We were lucky to catch up with Nadia Alonso recently and have shared our conversation below.

Nadia, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. To kick things off, we’d love to hear about things you or your brand do that diverge from the industry standard

The apparel industry is very saturated especially for T-shirts and T-shirt designs.

At WOW Closet CO we strive to stand out from the competition.

We offer various screen printing techniques that are unique and scarcely available in the United States apparel industry. To explain further, we use specialized techniques to give the design a 3D texture or visual stunning affect like flock, puff ink, glow in the dark or metallic affect to name a few.

Not only are our techniques unique but as well as our designs. Our designs are a pleasant fusion of pop culture with Mexican, Aztec and Mayan cultural attributes for cultural appreciation and education.

We are very passionate about having quality over quantity when producing our apparel and attempt to find and use the best possible materials and equipment for production. We also try to minimize big company involvement and use local artists and local screen printers in Mexico. Local artist and screen printers could be some of the best in the industry but small growing for various reasons. We want to break down that barrier and give them a chance to show their talent.

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 Nadia Alonso I am the owner and founder of WOW Closet CO. WOW Closet CO is an e-commerce based apparel company out of Colorado.

WOW Closet CO was established in 07/2020 and was created with the idea of generating more jobs for those around us and those that need experience to break into the entrepreneurial industry.

One of the most important core aspects of our company is our customer service. We strive to provide the best service, quality control and produce stunning designs while having a fun and relaxed work environment for our team.

We want our employees to feel that they make a difference in the company and in our customers lives so, no idea given is a silly idea. We would not be where we are today if it wasn’t for our team.

We are not just a company who focuses on profit but instead our community involvement and community care. We love requests and ideas from our customers and we will do what we can to fulfill their request even if it means a specialized order. For example, we had a customer who had an autistic child who absolutely loved one of our designs and he requested for that designs that did not have texture to be texturized since she loved sensory fidgets. We made a specialized order just for his daughter to be able to have. If we can help fulfill a customers request or need in any way then it has been a good day.

Growing up, I was far from financially stability and it seemed as though everyone was only looking out for themselves and their future. I care about people and growth with each other and that’s why any time we are at an event our employees are ALWAYS encouraged to lend a helping hand: when a customer is struggling financially, we will work with them, if a new entrepreneur wants to start their business but doesn’t know where to start, we exchange information and show them how to start, if another vendor needs advice or a helping hand, we will be there and give them our tips and tricks, if a customer needs a specific shirt because they are too tall, we will make a specialized order just for them.

We want to help everyone grow and feel appreciated not just ourselves.

We provide one-of-a-kind products and designs with our specialized screen-printing techniques at a fair and reasonable price.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

At the time WOW Closet CO started I was working as a full time Mortgage Underwriter. During the pandemic being a Mortgage Underwriter was a very profitable career and from the extensive work hours and hard work I was able to slowly self fund WOW Closet CO.

I would work my full-time job, sometimes as much as 60-70 hour work weeks and I would hire a couple of employees to take care of the day-to-day operations needed for WOW Closet CO. We had a great team of employees, with great energy and willingness to go above and beyond for our customers and company.

Since many business take years to see a good profit, my Underwriting position was able to pay for the employees hourly wages and business expenses until WOW Closet Co could be self sufficient.

When I had to leave my underwriting position and give my full attention to WOW Closet CO we began doing more local events in Colorado during weekends to get exposure and brand awareness whilst getting capital to help fund WOW Closet CO further.

We’d love to hear the story of how you turned a side-hustle into a something much bigger.

At the time the pandemic hit, I was in a very profitable position as a Mortgage Underwriter not knowing that the aftermath would take a big toll on the business.

I got laid off at the end of January 2022 from the Mortgage Underwriter position and the only source of funding for WOW Closet CO. I decided to go full force with the business as there were no Underwriting positions available. At this time WOW Closet CO had only been in business for a year and four months.

It is amazing that in a short time period the business was actually self sustaining itself and growing. We were able to continue with our production, events and continue to grow in our community.

Sadly, we started to notice a decline a few months ago and we had to cut most of our team’s hours. Heaven Javalera which is our general manager, and my daughter became a co-owner at that time was even willingly to take herself off of payroll to not only help the business grow but help our small family because that’s how much she believes in the core foundation of WOW Closet CO.

As the economy of the United States keeps deteriorating, I have taken upon myself to continue pushing forward and travel to different states to spread brand awareness. I currently have no physical help and at times I will sleep in our commercial van to keep costs down in an effort to keep our employees and production in tack with the little funds we were generating. I am currently in Las Vegas for a few weeks in December and will be in New Mexico in January.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://wowclosetcolorado.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wowclosetcolorado/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wowclosetco

Image Credits
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