get started

"Start where you are.  Use what you have.  Do what you can." 

Arthur Ashe

You may already know that my business was born out of necessity and that I stared with nothing.  When I rented my office space, it was small and very simple.  My ideas were my only currency.  And, after many months of struggle, I finally found a client who sent me a purchase order that saved my company in the eleventh hour.  It was a breakthrough and a jumping off place to start building my company.  For three years, I designed and manufactured handbags for many labels but not my own.  After three years time, I was finally able to launch my own brand.  It was not where I started.  I did what I could for other brands first to build up my business.

Arthur Ashe Photo: HARRY HARRIS/AP

Starting where I was, using my ideas and doing what I could was enough.  Arthur Ashe's words are true and inspiring.  My beginning was not fancy, not glamorous, not well funded and not well connected.  It was simply that I started, worked hard, called everyone that I knew and everyone that I did not know until finally one person believed in me enough to actually place an order.

Sometimes, all we need is to get started.  The media provides so many wondrous success stories that become over glamorized.  You might think to yourself, this is too high a mountain to climb.  Start, take that first step.  

Arthur Ashe was one of our greatest tennis players. He followed his own words.  He was the first black man to win the singles title at Wimbledon.  He started where he was in Richmond, Virginia from humble beginnings.  He used all that he had.

It is merely the decision to start where you are!