We were lucky to catch up with Stacy Johnson recently and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Stacy thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Risk taking is a huge part of most people’s story but too often society overlooks those risks and only focuses on where you are today. Can you talk to us about a risk you’ve taken – it could be a big risk or a small one – but walk us through the backstory.
I feel like my whole experience as a small business owner has been one big risk. From day one in 1998, when I quit my job as a designer at Cynthia Rowley in NYC taking the leap to start my own line, Stacia. And not just starting a clothing line, but opening up my very own boutique on a desolate, up-and-coming street in my Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn neighborhood, Smith Street. I had a lease and key in hand and the beginnings of a collection of designs. I was driven by my ambition and a vision of my future as a business owner and never had a moment to stop and think about how scary what I was doing and the risk of failure. The second biggest risk I took in my entrepreneurial journey was after 6 years running my own boutique and factory in Brooklyn, I was craving a simpler lifestyle and warmer climate to raise my newborn son. My husband, an on-air correspondent for CNN at the time, and I literally dropped everything and packed up to move to sunny California. I closed my shop, he quit his job, and with a 4 month old baby in tow, we set off for the West with no financial prospects, just a desire for change. I took 6 months to figure out my next steps as an entrepreneur and to enjoy my new Santa Monica neighborhood with a baby. But it was not long before I was itching to start up Stacia again, but with a baby at home I didn’t want to deal with running a store and managing a factory of sewers to manufacture my designs. Instead, I took another risk and re-invented my business as an Eco-knitwear clothing line of beachy, bamboo & tencel blend sweaters and separates inspired by the California lifestyle. Instead of dealing with a brick n’ mortar store, I chose for the first time to wholesale my designs to other stores. After 10 successful years distributing my knitwear to over 300 stores nationwide and even opening another boutique on Montana Avenue, plus having 2 more kids, I finally felt I had made it. Or at least finally making a comfortable living doing what I love. But as with any business, life can be a roller coaster of ups and downs and my business went dead stop after a fire in my store’s building in 2014. I lost all my inventory, and my landlord who owned the building for 50 years past away in the fire. Thankfully I had insurance and the love and support from my customers. Again, I took a breather to figure out what’s next for Stacia. Since then I have taken multiple risks to reinvent my brand, to keep relevant in the fashion industry, and move quickly with the changing market. I’ve had a brick n’ mortar store, wholesaled my clothing line to other stores, so what’s left? Direct to consumer was my next challenge and the new direction I chose for my business, and a risky one at that especially since my brand has been dormant since the 2014 fire. The last five years I’ve slowly grown my online presence at shopstacia.com, re-building my brand (new website, new logo, new branding, etc.) I’ve even taken a huge risk by discontinuing my bamboo eco-knits collection that my customers have come to know me for since 2010. Instead I wanted to go back to my Brooklyn roots and flip through my archive patterns from Y2K and get back to the drawing board, making my own patterns, cutting each garment in-house instead of relying on a factory. The risk is paying off little by little as I grown the business once again, but online. Focusing now on small batch designs, keeping no inventory, and producing the clothing to order, allows me to be small and nimble as a business. The market is constantly changing and I want to be able to adapt quickly. Just recently I took another business risk by introducing an on-demand 3D knitwear collection to my web site. Getting back to my knitwear roots and dipping my toes back into manufacturing sweaters, but this time I really wanted to keep it made in the USA and eliminate excess inventory. I’ve partnered with a factory in Brooklyn, NY, where I founded Stacia in 1998, to produce my “wholegarment”, 3D knitted garments. Let’s hope this latest risk pays off and I can continue doing what I love and evolving as a business owner and clothing designer.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I started Stacia twenty years ago in my Brooklyn brownstone cutting patterns on the hardwood floor. Today I continue to make small batch clothing using dead-stock fabrics and recycled materials. that can be found at shopstacia.com. Our motto is “wear now, wear always” which reflects our goal to create timeless silhouettes in natural fibers that can be worn all year-round and for years to come. We are the antithesis of fast fashion. Every pattern is executed by me, every piece cut by hand and sewn in Los Angeles one by one. This is slow fashion. Stacia does not keep inventory and we listen to our customers needs by only making what they order. Through our social media channels, Instagram and TikTok, I like to share with our followers the design process, from pattern to sample to photoshoot to final product. By showing the customer our slow process, we are helping educate the consumer to make more conscious buying decisions, to understand what made in the USA looks like, and how a small business works. We can’t compete with other large scale brands and we don’t even try. Instead we try to make a connection with our customers and followers by being authentic and sharing our brand story everyday.
