at one market right across the Ferry Building in San Francisco, by the onesie King. So I think it's very much in alignment on what I'm doing. So this onesie store by the onesie King will be serving Chaga mushrooms, which is the highest amount of antioxidants. So we're going to be having preset coffee and breakfast items. We're going to have my onesies as a gallery over there, so you see many of my evolutions of my onesies. And you get to purchase your onesies over there too as well. Moreover, there are guest artists that's going to come in events, shops, workshops and stuff like that. And. Even, for example, somebody who's can make patches or attach patches for you, all the goodies, all onesie related, everything happiness and fun. Yeah, you

Siobhan:

can almost, you can get, take your one of a kind onesie, and then even further correct, customize it and make it even like, kind of put your own spin onto that. Yes, that is really exciting.

Gavin:

Yes, I'm really, really happy about it. So it was, it was because of Paramount, a group and impact collective that has actually let me have an opportunity to have the first onesies store in San Francisco. And I think in the world too,

Siobhan:

that's amazing. I'm surprised there isn't like, no one has, no

Gavin:

one has the courage. But me, yes,

Siobhan:

yeah. Well, it is. It's building your community. It's supporting artists in San Francisco. It's helping to revitalize downtown San Francisco. You're going to be there three days a week, selling and having classes, and

Gavin:

I'm going to have Filipino food over there. I'm gonna have mushroom dyeing classes. We're gonna have Chaga breath work after work. We're gonna have booty yoga. We're gonna have yin yoga, we're gonna have hooerbics. We're gonna have so many things coming out for over there. I really want to activate San Francisco, and I am so happy that they're giving me a space and a community and resources for me to fulfill my dreams too, as well on having my first whimsy store. Yeah,

Siobhan:

so exciting. So it's going to be open hopefully the first week in August. Yes, which is kind of fast, yeah, it's fast, but it's also very like timely, because that's the anniversary of Chaga,

Gavin:

yes. So August 10 will be my ninth year. Yeah? So, yeah, between, yeah. I just can't wait. I just don't know what's happening, but it's here. I'm here for it too. I know

Siobhan:

it's so exciting. You actually have a couple of your products right in front of you, yeah? Like, now we're doing an infomercial.

Gavin:

Okay? We're not necessarily doing infomercial. There are other things that are actually happening over here. Okay, so first of all, it says, uh, I'm the only one that's been selling like, truffle salt, and it's amazing. It has like four different mushrooms on it, Chaga reishi, Turkey telling Lion's Mane mushrooms in a micro salt with two different kinds of black truffles. It's bomb. It's hella good. But get this, we now have sexy chocolates for men and women. Yes, so the men one, it's called matcha cacao mushrooms. For your mushroom, it has four different mushrooms on it, Chaga reishi, Turkey Tail and Lion's Mane extracts, coffee extracts, goji berries, ginseng, and for men, it has Horny Goat Weed extracts. For women, though it has blue lotus flower extracts, and blue lotus flower for everyone, promotes lucid dreaming. It also increases intuition. But for women, it's supposed to be really healthy down there as it nourishes and moisturize, yes. So eat for to activate, rub your thighs and have fun. So these are all going to be available at the store. Moreover, I'm gonna have specialized things, like, I'm developing a dried mango dipped with chocolates with adaptogenic mushrooms from the Philippines, so those things like that, because it will allow me to actually have a playground for me to really explore and expand my creativity. Yeah. So I'm really, really excited.

Siobhan:

This is amazing. I'm so excited for you, and so we're gonna kind of meet up every couple weeks and hear about how it's going. We're gonna track just the the stresses of opening this door, what it's like to open a store. I mean, already it's been trying to figure out how you're going to set up the store. You know, we've been talking about the design of it and how we're gonna hang your onesies and where we put everything. And it's, oh, yeah, such an exciting time. It's

Gavin:

an exciting time, but it's the same time. It's very interesting, because you have to lay out from down to the fonts, how you want to look at it, how people need to experience your onesie collection, from start to finish, the scent, the atmosphere, what are they going to taste? All the five senses needs to be activated in order for you to have that full experience. That's, that's, these are challenges right now for a retail owner or a future retail owner like myself, to actually go and revitalize San Francisco. Number one, number two is that I'm very happy that they're giving us an opportunity to do this. But at the same time, what resources do we need to pull as small business or to make this profitable for us and for the city too, as well,

Siobhan:

right? Yeah, because you're taking over a space that's been empty for a bit. Yes. And we're trying to bring business back and art back to San Francisco and help, you know, just further along our whole community,

Gavin:

exactly. And the thing is that San Francisco has always been one of the best cities in the world. Them, and there is always an opportunity, and always feel like it's always going to bounce back one way or the other. Why not be in the forefront of that?

Siobhan:

Yeah, that's exciting. I'm can't wait to be there and to be in the classes. I know I already love the chaga.

Gavin:

Oh yes, yes. Thank you. Thank you. Well, you're gonna love the onesies too, for sure. Oh yes,

Siobhan:

I just got a beautiful duster from you for every birthday present. Yes, and I can't wait for you to come out with a line of those for everybody.

Gavin:

Yeah. So I'm gonna be only selling onesies and ones, things that can go on top of onesies, like scarves, like we are gathering linings from 100 year old kimonos that we're turning it into scarves that you can mushroom, die in one of our classes and take it home. So these are experiences that we are going to be providing at one market plaza, at the onesie King store with Chaga.

Siobhan:

That's amazing. I'm so excited to see what you what's to come and talk to you again about what the next update is

Gavin:

yes, and we're going to have, like, a more consistent way for me to open, because I want to share this journey to everyone as a small business owner, especially at this trying times for retail, on how we can bring retail back with a more curated experience for everyone and make it enjoyable too as well.

Siobhan:

Yeah, and I think having the classes will help to get people because so many people are having trouble kind of coming back out into the world after COVID, I think, yes. And there's some kids that like, don't know how to people anymore, yeah. So come to a class, you know, you have something to distract you to kind of get you into being out with people and meeting people. It's a great way to meet some new friends, because you're all into the same thing,

Gavin:

you know? And one more thing is just like, Come out to class or come out and get a onesie. And you know what? If you don't feel like you're getting out in the world, go back home with a onesie. Yeah? Onesies are great. Yeah, they're great

Siobhan:

for sitting on the couch and being out in the world.

Gavin:

So where onesie by the onesie King. Just saying, Thank you so much. Siobhan,

Siobhan:

thank you so much Gavin. And I can't wait to talk to you once the store is open. And where can people follow

Gavin:

your journey? Oh, yes, onesieking.com, Instagram, SF, onesie king, or onesie King SF, the chaga company, of course, just Google Gavin and Chaga or Gavin and onesies I come out. Yes, you are out.

Siobhan:

Thank you so much everyone. Go find your onesie today, and remember to find some joy, and we'll talk to you soon.

Gavin:

Okay, see you later. Thanks, guys. Bye.

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