A Note From Jaya

Last week, I did a post on social media, where I asked all Svaha followers to ask me a question and told them that I would respond to everyone! I was overwhelmed by all the questions and the curiosity among everyone about the brand, the company, and also about me! That's when I thought, I must make the time to write to you personally. I will try to send more such emails to tell you about different aspects of the company, the clothing, and maybe a little about myself!

Many of you are familiar with the story about how I started the company. But, today, I am going to talk about some of the facts that not many of you know about!

In the summer of 2014, I quit my job as a buyer of ThinkGeek. I used to buy geeky clothing for the online store and absolutely loved my job. However, I didn't like the idea of my kids being raised by a nanny and the mom-guilt got to me! I decided to quit and be a stay at home mom. My son was in pre-school, but my daughter was not even three years old, so, I decided to keep her home with me so I could make up for the lost time with her. This is when she asked me for a t-shirt with an astronaut on it and I could not find it. I found a designer to make a few designs for me, found a printer to print some t-shirts for me, and decided to launch a kickstarter campaign. I thought lets see how many other mom's feel the way I do about clothing available for girls! My campaign failed. Yes! Kickstarter campaigns are a LOT of work. You can't just make something and expect it to be a huge hit! I learned my lesson, and did it a second time. It was successful this time! If you want to see it, go here. 

This is also when Shark Tank producers got in touch with me and we went through four rounds of interviews and finally didn't make the cut! Sometimes, I am glad about it, because I don't think I was ready for an investor. I wanted to run the company at my own pace. 

I managed to find a factory, make the t-shirts, get more than what was ordered (by kickstarter backers), launch a website and begin selling! This worked out for me, because I worked only when my kids were in school or sleeping. So, it was a perfect balance for me. A dream come true for sure! 

The business was really small. We ran it from the basement of a house. However, in 2016, we decided to launch our adults clothing line through another kickstarter campaign. This time, we did it right. It was a huge hit! That is when we launched our adult clothing line which was responsible for the huge growth of the company and us having to move to a warehouse! 

So much happened in the next two years, that I need another newsletter to tell you all about it! Hope you will enjoy listening to my story and learn a little bit more about what I did and how I did it!

Jaya