We were lucky to catch up with Brittany McIntyre recently and have shared our conversation below.

Brittany, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What sort of legacy are you hoping to build. What do you think people will say about you after you are gone, what do you hope to be remembered for?

As a entrepreneur and business mogul I pray that my legacy will be passing down the power to believe in yourself. I want to pass down a gift that everyone already has in them but have to learn to unlock. The gift of knowing their own SUPER POWERS! The ability to do whatever it is that will bring them happiness, financial freedom and overall to break generational curses as a female business owner.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

I was born and raised in North Carolina. I have a Bachelor’s Degree in Fashion Merchandising & Retail Marketing and a Master’s Degree in Education Management. Craving success, after finishing grad school I left North Carolina and moved to Atlanta to focus on my passion. I have always had an eye for fashion, never afraid to step outside of my comfort zone and set new trends. As a young girl I use to watch my aunts get dolled up for different occasions and finish their completed outfit looks with a pair of shades. That is when I knew that creating my own footsteps in the fashion industry and starting my own business would eventually be my ultimate goal. While working in a major department store, at times I didn’t feel like I was the perfect fit for their culture. In my heart I knew I wanted to stay in the fashion industry but didn’t want to work in retail anymore. In the mist of me working there I had to create something that I could call my own. In 2018, I established Shade911 to give trendsetting women a must have eye-wear collection for an affordable price. Creating my own lane in the fashion industry I have established customers from coast to coast. I feel like I give women across the world a reason to crave eye-wear as a finishing touch to their daily wardrobe. I left my job January 2nd, 2021 and have been a full-time entrepreneur every since then.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

Funding my business wasn’t hard. I had a full-time job and I am good at saving my money. Initially I did not invest a lot of money into my business. If I can remember I think I spent less that $300. I started off with 5 different styles in a few different colors and I got to work. As I made money, I repurchased inventory and saved as well. I did that for almost 3 years, then I started to invest my money into creating and private manufacturing my own branded sunglasses. My official launch for that was May 2022.

We’d really appreciate if you could talk to us about how you figured out the manufacturing process.

As of now I do manufacture my own products, as stated before I used the money that I made in my business to fund my brandy sunglasses. I did already have a few vendors overseas that I was in connection with but I was on the hunt for new vendors to manufacture my sunglasses. There is no other way to say this so I’m just going to say it, when finding new vendors you have to research research research there’s no easy way out. It took me almost 2 years to find the perfect vendors, create designs, negotiate pricing, order samples and find the right packing for my products. It was not a quick process, it took time. I had no team, no investors, therefore every move I made it had to be strategic because I was spending my own money.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.Shade911.com
• Instagram: www.Instagram.com/Shade911
• Facebook: www.Facebook.com/Shade911