Gas Light Apparel: mainly Bay Area and sports related ready reach a bigger customer base by expanding our designs to reach other interests, and trending style garments and styles

I was born and raised in Oakland California in a 2 bedroom apartment with my Mother and step Father in the not so desirable part of town. My mother did everything in her power to provide the best for me, sending me to private school through 6th grade. I was very involved in sports as a child playing baseball, and basketball from t-ball through high school. We then moved to a nice condo in Hayward California in the 10th grade, this showed me that goals are accomplished with hard work and dedication. Today I’m married to my high school sweetheart and have 2 wonderful boys, ages 14 & 15. I’m a garbage man and my wife works for the school district which pays the bills for now. We are looking to grow our clothing business to one day be completely self employed, and show our young boys that goals are indeed reachable through hard work and dedication.

My wife and I decided to start an apparel business about 3 years ago to help supplement our income. We started with an Oakland A’s inspired design with was hugh success. We were able to cover our start up cost, and profit enough to make several more orders of shirts. We networked at sporting events, street fairs, social media, and everywhere else we went. We have built off of that 1 design, and now have 10 designs we offer. Our designs are mainly Bay Area and sports related, which we are looking to expand to gain bigger customer base. We use quality products and never cut corners to save a dime. A lot of our sales are online, which takes a certain level of trust when buying from a small business like ours. Our customers are confident that their product will be of high quality, and if ever there is a problem we will correct it immediately. We pride ourselves on providing a quality piece of merchandise at a fair price, that people are proud to wear. Our 2 boys each have their own design with they funded on there own, and were able to cover their cost and make a small profit. We keep the boys involved in every aspect of the business, from what garments to buy, to the design process, to marketing, and selling the merchandise. We have our products available online and at select retail stores in the area. In the future we are looking to open our own brick and mortar and expand to other retailers across the country.

This loan will help us to reach a bigger customer base by expanding our designs to reach other interests, and trending style garments and styles. We will be able to purchase our own screen printing equipment, and embroidery machine. These key pieces of equipment will allow us to tremendously cut down our cost of making garments, and turn much more of a profit. We will also have to ability to make custom garments for other clothing lines. We feel like this loan could take us to that next level of growth that we are unable to reach without an initial investment fund.