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

PHANTASHIA, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you share a story that illustrates an important or relevant lesson you learned in school

My name is Phantashia Johnson, and I am the owner of The Aya Emporium LLC. I create handcrafted apparel and accessories. I learn how to sew in a “career center” program in high school. For half a day junior/ senior year and I spent time learning about creating garments and design illustrations. Although I have always had a love for doodling dresses, I had never thought of a career as a designer. I had the opportunity to visit career centers my sophomore year and I thought to myself well this will be boring but it’s a field trip so why not. I went on the tour and was beyond exciting at how cool it seemed. That experience started a trend in my life. I should always be open to trying to learn new things. I didn’t think going on this field trip would change the trajectory of my life but here we are. (Prior to that my plan was Law School) From two years of fashion design career center, I spoke with my professors who helped me put a portfolio together for Kent State. I didn’t know a lot about the school or anyone who went there. So, I decided let’s just try it out, and if I don’t like it I can come home. It ended up being amazing program, It’s the 3rd best rank fashion school in the U.S. While at Kent state, I thought I’d try studying away in NYC. While there my goal was to find an internship. Doing my research before I left Ohio; I contacted a company. Lined it up so it would be ready when I got there. When I arrived, I couldn’t get in contact with them. Devastated, I spoke to my teacher about it. I said to him, you know jumping out into the unknown has been a system that has worked for me before. But today, I don’t think it’s working in my favor. I had this internship set up at Tracy Reese and now I can’t get a hold of them. He goes, well they are only a block away why not just go there. So, I grabbed my backpack, walking into this NYC building I’ve never been to and office that was so unfamiliar and said Hi I’m Phantashia I spoke to someone about an internship. They were prepping for fashion week, so they were too busy for my calls/emails. But very much to my surprise I started that same week! This showed me, that being open to walking into unfamiliar territory is risk worth taking. Being open to new experiences is always to my advantage. This process continues from me. I landed a corporate internship with Li & Fung USA using this same tactic and my 1st job out of college as an Apparel Technical designer at Lane Bryant. Even with all those experiences I was still so nervous to start creating designs for my own business. It wasn’t until 2019, that I decided to take my own advice and just do it! I’ve learned a lot along the way, so many new experiences now that I design things for many different people. In 2019, I started the process of getting serious about creating custom garments and accessories. I am hoping that continuing to be open to new things and experiences will help me and my business grow.

PHANTASHIA, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

My name is Phantashia Johnson, and I am the owner of The Aya Emporium LLC. I create handcrafted apparel and accessories. I learn how to sew in a career center program in high school, then continue into college where I have a BA in Fashion design and technical production. Currently, I create custom garments for clients for special occasion. Such as birthdays and special events. My clients come to me because they are looking for something special curated just for them and their body. Nothing feels better than knowing this was made for me and I am the only one who has it. I am proud that I have been able to grow by word of mouth. Most of my clients hear learn about me from previous clients. I continue to find ways to make clients happy and to improve their experience with me.

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

Currently I create all my own products. I have been sewing for almost 15 years now. I learned how to sew in high school and in college. And even know I am always looking to learn new ways to sew things. When manufacturing my own products, this mean I am also my own QA team. So I’ve learned even though I made it. I still need to triple and double check everything, same as they would in a factory. You want to make sure that every client has the same experience.

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

I started my ecommerce sit with Etsy. And I was just winging it, really. Etsy is great because a lot of the traffic is driven for you. But there is so much to it, with keywords, and ads. And for a while it was great. The pros for me are that there is some natural traffic that comes from just being on Etsy. The Cons are you must really do the research. On best lighting, best keywords and the fees that are being charge. At one point I was paying for Ads and the Esty fees and it was eating up my profits. You really must sit and make a strategy to be successful.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.TheAyaEmporium.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theayaemporium/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AyaEmporium
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_Q7Rla9AxzoHw2LODEHXWQ