Happy October everyone and welcome to Thock King’s very first blog post! This marks the beginning of a new era for us, kind of like Thock King 2.0 if you will. We have a lot of exciting things in store for you guys including new keyboards from Chillkey, Womier, Wobkey, Leobog and Thock King, a bunch of new switches from up and coming manufacturers HMX and BSUN, and possibly even a revamp of the brand and website!
But first thing’s first, an introduction of sorts is in order so… hi! My name is Nessa and the founder/owner of Thock King whom I’ll be interviewing in a bit is my good friend James :) Some of you might recognize me as nessasaurus, which is my social media handle! I fell down the custom keeb rabbit hole over two years ago and Thock King was not only the very first vendor I bought supplies from but also the second vendor who reached out to me for an affiliate partnership. After graduating with a BFA in Graphic Design this past summer, James personally reached out to me to wish me luck; eventually one thing led to another and we’ve decided to work together for the time being to better the store! As we grow the business, I’ll mainly be in charge of design, marketing, and community engagement so you’ll probably see me around a bit.
Anyways, without further ado, let’s get to chatting with James!
N: So, tell us a little bit about yourself!
J: My name is James and I was born and raised in the Bay area. I'm married, a father of three boys aged 7, 5 and 9 months and enjoy spending time with my family. I was always very driven and starting at the age of 14, I worked in the restaurant industry and worked my way through college.. After college I was fortunate enough to get a temp position at Google where I worked my way up over the course of a decade plus and became a Strategy Operations Manager in the Healthcare and Research A.I. department before deciding to leave Google to manage Thock King full-time.
N: Transitioning from Google to owning a keyboard business is crazy! How did you get into keyboards in the first place?
J: I got into keyboards during the great “mechanical keyboard pandemic rush”. It started when my wife got me a VR headset and I realized that my PC of 10 years was severely underpowered so I decided to go all out and build a respectable gaming PC. After that was built I was doing research and what the best keyboard was and that's when I learned about custom mechanical keyboards and went down the rabbit hole.
N: I definitely agree that this whole hobby is one giant rabbit hole haha. What made you decide to start up your own business?
J: I grew up in a household of entrepreneurs and was always intrigued with the thought of being your own boss. When I later got into the keyboard hobby I was really fascinated by how much joy it brought to my day-to-day work and thought to myself that this was a priceless experience. I also saw how difficult it was to find parts and to get them quickly in the US, and that's when I came to the conclusion that there might be an opportunity where I can provide a better buying experience to other hobbyists while at the same time spreading the same joy that keyboards brought me to others.
N: What do you think makes Thock King different from other vendors?
J: Along with offering a wide variety of priced matched keyboard switches and switch testers, we also offer hand lubing and film service for most of our switches. I've personally lubed over 300,000 switches which I think makes me a master luber… and I've now scaled our process to a team of expert lubers. In addition to offering one of the largest selections of accessories, mods and tools for your keyboard we also ship in-stock products within 24 hours while offering some of the lowest prices for shipping.
N: With so many different selections on your storefront, do you have a favorite product from your store or one that you particularly recommend to new customers?
J: The very first product I started with was our 3D resin printed fidget cubes on Etsy so these will always have a special place in my heart. I believe we have a pretty wide selection of unique switch testers, some of which we manufacture ourselves like the fidget cubes and pokémon switch testers. I also like the fact that we are offering a unique value to our customers by allowing them to choose the exact switch they would like with it. I think it's a great way to test out a switch before you commit to a full set, plus you'll have a fun little toy that you can keep around on your desk after you're done testing the switch.
N: I have such a soft spot for your Pokemon fidgets! My Lapras fidget is always on my desk :) Are there any exciting plans or drops for the store that we can look forward to?
J: I'm actually really looking forward to working with you (Nessa), who recently joined the Thock King team as a Design and Marketing specialist to give our brand the much needed refresh and attention it needs for the next phase of our growth.
I would also like to focus on adding more options for entry-level keyboards. For example, we plan to stock keyboards from brands like Chilkey (ND75 and ND65), Womier (RD75), Leobog (Hi75), Wobkey (Rainy 75) and more from our own Thock King line very shortly and also provide a build and assembly service with all our keyboards where customers can choose to have their keyboard sent fully assembled with lubed switches and keycaps tested and ready to go.
N: I’m super stoked for all these new products! I think they’ll really elevate the store and give customers a lot of things to look forward to. And lastly, any words for our audience members or long-time customers who might be reading this right now?
J: I just want to thank everyone who has supported us throughout the years and making my dreams of being a business owner a reality where I can support my family but at the same time bring joy to people through the keyboard hobby–not to mention saving folks countless hours from lubing their own switches.
For anyone considering supporting us, I would say that I take the responsibility of working with you very seriously and I will always stand by my service and products and will do the right thing in treating you how I would like to be treated.
And that concludes the interview! If you’ve made it this far, thank you so much for reading until the end and we hope you guys got to know us a little better. As mentioned earlier, we have so many new updates and products coming to the store and we hope you guys are just as excited as we are. There are a lot of topics we want to cover through this blog but if there’s anything you guys want to see, please feel free to drop a comment or leave some feedback in our Discord channel! Even if it’s not related to the blog, we’d love for you to just say hi :) The Discord channel will also be the main platform we’ll be using to communicate all our store updates and restocks so make sure you join the server if you haven’t already. Anyways, that’s all from me today; see you in the next one!
Click here to join the Thock King Discord server