Today we’d like to introduce you to Falyn Eaden.
Falyn, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
FALosophy was originally just a series of designs that I thought were cool and wanted to wear myself. Due to an overwhelming amount of positive feedback, I decided to make these designs available to the public. I hope you enjoy the selection as much as I do.
I’d like to say clothing and fashion became a passion of mine shortly after my mother stopped dressing me, but that isn’t the case. In fact, my interest in clothing (specifically t-shirts), didn’t come about until 2006-2007, my junior year in high school. I got a pair of shoes that I saw my favorite artist wear at a performance for Christmas and was having a hard time matching anything in my closet with it. Instead of going out and shopping around for something to match, I decided to take a more creative approach and make a shirt myself.
I went to the store, purchased some white t-shirts, and some silver iron-on letters. My shoes were silver so I thought this would be perfect. This would allow me to accent the shoes without being too matchy-matchy.
I took my purchase home and began to design some shirts. One had my first, middle, and last name jumbled up on the front of it. Another shirt I can remember just had random letters of the alphabet on it. I wore the shirts to school and got mixed reviews. But the most important part about this was that for the first time, it didn’t matter how anyone felt about my outfit. I was proud of it. It was my creation. It was original. It was me. At the time, I was still far removed from starting my business. It wasn’t even a thought at this point.
Fast forward to 2013 and I began to have the itching feeling again. This time, I was a little more serious. I had begun doing research on transfer paper, shirt distributors, and even dying options. Yes, I was planning on dying my shirts. Why? White shirts are cheaper than buying colored shirts. LOL. You buy a white shirt, you dye it and you save money. Which means more profit. But moving on.
I went out and bought a printer, transfer paper, a handful of shirts, and 2 sweaters. I’d like to mention that I also needed a printer for my college courses but I refused to buy it for that. It took my spark of inspiration in creating for me to finally get one. Needless to say, I created 2 shirts and 2 sweaters. The process was stressful. The majority of the time the transfers failed to transfer appropriately onto the shirts. A good bit of my shirts didn’t get made. For the record, transfer paper is expensive. About $8 per 3 sheets. As you can imagine, be a college student, I couldn’t afford the constant failures.
The first of the two sweaters I made was a grey “Plenty of Fish in the C” sweater. During the transfer process, only half of the C got printed on the shirt. A complete fail. I was making this shirt to go to an event. Despite being frustrated, I wore the sweater anyway. I wore it with PRIDE. Once again, it was my shirt. It became much more than a mistake to me. It was a representation of me. My hard-work. My mistakes. My confidence. My happiness. I still wear it “til this day.”
The only shirt I made “successfully” was the “Banana” t-shirt. I attempted to dye the shirt purple. Complete fail. The shirt came out lavender and all the threads came out royal purple. It gets worse. For whatever reason, my printer kept printing the bananas red. They were supposed to be yellow. After reprinting them multiple times, and becoming more and more frustrated I decided to stick with it.
My best creation throughout this stent of dabbling in t-shirts was my 2nd sweater. The white “Carrot” sweater. People have asked what is the meaning of the “Carrot” sweater. The truth is, there is none. I thought it would be cool to put a carrot on a sweater. I believe this was the most popular of all the apparel I’ve made up to this point.
April 2017: My interest in starting a clothing business had become overpowering at this point. I thought about it regularly, did a lot of research, and decided it was time to just go for it. I found out the legal side of starting a business, filled out the paperwork, and applied for a business license. (Trust me when I say this. If you want to start a business, GO FOR IT. It’s a lot easier to start than you think.) Unfortunately for me, the fear of starting kept me from starting years ago. I decided that FALosophy would be the name of my company because it embodies everything my clothes represent. All of the apparel found here are of my creation. They are my ideas, thoughts, feelings, and opinions about life on a shirt. They are all products that I stand behind. Or in this case, wear.
