We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Jovan Davis. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jovan below.

Jovan, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

I worked with young people who had been committed to the department of youth justice system in 2008 and 2009. My responsibility in these children’s lives was to serve as a mentor and ensure that they were headed in the direction of success. I was their ITPM since certain youth had curfews and required supervision while they were released into the community ( Intensive Third Party Monitor ). I’ll check to see if they are abiding by their release agreements, keeping track of their attendance in school and in class as well as making sure they get home before their curfew. I will closely collaborate and interact with these kids every day to explore how we can develop a strategy to lessen the likelihood that they will return to the juvenile justice system. To expose them to various ways of life, I shall remove them from the villages that they have never left. These occasions will include visits to museums, bowling alleys, five-star restaurants, college campuses, and college classes where students might sit in on a real Bowie State University class. The REAL TALK SESSION was a once-weekly component of our program when we conversed with everyone in a healing circle. In these meetings we created a brave space where these kids became vulnerable and expressed to us how they really felt. We noted that they didn’t say hello to neighbors if they didn’t know them and that they didn’t think they would live past the age of 18, let alone 21. With this limited belief, they would make every effort to complete as much as they could in this brief period of time. Before what they believed to be their time was up, these kids desired the fastest cars, the hottest women, a lot of money, tattoos on their faces and necks, drugs and other impressive things they would see on TV. What entertains you, trains you. I asked myself how we get so disconnected from our communities that we cant speak to each other ?, compliment each other?, or show love and build each other up?One kid said “Hate is The New Love “. That was a powerful statement. I then said to myself “How Did Hate Become Cooler than Love?” I understood what he meant but I had to change that narrative. Immediately another component of the program was formed called creative expressions. We then changed the ways we greeted each other by making caps with embroidery stitching on them. The males wore King caps we called them crowns and the females wore the Queen caps. That was the solution to speak and think highly of ourselves and to move differently once you understand how power the words you are carrying on you. We noticed that a lot of males had bottled up energy and suppressed all that trauma and became violent or depressed. The real talk sessions would be an outlet to release their traumas and start healing. We created shirts with a red Heart on the sleeves which meant wear your heart on your sleeve and it was ok to show emotion, express yourself and communicate. These children never thought about designing their own clothes because they never saw someone look like them do so. We can’t be nothing we never see, after they saw it happen now they believed it was possible and started getting creative. These kids would want to design jean jackets with paint, laptop bags, jeans shirts etc anything you can think of. After a couple months people requested for more items to go with their caps, this when The Love More Brand was formed. The mission was to redefine cool and to show more love in our community so the name was perfect. We also changed the name of our organization to the love more movement 501c3. That’s why it was important to change the way they think and receive information. Only greatness can come from that. The most effective way we got these children to change was to hear what the problems in their lives were and meet those needs. I knew we were on to something because we discovered problems within our community and found solutions to those problems. If we would have never listened to these youth or exposed them to a different perspective we would have never got the chance to save lives or create short term and long term effective solutions. Exposure lead to Expansion

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’m Von The Merch Mentor, and they say that if you want to be successful in the clothing industry, the fastest, most effective way to learn is from someone who’s already walked a mile in your shoes. That’s me! Over the past 5 years I’ve built and gross 6 figures with my online store, Opened two brick and mortar store fronts( Portsmouth Va,Washington Dc), secured partnerships with a major corporations like Shoe City (www.ycmc.com) and have earned over 6 figures by having placements in over 30 Shoe City locations in various cities and states (Washington Dc, Maryland, Baltimore, and Virginia). I have built relationships to design numerous apparel for government and community organizations. Last but not least I’ve helped entrepreneurs with little to no experience start and launch a total of 50 plus brands from 2020-2022.I’m living proof that you don’t need years of experience,thousands of dollars of start-up money,or massive amounts of equipment with employees. To be successful and financially free when it comes to launching your clothing brand, all you need is a simple, step-by-step blueprint, that will lead you straight to the lifestyle that you’ve ALWAYS wanted to live.

I help individuals who struggle to launch their business successful and see predictable income by getting consistent customers. What set me apart for others is my 3M launch system that i use to change my life 8 years ago that’s currently been used to change the lives of others in my community. I proud i can empower my community . seeing the end results is what keep me motivated and my moral high. @themerchmentor on instagram and @lovemorebrand. My websites are lovemorebrand.co, www.lovemoremovement.org.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

I focused on One thing. I discovered My target audience , their root problem, build a vehicle that took my followers from pain to joy and crushed my followers limited beliefs. I wanted to add value to my followers I wanted to get my followers to know who i was to like who i was and to trust me. On my feed i like to have content that will inspire my target audience, motivate them, valuable information that will educate them, and lifestyle content.

My advice would be stay consistent provide valuable content that you can engage with your followers using testimonials from your work whatever it is you do . Create content should add value that meet the needs of your followers. Use social media to the best of its ability. Results, pictures, graphs and creative ways to document your journey will be helpful like use trending sounds, trending videos , using influencer marketing etc.

How’d you think through whether to sell directly on your own site or through a platform like Amazon, Etsy, Cratejoy, etc.

I utilize www.lovemorebrand.com on Shopify. I choose Shopify because it allows you to add apps to your business that increase revenue and find innovative methods to give your customers a good online shopping experience. My favorite apps to integrate with shopify is POSTSCRIPT AND KLAVIYO.

Contact Info:

• Website: WWW.LOVEMOREBRAND.CO
• Instagram: @THEMERCHMENTOR
• Facebook: Jovan Davis
• Linkedin: N/A
• Twitter: N/A
• Youtube: n/a
• Yelp: n/a