We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Renia Pruchnicki. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Renia below.
Alright, Renia thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Alright, so we’d love to hear about how you got your first client or customer. What’s the story?
In 2001 I created my very first collection of sample belts along with some professional looking literature. I took to the streets in Toronto, Canada and literally walked into stores and asked for the manager. I did not have any appointments booked.
On that day, I received 3 orders from 3 different stores! Two of them were stores on Queen Street West and the third was a store in Yorkville called Over the Rainbow. This was wonderful news, as these two areas were really well known areas in Toronto for fashion. I recall being surprised that I was able to get my belts into these stores. It was one of the most memorable days of my life! I was literally jumping up and down on my couch.
Renia, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
My name is Renia Pruchnicki. I graduated from Ryerson University in Toronto Canada with a BA in Fashion Design / Production. I always had a flare for the arts and in high school I used to make my own clothes. I was always very creative. I was an entrepreneur at a young age – I had 2 paper routes and would walk the neighbours dogs at lunch.
After graduating in 1994 I worked for 7 years in the fashion industry as a pattern drafter, and product designer. One of my jobs was designing ski wear and snow board wear – out door gear. I even designed soft sided coolers. Eventually the company I was working for laid me off and I was on unemployment thinking my life was ruined!
While standing in the unemployment line, I noticed an ad for “self employment assistance” – a program offered by the government where I would take a course and be guided to start my own company. That is where Truth Belts was born.
The year was 2001. Belts were the hottest fashion accessory at that time – all of the magazines were talking about it. With my background in technical outerwear, I decided to create belts out of non-leather materials. I did not have experience working with leather, but I sure had a lot of experience working with a lot of other fabrics suitable for outdoor wear. So, I deiced to start a vegan belt company. And, at the time I was not even a vegan!
It was a hit. People loved my belts. I wanted to make sure that everything was Canadian made. I had experience sourcing things from around the world from my other jobs and I had relationships with various manufacturers, so I was able to make things happen quickly.
In 2001 I was selling my belts on line. At the time I was a very new thing and I had to have a separate website so that the stores who were carrying my belts would not know that I was selling on line, directly to customers. On line sales were new back then!
In 2003 Peta (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals) awarded me with a Proggy Award for (Best Leather Replacement Clothing Company in North America). It was so exciting! Things started happening.
I turned vegetarian and then vegan. The journey taught me a lot. I eventually expanded the line to include hand bags, suspenders, wallets, T-shirts and Yogabands.
One day I was inspired by a company called TEN TREE who had an incredible business model. They made it so that 10 trees were planted with each product they sold. I though this was a fantastic idea, so I teamed up with the same organization they used called One Tree Planted to make this happen. To date around 6000 trees have have been planted as a result of Truth belt sales.
Truth Belts has been around for 24 years (as of 2025). I have been through so much. I have made mistakes, had to be very flexible and learn how to ride the ups an downs. I am proud to say that the company is still running! In addition to selling Truth products at www.truthbelts.com, you can also find them at Amazon.com. Truth Belts also has been successful funded three times on Kickstarter.com.
What sets Truth products apart from others is the high end unique materials that we use. Our belts really last and are made with care. Customers can see and feel that. Our repeat purchase rate is 75%.
I have decided that it’s time for me to pass the baton onto someone who will thrive with this company and take it to heights that I never could. I have decided to sell Truth Belts this year (2025)! I’ve never sold a company before, but I imagine mentoring someone through their first year and my wish is for them to be incredibly successful and happy with this new venture.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
The first time that I really started making money, I made a decision to try something new. I decided to make a commercial and have it air on TV in the United States. I worked with a professional company in the USA to make this happen. The commercial was pretty good. We agreed it would air over the Christmas holidays.
What ended up happening is that my commercial did not air when they said it would. It aired in January – which was not a good time! I missed the holiday market.
There was a lot of “back and forth” and eventually the company would not respond to my calls or emails. I spent $10,000 on this. US dollars! That was A LOT money. I got nothing from it. I may as well have flushed $10K USD down the toilet!
I was very upset by this. When this happened, I spoke to a lawyer to see what I could do. He gave me a very good piece of advise that to this day I still remember.
He said that he had seen clients spend so much time and energy on wanted to get back at a person, or feeling down, in regret, that they end up wasting so much time and energy on nothing. I was not going to get the money back. He suggested that I simply forget about it, brush myself off and move forward.
This is what I did. I had the experience of losing $10K USD. I tired something new, and I failed. But I know that there really is no such thing as failure, only learning.
We’d love to hear your thoughts about selling platforms like Amazon/Etsy vs selling on your own site.
One day back in… oh… I think it was 2010 or so, I got an email from a company called Amazon.com.
They were looking for companies to sell product on their website and they had a promotion where they would list all of my products for me for free! All I had to do was supply the products when someone placed an order.
I decided to try this. So, they listed all of my belts. When you first list on Amazon, it is set up in such a way that you must be the one to send out the belts when an order comes in. That is called FBM (Fulfilled by Merchant). Amazon takes 10% in this scenario.
I did that for a few years. Things started happening. One of our belts called the ‘Seva’ – a flat stretchy belt that, for what ever reason, struck a cord with the public. One December, with no advertising, I sold $10,000 USD in one month on Amazon.com. I was fulfilling everything myself. It was a lot of work, but it was amazing!
Eventually, I switched over to something called FBA (Fulfilled by Amazon) which means that I ship a lot of belts to Amazon’s warehouses in the USA and when an order comes in, Amazon ships it out to the customer. This means you are part of the Amazon Prime program. Amazon’s cut is 30%, which is a lot, but you sell a lot more.
The pros – by selling on Amazon.com you reach a lot of people. You really can make a lot of money, especially if you have a team helping you.
The cons are that you are working with a computer. It’s better these days, but back when I started, there were a lot of glitches and I really had to spend a lot of time learning how to navigate the back end of Amazon. I can remember one 3 month period where for what ever reason, I was not getting my usual bi-weekly payments. I was on the phone with them constantly. They could not figure out why they payments were not finding their way into my bank account. I had to borrow money from my mom. Finally, after a huge amount of stress and time, 3 months worth of payments arrived.
It can be very frustrating working with Amazon. And with each passing year, it has become more complicated (although the back end is now a lot better – not as glitchy). I now have a team of experts handling my Amazon account for me. I still think it is one of the best selling methods out there.
Contact Info:
- Website: http://www.truthbelts.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/truth_belts/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TruthBelts
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/renia-pruchnicki-b7398a/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/truthbelts
Image Credits
Renia Pruchnicki