It’s time to start meeting our 2023 Spring cohort members! First up, meet Alan Fitt, working on a great reuse fashion project.
Hi my name is Alan Fitt, I am originally from Trinidad & Tobago but lived in San Diego and moved to Tampa almost two years ago. I am a creative person, I love inventing, product design, and art. This led me to the idea of designing premium, unique sunglasses made from used fashion.
Fast Fashion is the rapid production of low-quality, low-cost clothes with massive environmental and social cost, it is responsible for 10% of greenhouse gasses.
Each year, a staggering 80 pounds of clothes per person are discarded, including unworn items, with a significant portion ending up in landfills or bodies of water in developing countries, contributing to the pollution of our oceans with microplastics. The people who make these clothes are often exploited.
I knew I wanted to start a business but didn’t want to manufacture just another pair of soulless, poorly made, unsustainable plastic sunglasses from overseas. I wanted to use a unique, beautiful, iconically human material that we take for granted: textiles. Now, I am not saying that sunglasses will solve the problems of the fashion industry, I want to bring attention to it though and spread the message of “buy less, buy better”. But a message is not good enough. We’ve partnered with a non-profit that provides vision-saving surgery to someone in need with every pair of glasses sold.
I love the idea of trying to make a premium product in America, Tampa Bay is the perfect place. It has that calm, cool elegance that lends itself well to the brand I want to build. I won’t lie, the idea of trying to start a business manufacturing sunglasses has been daunting but that is what Equity in Entrepreneurship has been great for. The program has provided me with tons of training that I have used to take a deeper look at my business and strategy to give me the best chances of success.
Entrepreneurship is sometimes lonely and I have gotten great strength from my fellow entrepreneurial community there who are trying to make their dreams happen. Added to this, I’ve been able to use the AMRoC Fab Lab and the great people who run it to help me refine my manufacturing process so I can make smart decisions about spending capital.
Ultimately, I want to leave a positive mark on this world. If I can bring attention to a cause, help a person in need and make a living, I’ll consider it a win ….I won’t lie though, I want to go big!
We’re cheering Alan on and are pretty confident that Alan will, in fact, Go Big with his sunglasses concept! Look for a date soon for his 1 Million Cups presentation in July!
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