Back in 2003, we had an idea. Then we had a name, and a very clear vision of the kind of underwear we wanted to make. The only problem was that we knew practically nothing about clothing manufacturing.
The internet already existed in the early 2000s, but finding information wasn't nearly as easy as it is today. We had no idea where to even begin.
One of our acquaintances made handbags for a living, which gave us our first clue about who might know something about industrial garment production. Looking back now, what we did next seems rather unusual.
We called the switchboard of a university of applied sciences and asked to be connected to a lecturer in clothing manufacturing. We didn't know her, and she certainly didn't know us. Still, she took the time to explain over the phone how garments are made and what all the strange industry terms meant.
Sadly, we no longer remember her name. If you ever happen to read this, we'd simply like to say thank you. That phone call was far more important to us than you could probably ever imagine.
It marked the beginning of several years of failure.
A friend's mother also gave us contact details for Finnish clothing manufacturers, but not a single one of them ever replied. The same thing happened across the rest of Europe.
Eventually we started ordering samples from India and China. Every single one was of very poor quality. One thing about garment manufacturing is that everything takes time. We waited months for samples, and when they turned out to be disappointing, we had to start all over again.
The years went by and life moved on. We graduated, started working, and lived the lives of young adults. Yet Mähöne somehow found its way into almost every evening spent with friends.
At some point our friends began teasing us about our never-ending project.
"If you ever sell even a single pair of underwear to someone outside this group of friends, I'll wear nothing but Mähöne for the rest of my life," one of them promised.
To be fair, they had a point.
There was plenty of talk, but very little action.
By then Mähöne had already existed for five years, and we still hadn't produced a single pair of underwear. Maybe that was exactly what made us try even harder.
Fortunately, many of our friends had also started treating the project as their own. One of them suggested contacting the foreign embassies based in Finland. It sounded like a strange idea. Then again, by that point most of our ideas had been a little strange.
Through the embassies we found contact details for clothing manufacturers around the world, and we started sending emails.
One of them ended up in Thailand.
And someone replied.
It was 2010, and by pure coincidence I was about to leave on a backpacking trip through Southeast Asia. I decided to visit the factory.
In January 2010, after an overnight flight, I walked through the factory doors wearing sandals with a backpack on my shoulders. I was tired and nervous, doing my best to explain what kind of underwear three Finns wanted to make.
The women running the factory greeted me with curiosity and genuine kindness. They served me tea, lemonade, and fresh fruit. Sixteen years later, they still laugh about that early morning meeting.
The factory's minimum order quantity was 10,000 pieces per product. Our budget wasn't anywhere close to that.
For some reason, we still managed to negotiate the first order down to 2,000 pairs. At the time, it felt like a huge victory. The factory was already producing underwear for several well-known brands, and for the first time we began to believe this might actually work.
The design itself was already finished. The only thing still missing was the waistband.
I asked the factory to show me the most durable waistband they had. It also happened to be the roughest one they offered.
It felt exactly right.
Back in Finland, we finalized the order.
Then came a moment that still makes me smile.
We had to pay the deposit before production could begin.
So we wired 6,000 US dollars to a factory in Thailand that we barely knew.
Today, I'm not sure I'd have the courage to do that again.
But back then we were young, perhaps a little naïve, and desperately wanted to believe our underwear would finally become reality.
We talked about the possibility that the money might simply disappear forever.
But if that happened, at least we would have tried.
Then we waited.
Our first production sample arrived in Finland in March 2010. It was an excellent product—except it was too small for any of us to wear. We eventually found a squirrel-sized friend willing to test it for us and confirm that the underwear actually worked.
Then, one summer day in 2010, twenty boxes of underwear arrived at Helsinki Airport.
After clearing customs, we opened the very first box right there in the cargo terminal.
The products were exactly what we had agreed on.
We loaded the boxes into a van and headed towards Mähöne's very first warehouse—a garage on Porintie in the Munkkivuori district of Helsinki.
One moment from that day has stayed with me ever since.
Later, I was sitting in traffic on Ring Road I with one box of underwear in the back of my father's Saab. I didn't own a car, so I had borrowed his for the deliveries.
I started pounding the roof of the car with excitement.
Personally, it remains one of the greatest moments I've ever experienced with Mähöne.
The hardest part was over.
Our words had finally become reality.
From that point on, the worst thing that could happen was that we'd be stuck with a lifetime supply of underwear.
Our next story is about how we started selling underwear from the trunk of a car—and why it was our friends who kept the company alive through its hardest years.
