We were lucky to catch up with Cyrus Oliver recently and have shared our conversation below.

Cyrus, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

The story behind my mission is, I wanted to create a brand in which revolves around feelings that are somewhat relatable. My brand mainly preaches “it’s okay to express how you feel through art”. We live in a day and age where it’s a challenge to express how you feel without someone making you feel less than how you are. So one way I figured out how to escape from that is to show not only is it okay to tap into your feelings but it’s also possible to do that through art.

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

My name is Cyrus but my close friends call me Hippy. I started to get into fashion more around the age of 13. At that time I was a bigger kid so it was very hard for me to find clothes, shop etc. I attended a school that was mainly about performing arts. Being around that really opened the doors for me to tap into my creative side of things. Fashion played a big part during my middle school/ high school years. My school would have fashion shows once a year and I would attend them but I was on the technical theater side. Seeing how people could take their ideas and a few pieces of fabric and bring everything to life was always interesting to me. The day I decided I wanted to get in fashion more, I started with a pair of jeans. After that I couldn’t stop. It felt like I found my career of choice at an early age. Throughout my high school years I was still making clothes but not as much as I am now. When I graduated, I thought I was going to live out the American Dream, go to college, become an engineer and so forth. But some things just don’t work out how you want them to. So a year after I graduated, I asked myself what do I really love to do and that’s when I realized I love art. So I realized not only am I good at art but I’m also good at creating clothes. I did research on how to create a clothing brand and what it takes to own it and keep it afloat. I went from creating things with my own hands to having multiple overseas and in house manufacturers. In house manufacturers are manufacturers within the United States. I create multiple different products such as jeans, hoodies, shorts, glasses etc. Basically anything you can wear. As my brand grows I want to take into the quality side of things more because you can always have the best designs ever but if the quality isn’t on the same level or better than your product won’t sale.

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

When I started out, I started out doing this method called “The Preorder Method”. The way you do that is, you create the product digitally. Once you have the digital product you then gather everything you need for that one product such as size charts, pdf files of the design, fabric type and every little detail about the design. Once you have all of that together, you then send everything over to you manufacturer (if you have one. If not, it’s perfectly fine). You have to communicate to your manufacturer you need a SAMPLE of this product. Once you get the sample of the product in, you have to check the quality. If the quality is meeting your expectations, you have to start promoting. You have to promote the product for at least a month before your initial release date. Running advertising will help you out a lot on this step. Once you reach the release date, you wanna have your site available for at least 10 days. All the orders you get from your drop, you have to send those over to your manufacturer asap. The capital you gain from your preorder, you’ll use that to put everything in motion.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

The way I built my audience on social media is I figured out who already had a following and had a “bigger” name and met up with them and gave them a few of my products from custom products like jeans or a custom hoodie and had them share it with their followers. Something like a social media influencer. I also started to pay for advertising. Advertising is one of the best ways to really build your audience. When I learned how to utilize that platform of ads, I really took advantage of it and made the best out of it.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.hippystudios.org
• Instagram: _hippysupreme
• Other: My business page on instagram is @hippystudios_