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Forked Up Art twists flatware into profitable, gallery showcases

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General manager of Forked Up Art, Landon Kunzler, featuring a variety of artwork pieced together from forks and spoons. Photo credit: Forked Up Art

“Art to me is an expression of any emotion through multiple different ways,” said Landon Kunzler, general manager of Forked Up Art.

The title explains it all. Forked Up Art is a distribution-based company that makes art out of nothing but forks and spoons.

“Our artwork is very niche specific,” Kunzler said.

Forked Up Art is located in Ogden, just off Pennsylvania Avenue, where it has been located for about about a year now. The business was previously located out of Salt Lake City.

Landon Kunzler explained that all of the art is welded and created at the warehouse, and they then ship to a variety of retailers all over the nation. They also sell their own artwork through their website.

A few of the retailers they cater to include Wayfair, Etsy, Anthropology and Amazon.

Since it was started five years ago by company founder Judson Jennings, the fork- and spoon-based company has been consistently making pieces of art.

It was Jennings who initially came up with the idea of the business and the first work of art wrought with a fork. “Someone was trying to get a pickle, so he made a pickle fork,” said Camilla Kunzler, wife of Landon Kunzler and desk manager at Forked Up Art.

According to Landon Kunzler, the company has over 200 different designs, all made of forks and spoons. The artwork is broken into three different categories: figurines, garden art and housewares.

Landon Kunzler said it’s not just a one-man show at Forked Up Art, adding that they have four in-house artists at the Ogden location who create all the different works.

Landon Kunzler was in the military at the time when he got referred to Forked Up Art by a friend. What began as a temporary side job turned into a lifelong career for the couple.

Considering his personal experience and the experience from Jennings, Landon Kunzler offered his own advice to college students: “Don’t be afraid to dive into the dark,” he said.

He said once students graduate, rather than trying to compete for the same job that other graduates are going for, students should start a business of their own, adding that students should have faith in themselves.

“I think in Utah, out of any other state in this country, has really proven that small businesses can succeed,” he said.

According to the the Kunzlers, they a have what they call a “growth plan” for the company.

The couple spoke about future plans for the business. One day, they may expand and open up a gallery where they could be online or a physical gallery that would showcase artwork.

“In the last five years in business, we’ve grown to about 2,000 retailers nationwide,” Landon Kunzler said. The couple hopes to expand their market even more.

The couple is also considering going beyond the art of spoons and forks. Landon Kunzler said once they grow their line of product, they will start to look into expanding that line and incorporating other forms of art from local artists.

“I’d want to have a diversified product list to be able to have multiple opportunities to bring money in, not just on forks and spoons,” Landon Kunzler said.

According to the couple, the company plans on attending future art shows. Right now, the company is interested in keeping the art in Utah and exposing the art into the smaller scale art markets.

“Those are the best markets to go to,” Camilla Kunzler said.

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