We were lucky to catch up with Sharhonda Smith recently and have shared our conversation below.

Sharhonda, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

While attending an online business school in the spring of 2019, I developed an initial business idea to provide a local resource for families to purchase gymnastics essentials from one centralized location. As a mother of two competitive gymnasts of seven years at the time, I understood firsthand the demand of the sport and the challenges it presented when searching tirelessly for specialty apparel and accessories.

But in the summer of 2019, my business idea propelled into something much more profound after spending countless hours in the gym watching my daughters train and simultaneously observing innumerable, heartbreaking moments of gymnasts battling fear or mental blocks, a common phenomenon among many athletes which ultimately leads to mental paralysis preventing forward mobility in the sport.

And then it happened to my daughter! Twelve years old at the time, my child experienced her own personal battle of fear that seemingly appeared out of nowhere. Week after week, month after month, I dreadfully witnessed countless gym workouts of my daughter become immobilized by fear to the point she balked on even the most basic tumbling skills. Her training had been progressing nicely until suddenly one day she developed a devastating mental block. Suddenly her passion for gymnastics transformed into frustration as she bawled inconsolably during workouts plagued with dreadful unwarranted thoughts of terror before attempting tumbling passes.

Feeling helpless yet desperate to find a solution to help my daughter and her gymnastics peers defeat this disastrous dream destroyer, I ultimately realized the only way to help these athletes defeat fear was through the power of its opposite counterpart – faith. Through this, the concept of Glorified Gymnast was born. Promptly realizing the lack of available resources, I was blessed to have identified a unique niche that was grossly under-served. In fact, at the time, it was completely non-existent.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

After becoming mentally exhausted working relentless hours and failing to fit perfectly into corporate America’s expectation of the “ideal employee”, I finally decided to pursue my God given purpose and became an entrepreneur. With no funds other than the $1K gift I received for earning top scholar of my graduating class, I officially formed my new business, Glorified Gymnast at the height of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic.

Near the end of 2020, Glorified Gymnast became the exclusive leader in the offering of faith-based gymnastics leotards and apparel. However, we are more than just a gymnastics apparel company. Our priority is addressing the mental wellness of gymnasts to ensure they are equipped with the necessary spiritual tools to overcome every challenge. Our apparel brand supports our mission to empower gymnasts with faith and boldness to eradicate fear. Imprinted faith-inspired messages that exudes courage confidence and strength are incorporated into the most beautifully designed leotards and apparel. Each garment serving as a visible reminder for gymnasts to build their faith on God’s faithful promises and overcome fear while they train.

Glorified Gymnast was first established as a leotard company by way of collaborations with other leotard labels, producing leotards that featured two separate, distinct brands, from 2020-2021. However, in 2022, we were blessed with an extraordinary opportunity to finally go solo and produce our very first signature leotard collection which only features our unique GG brand logo. To date, we are the sole source of faith-based gymnastics leotards and apparel within the entire gymnastics industry, both domestically and internationally.

Our entire faith-based leotard and apparel collections are available at wholesale pricing for gym club pro-shops. In addition, we offer customizable leo styles for training and competition for club, collegiate and national teams. Custom attire is also available for other businesses.

More information about our offerings can be found on our website at www.glorifiedgymnast.com, or follow us @glorifiedgymnast on Instagram and Facebook.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

There are so many stories! I have experienced countless trials that was extremely difficult and exhausting! One of the most memorable dates to June 2019 when I lost my role as a contract worker. Just six months prior, I had planned to enroll in a nine-month online business school to become an entrepreneur. But just a month before school was to start, I was served with
foreclosure court papers. As I read the words printed on those papers in my hand, I felt hopeless and was completely devastated! The beautiful dream home, built from the ground up in 2016 for me, my husband and two young daughters was about to be taken from us!

I started questioning whether I should attend business school given the risk of losing our home and the need to reserve funds to save it rather than incurring tuition costs. But something was yearning inside of me to go forward with enrolling despite what I was facing. I simply could not fathom the thought of delaying my enrollment.

So, I stood strong in my faith! I believed God’s faithful promises and declared His word over my situation. I decided to walk by faith and not by sight and enrolled in The Joseph Business School the following month. The rest is history! In January 2020, I graduated top scholar of my graduating class with a 4.0 GPA! Three months later, I finally started my new business, Glorified Gymnast in April 2020.

Despite the adversity I was facing during that time, I never gave up. Even when I was in jeopardy of losing my business school enrollment after the loss of my contract role, I still persevered. Never losing hope, God blessed me with a scholarship which paid for my tuition for the last months of enrollment.

Although it was not easy, I continued to pray and meditate on various biblical scriptures that pertained to the dreadful situation I was facing. God’s word empowered me with hope and perseverance to keep moving forward towards my goals even though I was facing so many obstacles.

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

We had always planned to facilitate our own manufacturing since the inception of Glorified Gymnast. However due to lack of resources, we initially collaborated with other leotard companies to assist with our production efforts in our first two years of business.

Finally, this past July 2022, we were blessed with an extraordinary opportunity to secure our own vendor and produce our very first signature leotard collection which only features our unique GG brand logo.

At the time, I wasn’t actively searching for a manufacturing vendor, as plans to pursue was in the distant future. However, a completely unrelated event surrounding the gym club my daughter was attending led to an expedited decision to seek a vendor to manufacturer our products. It was then that I recalled several unread emails sitting in my inbox from a manufacturer offering to assist with our production needs. After engaging for almost a month, we finally made the switch and are expecting the production of the first 3 leotards from our signature collection around mid September 2022.

I have learned several invaluable lessons regarding the manufacturing process. The biggest lesson learned thus far, you have to understand that mistakes are bound to happen, and when they do, it’s important to focus on what can be done to rectify it versus wasting time and energy in sorrow and regrets.

In the second year of business, we experienced two separate occasions where the manufacturer made substantial production mistakes printing our leotards. Both times, I was livid! I couldn’t understand how such gross negligence could have occurred. My dissatisfaction was made known and I expected to be compensated accordingly, but there was no recourse offered other than the obvious, reproducing the apparel again.

In my opinion, going back to production was a no brainer. It was expected. But I wanted more. Realizing restitution was not in the books, I finally had to accept the manufacturer’s offer to ship the defective products to me, as well as the ones reproduced.

Holding onto the misprints for months, I was thinking they’d forever be stored away in box completely useless. Suddenly, God revealed a way that I could turn what appeared to be unsalvageable, into something even more special than the original. Ultimately, the leotards that were once faulty became perfectly profitable.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.glorifiedgymnast.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/glorifiedgymnast
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/glorifiedgymnast
• Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/company/glorified-gymnast

Image Credits
Clay Morgan Photography Artkeh