Having Serious Fun

Clayton Spencer, BBA’03, Built Poncho Outdoors to Reflect His Passion for wild places — and a Culture of Camaraderie

By Todd Savage   

Photograph By Josh Huskin

After graduating from Texas McCombs in 2003, Clayton Spencer left Austin with a BBA in one hand and a fishing pole in the other as he sought adventure in Alaska.

Spencer grew up spending time on his family ranch in the Hill Country where he learned to hunt in the woods and fish in muddy stock tanks, and he spent weekends during his senior year at UT fly-fishing with buddies on the San Juan River in New Mexico and quail hunting in West Texas. In Alaska, he worked as a fishing guide and then found the inspiration to create a company that celebrates his love of the outdoors. 

But first, a reality check.

“Alaska was absolutely the experience of a lifetime, definitely fulfilled my passion, but the real world slapped me in the face,” recalls Spencer, who has a dual degree in the Business Honor Program at McCombs and Plan II. “The $50 a day I was making as a guide was not cutting it.” 

After one year in Alaska, he made a big pivot, from the wilderness to the wilds of New York City, where he took an investment banking job. “The Alaskan experience really drove the decision to go build some real skills in a very rigorous environment.” 

After honing his financial chops in banking, Spencer continued his education at Stanford University, earning an MBA in 2011. He then spent a year researching various business ideas. In the end, his first love — the outdoor life — took hold of his imagination and didn’t let go. It would inform the kind of business leader he would become. 

“I take great inspiration from seeing beautiful, pristine, wild places,” he says. “I don’t know where that comes from, but I just know that I feel invigorated when I’m in the wild. It’s special.”

In 2017, Spencer founded Poncho Outdoors. Working practically in the shadow of the UT Tower, he became CEO of a growing brand specializing in men’s lightweight performance shirts. 

“Coming up with the idea was the hardest part,” says Spencer, attired in casual Austin style with a Poncho cap, one of his company’s shirts, and shorts. “I spent almost a year trying to figure out what my expression of a business in the world would be. The uncertainty about the future made that a painful year of soul searching. Once I made the decision to create Poncho and go for it, I was able to put my head down and not look back.”

Inspired by Experience

Entrepreneurs often create businesses that solve problems they’ve experienced. In Spencer’s case, he had always worn the traditional fishing and sporting shirts with an abundance of loops and pockets. He started thinking he could make a better, more functional shirt. “I wanted to create the best shirt for the outdoors,” he says.

The company, headquartered in a late 19th-century colonnaded historical home just steps from the Drag, has steadily built a devoted following of fishermen, hunters, and outdoorsmen who prize the fit, practicality, and styling of its high-performance shirts. The shirts come in a range of styles, with evocative names derived from fishing, Texas landscapes, and Austin places (“The Barton Springs,” “The Zilker, and “The Guadalupe”), made with a variety of quick-drying fabrics, prints, and styles. They are as popular with sportsmen as they are with urban guys who don’t know a crawler from a crankbait. A UT-branded burnt orange shirt called “The Drag” is made with Longhorn fans in mind. Spencer explains: “Austin is our home! We live and work here and love it, so we named many shirts after the places we call home — and the places where we play.”

The company has about 100 employees in its campus-adjacent office and in a warehouse in North Austin. Shirts are sold almost exclusively online, as well as through several retailers, including Tyler’s in Austin, where Poncho is the top-selling brand.

Workplace Values

Besides his clear vision for the product category, Spencer had a strong sense for Poncho’s company culture. As its leader, his style merges his love of fun and his serious approach to the work. 

“I want joy in my work,” he says. “I want to put something out into the world that I am really proud of.”

He pursues potential employees who want that too. All his time in the outdoors has taught him how one person can change the dynamic, whether it’s a fishing trip or a startup operation. 

As the company has grown, Spencer says he doesn’t spend much time thinking about his leadership philosophy. But he knows what has worked: “The things that have served me well as a leader are, one, having a really clear vision about what we want to be in the world and setting clear goals about how we’re going to get there. Two, hiring great people. We have a very big and serious vision about what we want Poncho to be in the world. And the best way we’re going to get there is by hiring great people to help us do it. And three, just being kind and very determined.”

On a tour of the Poncho office, decorated with bearskins and deer antlers, he introduces a visitor to members of his management team. It’s a small group, even if it has taken a long time to assemble. Poncho’s team includes finance and operations manager Charlie Howell, BBA ’20, MPA ’21, and product development manager Jackson Jeansonne, BBA ’22.

“Having the smallest team possible to make the highest impact possible creates the most fun possible,” Spencer says. “Every single person here deeply matters. That creates a sense of accountability, pride, and enthusiasm in the work that we do here because everybody is so critically important.

“We’re very serious around here. We’re highly accountable to our goals. We have direct conversations, but all that can be done with a spirit of kindness and teamwork and joy and having a lot of fun. Things go better when everybody feels that.”

Dreaming Big

While the company has focused on men’s performance shirts, Spencer says Poncho has big plans for something more. When he was crafting a vision for a company, he decided against going the path of a venture-backed company and a quick exit. He wanted something different. “I want to create something that will stand the test of time,” he says. “I hope to be growing Poncho for the rest of my life.”

Late this past summer, Spencer returned from his first visit to Alaska in two decades. He says he had imagined after starting an outdoor brand that he’d spend every season there, but the trip came only after eight years of planting the seeds for conservation partnerships and exotic location shoots combining work and outdoor adventure. Finally, as a reward for his leadership team, he took them on a trip to Alaska. He rented a lodge in a remote area and included two lucky customers who won the chance to join them for a weeklong fishing adventure.

He recalled the “wow” of the plane rides to their fishing sites as they viewed the untouched landscape. “You’re looking down, and you can’t see another sign of human intervention in any direction for hundreds of miles.”

Everyone had the Alaskan wilderness adventure of a lifetime, he says, even the customers who were thrown into the mix. The company’s culture won the day and underscores what Spencer says are the most important attributes that drive his company and his leadership.

Sitting on a boat waiting for the fish to bite, Spencer says, you learn to enjoy the camaraderie of your companions. “It’s the same as the culture I’m trying to build here — the camaraderie among our team,” he says. “I could have stayed in finance, I could have stayed in private equity, but I started this business because I wanted to enjoy the journey.”

Having the smallest team possible to make the highest impact possible creates the most fun possible.”

— Clayton Spencer