Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Josh Mejia. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alright, Josh thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

My family has had a children’s clothing line since 2008 called Penelope Wildberry and due to a family issue it was needed for me to come in and take over the business in 2018. I’ve been an entrepreneur my entire life, but I had never entered the apparel industry and did not know the first thing about it! lol but our family was on the verge of losing the business and so I stepped up to the plate to help. As I began to dive into this world I noticed a ton of issues we were having with the main one being our supply chain. We heavily relied on outside contractors to complete the majority of our products and like so many brands out there, we had a ton of problems and lost the ability to control our quality due to the factory or vendor just not understanding or simply not caring.

With these being a major choke hold I decided we needed to bring our entire process in house to be able to truly control our products quality and be able to deliver a high quality products in a timely fashion for our customers and this is how the journey of creating The Sublimation House began!

Josh, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I have been an entrepreneur my entire life, seriously since I was in elementary school I would sell my lunch to my friend that used to bring money to buy lunch. Instead of buying lunch I would pocket the money and wait to get home after school to eat! lol I truly believe I was created for this very purpose and my journey so far proves exactly that.

Im a mechanic by trade, I began working on cars since I was 14. After school there was an auto shop down the street and he was a family friend and he allowed me to apprentice with him after school and on the weekends.

I was involved in a motorcycle accident where I truly believe was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. I was headed down the wrong path and life hit me hard, 14 reconstructive surgeries hard! Post accident I was unable to walk and needed 24/7 care, so I needed to move in with my parents who were living in North Carolina at the time.

As I went down my recovery journey, there was a point where my moms car needed brakes and although I am a mechanic and could have easily done the work, I was in no physical shape yet to be able to as I still needed a walker to get around. I was referred to a mechanic that could help and so one day I went down to visit to get a quote. As I entered the office, there was another customer inside the store speaking with the owner about her car. The owner was Venezuelan and english was his second language and the customer was African and english was also her second language, as you can imagine the miscommunication was insane! lol I speak English and Spanish fluently, so about 5 min in I asked if I could step in and help translate what was going on and in another 2 min the customer was happy and walked out the door.

The owner asked if I had previous experience and was looking for work. I was not at the time but it seemed like the right opportunity and a few conversations later I was hired! It didn’t take long for me to find that I wanted to own a shop and so the owner and I partnered up. I worked 19-20 hours a day for a year and a half straight to save up $60,000 cash to be able to join this venture. I worked overnight as a janitor first and then a mechanic on the railroad. I would work from 8:00pm to 6:30am, go home sleep untill 11am and then go to the mechanic shop until 7:30pm where I had to go back to the railroad. It was brutal, but I absolutely loved that time in my life and learned soooo many great lessons.

Unfortunately things did not work out between us and we needed to part ways.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

So my first business I started was an automotive repair shop. I worked at this shop with my soon to be partner. After realizing it was my calling to be an entrepreneur I took a job on the railroad overnight where I worked from 8pm – 6:30am, went home to sleep till 11:00am and then went into the shop from 12:00pm to 7:30pm. I did this for a year and half and was able to invest $60,000 into the business.

Can you talk to us about manufacturing? How’d you figure it all out? We’d love to hear the story.

When I came into this business I had no idea how to create a product or start from a concept and bring it to life. Thankfully Im a self learner and can pretty much teach myself any skill, so I turned to the internet and began my research. My knowledge is a combination of; courses, youtube, google and contacting other people in the space.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://thesublimationhouse.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thesublimationhouse
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thesublimationhouse
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/thesublimationhouse
• Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/thesublimationcasa
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/thesublimationhouse