Building a brand on a love for Portland
By April Miller, UOAA associate director of marketing and communications
Every day for the past eleven years, Marcus Harvey has put one foot in front of the other, building and scaling Portland Gear from a small T-shirt start-up to a global travel bag brand.
“I think my biggest skill that’s gotten me here is just being naive,” Harvey, BS ’12 (digital arts), said. “Maybe if I’d overthought it in the early days, I wouldn’t have done it. If I had planned too much, I wouldn’t have done as well . . . And then I was able to stay in the game long enough to stumble off a couple wins.”
Harvey—a Hillsboro, Oregon native—founded Portland Gear in 2014 after losing his job at a Eugene screen printing shop and moving back home. He said he had no expectation that this passion project would evolve to what it is today. He was just doing what he knew and loved, while creating a community of people who shared his passion for Portland.
“I’d always wanted to own my own brand, but I didn’t know how to do it or what that looked like. In 2014, the timing was just right, and I was able to come up with a good logo . . . It was the right time, right place, kind of a simple product offering, and it spoke to people,” he said.
He connected with a Portland screen printer and developed his first product, the “P” T-shirt, with Portland Gear’s signature “P” logo on the left chest and “Portland, Oregon” on the back. Starting with small batches, Harvey printed and sold the shirts, making a few hundred dollars at a time.
Marcus Harvey models a sweatshirt, jacket, and hat with Portland Gear's signature "P" logo.
Entrepreneurship takes root in the residence hall
This model of screen-printing small batches of shirts is similar to what Harvey did as a student at the UO, where he sold skate shirts from his Living Learning Center residence hall room. It was through this experience that he became more interested in creating products and building a brand.
“That was when I started to understand the idea of what a brand was and that a brand was bigger than a product—it’s storytelling and inviting people to be part of it. Those days were really important when I look back.” Harvey printed shirts in his parent’s garage during summer breaks and gave them to skaters at Eugene area skate parks, even sponsoring a local skate team. However, he quickly learned the power of authenticity in building a brand.
“I had never skated and never surfed, and so I couldn’t show up authentically in that industry,” Harvey said.
Building an authentic brand
He took that lesson learned into Portland Gear—building the brand on an authentic connection to the PDX community from the very beginning. Before he’d even launched the company, Harvey started the @Portland Instagram account, where he shared photos of the city and connected with the Portland community. That account ended up being a catalyst for Portland Gear’s early sales success—alongside pop-up shops from a 1973 Volkswagen bus Harvey purchased.
The bus became Portland Gear’s home, before the company ever had a storefront. With the help of friend Eli Abramovitz, BS ’14 (general social science), Harvey brought his products to street markets and events all over Portland. And the brand took off.
Portland Gear's 1973 Volkswagon bus was instrumental to the brand's early success. It's what Marcus Harvey used to sell gear at events and street faires.
In 2016, Portland Gear opened the doors to its first store in Downtown Portland. They added a Washington Square store in 2019 and have since expanded the downtown store to a larger space, as well as opened a store in the PDX Airport—all with Abramovitz’s operations support. Today, the fellow Duck and Harvey’s Delta Tau Delta fraternity brother is Portland Gear’s director of operations and business development.
As a UO licensed vendor, Portland Gear sells a version of their Cascade Backpack with Oregon's "O" mark embroidered on the front. The inside of the backpack even has green lining with the UO fight song text.
Much of the company’s fast growth over the past three years can be attributed to the release of Portland Gear’s Cascade Backpack, which Harvey said accounts for more than 85% of their business today. After eight years of selling shirts and hats to an audience of primarily Oregonians, he said they stumbled into travel bags and watched their audience broaden to a national and global scale.
“Now it’s more taking the insights of Portland and the Northwest and creating product with it . . . [incorporating] that weatherproof, proximity to the outdoors, everyday travel vibe,” Harvey said. “It’s really fun to see these products get sent out everywhere, [even] to people who have never been to Portland and don’t even care to.”
A family of Ducks
At just 35, Harvey can look back on over a decade of business at Portland Gear—something he never imagined would be the case when he started out. Having found success early in life, he’s looking forward to giving back and enjoying the journey with his family.
“I’ve already won . . . so the rest of my life is just a gamble to see what happens . . . Now, I get to play the game of life and see how big it can be if I want it to be and see what it can do for other people. It's a pretty cool blessing,” he said.
Harvey met his wife, Noelle, the same week he started Portland Gear in 2014. Together, they share two kids with a third expected October 2025. The family regularly visits Eugene to attend Ducks games. As a second-generation Duck, Harvey said staying connected with the UO community represents family and pride in where he came from.
“I love the Ducks, and I loved my time [at the UO],” he said. “Some of my greatest relationships came from there, so they were really transformative years. We will forever be involved with the Ducks.”
Marcus Harvey followed in his parents' and sister's footsteps in becoming a Duck. Pictured in this childhood throwback photo (from left to right) is: Kayla (Harvey) Dessert, BS ’07 (education studies), MEd ’08 (teaching and learning); Marcus Harvey, ’12 (digital arts); Karen Bloom Harvey, BS ’81 (elementary education); and Brian Harvey, BS ’81 (finance).
Marcus Harvey regularly attends University of Oregon Athletics events with his family.
Marcus and his wife Noelle pose together with their two children at Autzen Stadium during Oregon's September 2025 game against Oregon State.
Looking ahead
As Harvey looks to the future, he’s excited to see what his growing team at Portland Gear can create and innovate in ways he can’t even anticipate
“We have no rules and no boundaries. We have no one telling us what to do, so we get to do whatever we want, and that creates a lot of amazing opportunities to try things and have fun,” he said. “What we’re doing ten years from now will be completely different than anything I could plan right now, and I’m good with that . . . It’ll unfold as it should.”