So now, here we are, myFALosophy.com. Thanks for taking the time to get to know me and the company better. If you haven’t already, please sign up for our mailing list. That way you can receive discounts, and stay in the know about what is going on and new products. Follow us on IG @myFALosophy and on Facebook @ facebook.com/myFALosophy.
Has it been a smooth road?
Running a business has been anything but smooth. The main struggles included:
Exposure – Finding out how to get my company name out was extremely difficult. You don’t really anticipate this problem when you first start out but it’s a factor that has a large impact on the success of your business. If no one knows about you, no one can support you.
Pricing – Determining if I should price the products based on what I want my individual profit to be or what I think people are willing to pay is a big one. It’s a constant battle deciding between the two.
Client base – Keeping a consistent base of customers that purchase regularly is a hard thing to keep up. You have to find a way to break into the barrier of strangers. Once the immediate people in your life purchase they feel the sense of support and that their job is done. You have to capture the attention of those people who have no ties to you.
Startup cost – Every business has a start-up cost but it’s the nitty-gritty details that end up costing the most. For instance, you know you don’t get a website for free, but you may not have known you have to pay to host and pay for a name. Little hidden cost can add up quickly and put your business further in the hole than you anticipated.
Remaining Optimistic – All of these struggles individually don’t seem to bad but these problems don’t wait in line and take turns on when they’ll appear. Dealing with all of these things is what caused the largest struggle of all.
Continuing the business – The hardest thing to do is to continue running the business despite seeing the results you want. You constantly try to new things and attempt to make things go in the right direction and at times it doesn’t seem like it’s enough. Along my journey, I have considered stopping multiple times. For some reason, I always get a spark of inspiration and decide to renew my license right before it expires every year. We live to fight another year.
So, as you know, we’re impressed with FALosophy – tell our readers more, for example, what you’re most proud of and what sets you apart from others.
At the moment, FALosophy is a clothing brand. I come up with clothing designs that I like and make them available for sale. T-shirts, hoodies, hats, tanks, and crop tops. With me being a creative at my core, we specialize in graphic design. We are known for using these designs for clothing but also work with logos, backgrounds, profile pics, invitations, etc. We also do custom clothing designs for customers (company, family reunion, events, etc). I’m most proud of the growth I’ve seen take place within myself and the company. I’ve really had to showcase resilience during this process. FALosophy has always been an evolving entity. I’m always trying to find the most effective way to work and improve the company to produce better products. I think this is part of what sets me apart. I am as much a fan of fashion and design as I am an owner. I’m not here to take advantage of anyone. I will always work hard, do my best, be honest and deliver. I treat customers the way I’d want to be treated by another business.
Let’s touch on your thoughts about our city – what do you like the most and least?
One thing I like about Atlanta is being able to see so many successful blacks throughout the city. We have a strong representation in multiple different industries and fields. It feels good to see my people doing well for themselves. I have a very strong passion for my people and that can be seen throughout my clothing designs at times.
One thing I dislike about Atlanta, which could be more of a reflection of me rather than the city, is that despite there always being something to do here, I never know about it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ll hear about an event and say “Dang, I wish I knew about that!” There is definitely something going on for everybody here, I just need to know what outlets will keep me informed ahead of time.
Oh, and I’m still upset that they didn’t show the (2019) Superbowl on any of the big screens downtown. I think this would have been a lucrative event. So many people, like myself, were downtown looking for a place to watch the game. I think the city missed out on a great opportunity and if I thought of it I know it had to cross their minds. So they just decided against it? I need answers!
Pricing:
- Animated Profile Pics $1
- T-Shirts / Hoodies / Sweaters $20-$30
- Logos/ Designs $100 – $300
- Hats $20 -$25
Contact Info:
- Website: myFALosophy.com
- Email: customersupport@myFALosophy.com
- Instagram: @myFALosophy
- Facebook: facebook.com/myFALosophy
- Other: https://www.youtube.com/user/thatsFAL
Image Credit:
FALosophy
Getting in touch: VoyageATL is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.
