Texas-Based Indie Shop Bakery Wins Sendero Provisions Account

Western wear and lifestyle brand Sendero Provisions has named Austin, Texas-based independent agency Bakery as its creative and cultural agency of record following a competitive review, the company told ADWEEK exclusively.

The account spans creative, media, and content creation. In addition to Bakery’s main creative agency, the partnership will also employ Bakery’s media arm, KEN Media, and Supernatural, a content creation studio launched in January. This is the first time that Bakery has won an initial pitch with all three segments of its agency.

“We’re just seeing that this sort of triple-threat thing we have going on is so efficient for brands right now, and for us,” Micky Ogando, chief executive officer and chief creative for Bakery, told ADWEEK.

The new account follows a string of AOR wins over the past 18 months for 15-year-old Bakery, including personal care brand Tree Hut, tomato company NatureSweet, milk brand LA LA, and Promised Land Dairy.

Growth the size of Texas

Founded in late 2014 as a scrappy little company making hats inspired by National Parks, Sendero expanded into western apparel and accessories for men and women over the past decade, just as the western aesthetic took hold of the cultural zeitgeist. Sales grew 257% between 2021 and 2024, according to Sendero.

The company currently employs over 60 people, up from 12 just two-and-a-half years ago, said Sendero founder and chief executive officer Hunter Harlow. With his sights set on international growth and plans to double down on brick-and-mortar retail, his goal in working with Bakery is to bring more focus to the brand narrative, which draws on his roots as a seventh-generation Texan and his experience studying geology in the Southwest. (Harlow dropped out just before completing his PhD, he said.)

“We wanted a way to communicate all of those stories in a holistic way through our entire ecosystem of brand touch points,” said Harlow. While Sendero has worked with creative and marketing agencies on a contract basis in the past, this is the first time the brand has established an ongoing AOR relationship.

‘Love at first sight’

Harlow said that Sendero interviewed around 20 agencies to start, and requested pitches from about a half dozen. The process took around eight to 10 months.

“Bakery’s ecosystem was heads and shoulders above some of the others,” Harlow said. On top of that, the cultural fit was evident immediately, a sentiment that Bakery’s Ogando echoed.

“There was a little bit of love-at-first-sight kind of vibes,” Ogando said.

“At Bakery, we always talk about how we take the work very seriously, but we don’t take ourselves seriously at all,” he continued. When Harlow walked into the office, the same energy was reflected back, Ogando said.

Inspired by (real) Texan sensibilities

While it’s undeniable that western styles have become mainstream over the last few years, it often takes on a Hollywood sheen that doesn’t hit home for Texans like Harlow, or even long-time residents like Ogando, who relocated to the Lone Star state from the Dominican Republic about 20 years ago.

“It’s almost like a New Yorker’s like image of what a Texan would be,” Ogando said.

By contrast, the Texan spirit that Bakery and Sendero want to tap into doesn’t take itself so seriously, he said. It’s less John Wayne and Clint Eastwood, and more like The Dude from The Big Lebowski. It’s deeply connected to place. And it’s more committed to having a good time with good people than perfecting fly fishing techniques.

“We don’t want to put out our big kind of Western Opus,” Ogando said. “We really want to own a new category for ourselves in western wear, which is that organic, natural spirit of the people that are from here.”