Before the laser. Before the tap. Before the company.
There was a sticker, an avocado-green refrigerator, and a mom who understood that creativity sometimes looks a lot like making a glorious mess.
People often ask where the idea for State of Stick, Co. came from.
Most assume it started with a laser cutter, NFC technology, or a business plan.
It didn’t.
It started with a sticker.
1985: A Tiny Treasure Chest
In 1985, like so many kids of my generation, I became obsessed with Garbage Pail Kids. They were funny, gross, rebellious, and completely unlike anything else I had ever seen. Every new pack felt like opening a tiny treasure chest.
Most kids kept their stickers in binders.
I covered our avocado-green refrigerator with mine.
And here is the part that still makes me smile: my adopted mom, Carleen Cozart, let me do it.
Think about that for a minute—an entire refrigerator steadily disappearing beneath a wild little world of stickers. Most parents probably would have stopped it after the first few.
My mom didn’t.
She let me create. She let me collect. She let me turn an ordinary appliance into the most exciting object in the room.
Long before I knew the words creative permission, my mom had already given it to me.
I wish I still had a photo of that refrigerator. I have asked family members over the years if anyone has one tucked away in an old album, but so far, no one has been able to find it. If one ever turns up, it will become one of my most treasured photographs.
The image accompanying this story is an editorial illustration inspired by that memory—not the original refrigerator or a family photograph.
A Lifetime of Loving Sticky Things
Looking back, I realize those stickers were never just stickers.
They were little pieces of art.
Tiny stories.
Conversation starters.
Collectibles.
They made an ordinary thing feel personal. They turned a kitchen appliance into a gallery, and every trip to the refrigerator into another look at the collection.
That fascination never really left me.
Over the years, I collected decals, labels, magnets, signs, memorabilia, and just about anything that could transform an everyday object into something worth noticing and talking about.
I did not know it then, but I was already learning one of the ideas at the heart of State of Stick:
Physical objects can carry meaning.
From Stickers to State of Stick
Decades later, that same curiosity became State of Stick, Co.
Today, we create collectible emblems, connected products, and interactive experiences that allow a physical object to open into a larger digital story. Depending on the project, a tap might lead to a video, a recipe, product information, a collector experience, or content designed to keep evolving after the first encounter.
The technology changed.
The feeling did not.
I am still chasing the excitement of opening a fresh pack, discovering something unexpected, and immediately wanting to show it to someone else.
The difference is that now I get to make objects capable of creating that feeling for another person.
Remembering My Mom
The hardest part of this story is not the stickers.
It is that my mom passed away when I was only eight years old.
She encouraged my creativity before I understood what creativity was. She made room for wonder without needing to know where it would lead.
I often wonder what she would think if she could see State of Stick today.
I would like to believe she would smile, laugh, and remind me that covering a refrigerator with stickers was not such a bad idea after all.
In many ways, every emblem we make carries a little of that encouragement forward: permission to make something joyful, personal, and worth remembering.
Why We Build
State of Stick is not about making just another sticker.
It is about creating things people want to keep.
Things they remember.
Things they collect.
Things they share.
Because sometimes the smallest things leave the biggest mark.
And for me, it all started with one little sticker—
and an avocado-green refrigerator.
A family photograph still missing
Have you seen the famous refrigerator?
If you knew my family and happen to have a photograph of that avocado-green refrigerator covered in stickers, I would love to hear from you. It would mean more to me than you could imagine.