Our Minneapolis custom hat bar, a live patch bar by another name, starts with a rack of blank caps, a table of patches made from your art, and a heat press. Each guest picks a cap (trucker or dad-hat style, from the blanks you choose), picks a patch, hands it over and watches the crew press it on. At a Convention Center booth we stretch the rack longer to handle the traffic; for an Uptown birthday one press is plenty. The whole kit travels up from Fullerton on a truck, and our crew flies in the day before.
Pieces of a Twin Cities hat bar
- A display that fits the room, whether that's a hotel lobby off the skyway or a brewery patio in Northeast.
- Caps in summer, beanies in winter: from November on we stock more knit hats than brims.
- Patches from your artwork: several designs, so choosing is part of the fun.
- Compact enough for lofts: one rack and one press squeeze into a small North Loop space.
Minneapolis hat bar questions
Do guests get felt western hats?
No. Ours is a cap and patch bar, with knit hats added for winter. There's no felt and no brim shaping, and from November on the rack holds more beanies than caps.
Can the hat bar set up in a skyway hotel ballroom?
Yes. We need the service elevator, since cases don't travel well through a skyway, and a circuit the banquet kitchen isn't using. The display gets built to fit the room.
Does the hat bar work at a January event?
Yes. Knit hats take over the rack, and we leave extra time at load-in so gear coming off a cold truck can reach room temperature before the first cap gets pressed.