Can you talk to us about manufacturing? How’d you figure it all out? We’d love to hear the story.
When I started my business in 1998, I couldn’t afford to hire a full production team nor place my designs in a factory as minimums were too high. Thankfully my training at Parson’s School of Design prepared me to do a lot of the jobs required to start a clothing line. It’s true a small business owner must wear many hats. I drafted or draped my own patterns, purchased the fabrics, graded the patterns, and cut my designs myself in the beginning. I used independent contractors to sew up my designs for my boutique. As we grew, I was able to hire a full production team of 5 sewers and 1 cutter to manufacture my collection for the Stacia boutique in Brooklyn. In addition, I had a wonderful connection to a sweater factory in Hong Kong when I worked at Cynthia Rowley. Our partnership lasted over two decades as I grew my business from one store to selling thousands of sweaters a season to many stores. Since I was a small brand and only had one outlet to sell my designs, I would use up their dead-stock yarns leftover from other brands to make up small batches of my sweater designs which sold really well in my shop. Flash forward 6 years and a move to Santa Monica, I pivoted my business to solely manufacture and sell knitwear. My Hong Kong factory was a huge help in growing from a few hundred sweaters for one shop to thousands of sweaters for my new wholesale business. It was a wonderful partnership and even though I no longer manufacture sweaters overseas, they are like family and we still keep in touch. After the pandemic with so many shipping delays and rising costs overseas, I wanted to move my sweater production to the USA. This was a difficult task to source a knitting factory in the US which has high minimums, higher costs, and I’m still having to import the yarns from overseas. I took a break from designing sweaters because I hadn’t found a solution to this production problem. I instead focused on growing my Wovens collection of dresses, tops, and pants. About 5 years ago I learned about a 3D knitting technology coming out of Japan by a company called Shima Seiki. They had these amazing 3D knitting machines that could knit a whole garment in one piece. No seams. No sewing. Zero waste. I met with Shima Seiki here in LA about 5 years ago and was fascinated with the technology. How could I get my hands on one of these machines?! Only a few factories in the US had them and the costs were exorbitant and not yet ready for the mainstream. I can’t exactly ask my customer to go from paying $200 to $800 for a sweater, even if it is made in the USA. But a few years ago, I stumbled on a new factory in Brooklyn that had these machines and they were building a platform for designers to manufacture 3D knitted sweaters. I toured their facility in 2021 before they launched their platform. We just dropped our first 3D knitted zero-wast collection and are excited to see the response. The factory has an app installed on our Shopify web site so whenever a customer orders one of our knits, their order is directly queued into production at the Brooklyn factory. Within 3 to 5 business days, their order is drop-shipped to them from the factory. Stacia holds no inventory, therefore no excess stock or markdowns. We only produce what is ordered. This is the future of fashion.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
Even though I still consider myself a small brand or indie designer, I’m actually a veteran of the fashion industry at this point. I can’t believe it’s been over 20 years in business at Stacia. The fashion business is definitely a roller coaster ride with many ups and downs. My business has weathered the dot-com bust, 9/11 (my boutique was less than 5 miles from Ground Zero), the 2008 recession, a fire, and a pandemic. All these life events have definitely made this journey more meaningful and I’m proud I”m still in business. With every knock-down, I had to pull myself back up and pivot the business to keep things afloat. I think being small and nimble has given me an edge. If I had been bigger and had more at stake, any of those life events could have taken my business down. Thankfully, I was able to adapt and stay true to my brand’s vision. Trends in fashion come and go and the fashion business is always changing, but my mission has always been the same. Keeping my business small, allows me to be creative and conscious of every piece I design and make. I can quickly adapt to any changes in the industry and not get bogged down with all the details. Even though I have a lot of experience in this industry, I still feel like I’m learning every day. Whether it’s discovering 3D knitting technology, building a web site, posting a reel, or figuring out how to monetize TikTok, I’m constantly learning new ways to be a better entrepreneur and designer. And I’m still wearing lots of hats.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://shopstacia.com/
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/shopstacia/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shopstacia
- Linkedin: https://linkedin.com/in/shopstacia/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@shopstacia
- Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@shopstacia
Image Credits
Carmel Samiri