Steve Jordan chats to Bill Cain about starting something new, making people feel good and hats.
When the fun stops … stop! It’s a phrase usually reserved for gamblers but, if we all want to live our short lives to the full, there’s no reason it shouldn’t apply equally to any aspect of life.
It’s certainly a principle that Bill Cain has adopted. He spent around 30 years working in the mobility industry, primarily with Santa Fe, but then decided it was time to try something different. “The changes that were happening with Santa Fe made me feel that I had done my time,” he said. “I realised that the management and I were not seeing eye to eye. I’d become a little fatigued by it all. So, I just slipped out the back door. I’d had a good run.”
Bill slipped out to follow a passion. He’d always liked hats. His father liked them too. Back in 2012 he’d had an idea to import Panama hats into Singapore. He met a hat exporter through a friend, spent some time in Ecuador to find out everything he needed to know about his product, rented a small shop and worked in it for a few hours each Saturday. He called his company Hat of Cain.
So when the inevitable break came with Santa Fe in late 2018, Bill was free to enter full-time into a world of style and fashion. He expanded the shop, opened it five days a week (Tuesday – Saturday), and relaxed into a totally different lifestyle ...
Photos: Bill Cain (top) and inside Hat of Cain.