Liberty screen printer brings Hustle + Heart in the face of early-stage failure
March 20, 2019 | Elyssa Bezner
Liberty-based apparel company Hustle + Heart wouldn’t have found success without failure, said Serena Kotalik.
“[You should] never give up whether you’re starting a business like mine or any other,” said Kotalik, founder of the primarily wholesale, online company, which sells many of its wares through a VIP Facebook group. “With each [failure] I have learned [from it] and gotten past it.”
Hustle + Heart took on many forms before landing on the correct one, she explained, with the store evolving from an Etsy-based brand selling phone cases, to screen-printed graphic tees, to finally, its wholesale and Facebook sales structure.
Click here to request to join the VIP Facebook group.
“I’ve taught myself everything that I could possibly figure out how to do,” Kotalik said. “I read books, I watched webinars, and I read blogs about this entire process until I knew exactly what it was and what equipment I needed.”
The switch to wholesale came in response to competitors copying the store’s original designs as well as a dizzying influx of custom orders, she added.
“Now I can have the boutique owners join my Facebook group and then they can comment [on posts] or order or message me to say what they want and that way they can all have an area where [specific people] can see all my designs,” she said.
Click here to learn more or shop Hustle + Heart.
“My brain is not like the normal person,” laughed Kotalik. “I love the fact that I get to be creative every single day. I constantly think about work and I’m so excited to wake up the next morning because I am just so pumped. That’s what drives me. My days just fly by so fast because I love what I do.”
While running a standard online boutique of her own remains a dream, the wholesale aspect of the business already consumes so much time, said Kotalik.
“I can’t add another business to my life right now,” she said.
2019 Startups to Watch
stats here
Related Posts on Startland News
Roller Warriors skate over 1970s-era stereotypes with message of empowerment
Kansas City Roller Warriors are in the business of self-expression, strengthening team bonds and legitimizing their sport, skaters say. The player-owned roller derby league operates as a limited liability company, but essentially functions as a non-profit, organizers said. Having grown from grassroots origins in 2004 to now a member of the Women’s Flat Track Derby…
Prairie Village company’s Firefly lends serenity, tech to backyard fireworks
Prairie Village-based Winco Fireworks is officially launching Firefly, a remote firework firing system, introducing a tech blend to the formerly traditional firework industry and backyard Fourth of July celebrations. “It’s a really neat invention,” said Michael Collar, president of Winco Fireworks, which focuses on consumer fireworks. “There’s a lot of commercial firework companies that do…
We Create KC report: Startup investment soared to $540M in 2017
A startling statistic for those who think capital merely flies over the Midwest: Kansas City saw a 69 percent increase in startup investment from 2016 to 2017, according to KCSourceLink’s We Create KC report. All told, early-stage businesses classified by KCSourceLink as startups — typically defined as those with 20 or fewer employees — nabbed…
Hack Midwest offers coders freedom through 24-hour app creation competition
Technologists are often surprised by what they’re able to accomplish when they work together in a competitive format, Mike Gelphman said. That’s part of the reason Hack Midwest is returning this summer with the objective to inspire more techies to embrace their imagination, said Gelphman, founder of the competition, as well as KCITP, an area…