Jeff Bryan. Photo by Can Türkyilmaz

Fighting crime is tough. Fighting crime while wearing an uncomfortable shirt? It just shouldn’t happen. Yet Swiss Avenue resident Jeff Bryan lived with it for most of the 30 years he served on the Fort Worth police force. “The shirt buttoned at the top and we wore a pull-away tie — eight-hour shifts — and you are always turning and moving your head, and chafing the skin on your neck. All the police had the same problem.” The department once tried providing silk-collared shirts, which helped a bit, but neck scruff would eventually shred the material, he says. “I always thought, if only someone could come up with something to put on your clothes to prevent this discomfort, they could make a lot of money.” Not long before his retirement, Bryan mentioned the idea to his neighbor, Tarek Omar, who has a background in both business start-up and cosmetics, and he thought it was a great idea. They went into business together to develop Collar Glide anti-chafe stick. “We tried many different formulas, and I wore it every day for about two years before we finally settled on one,” Bryan says. “Then we had our friends try it, and we found it works not just on collars but on tags, shoes and really any piece of clothing that tends to cause irritation.” Bryan and Omar are particularly proud that their product is produced completely in the United States. “I am an old guy, so I care a lot about this kind of thing,” Bryan jokes. “We are owned, formulated, designed, packaged locally — right here in the Dallas area.” Collar Glide can be found at Tallulah Belle in Lakewood, at Uptown Cleaners on McKinney or online at collarglide.com for $5.95 a stick. “Depending how aggressively you use it,” Bryan says, “it can last about 50 applications on shirts.”

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