By Joseph Chapman
What can’t senior Naz Bohannon do? When he isn’t hitting the books or helping the men’s basketball team secure a victory, he’s running his own small business. In October 2019, Bohannon began working to launch his clothing company, Majestic Stylez. As a business major, Bohannon is well prepared to take on the task. I was able to sit down with Bohannon and discuss what it has been like during his first year of operation.
When starting your business, did you get any advice from the Williamson College of Business?
We were off the campus because our school was [closed], so I really didn’t ask too many people until I got back, but my aunt owns our own salon at home. So she helped me figure out how to form an LLC. What were the parts of it? What were some hardships that I will face along the way? As that went and she just encouraged me every step of the way: “Here’s how you go about doing this. This is how you figure out what your brand or what is going to represent and what it’s going to mean.” And things of that sort.
How did you get the idea to do clothes?
It was my girlfriend, actually. I always loved business and outside of basketball, I always tell people I wanted to be a business mogul sometime in my life. I would love to be in Forbes Magazine. So, I had a liking for style and getting dressed in fashion. She loved clothes as well, so it went hand-in-hand and saying, “Let’s get into the industry of clothing business.” And I know it’s a way to make money. There’s a market to go to. She went to a different school, I went to a different school. [We’re] both from two different cities. So the networking was there, and it actually helped.
How is it to run a business based out of two different cities?
It’s been great. Sometimes, you face the discrepancies in the differences in the weather because she’s from Kentucky and Louisville and I’m from northeast Ohio. We know here, you have two seasons, almost — summer and winter — but there they have traditional four seasons and it’s hotter longer, so sometimes we’ll do hoodies. It’s okay for here, but there, it may not be. But for now, it was fine because we’ll do fleece shorts or something. You can throw on a hoodie and shorts there, but here, maybe you want to go for the full sweatsuit still. So, getting around that.
Who designs your clothes?
Actually, at this point, we outsourced a couple of things and we had a manufacturer overseas do something. That was the easier way, but because of COVID, sometimes we had to wait 45 days between getting what we needed to get. At this point, we have our own machines at the house and we come up with edits and designs. We hired a couple graphic designers. We come up with an idea in our head.
How did you come up with the lion logo?
The lion is actually my idea because [my girlfriend] came up with the name of Majestic Stylez. I thought of the lion because our brand focuses on the royalties and life and everybody being a king or queen in their own way. Our slogan is dressing royalty, so with the lion I just mean that when you think of majestic it’s the first thing that comes to my head because it signifies beauty and strength and that everybody has style in their own way. So that’s where the name was. As far as our staple, it was going to be the crown. We bring the crown on every different thing. But then I was like, “No, I liked the lion.” We put [the crown] on the lion. The lion symbolizes a lot just outside of even being majestic, and it’s been working this far.
What are Majestic Stylez’ most popular items?
Last summer we did shorts that had “royalty” across the front. This past winter/fall, we did sweatsuits and those were big. They had the lion branded on the front with “Majestic Stylez” [on the chest] and on the pants, and girls would just have a signature “Majestic Stylez.”
Anything big coming up soon?
Oh yeah, so just literally before we walked in here today we were dropping something live today. We have a four-part spring collection that’s coming soon, and the first part of it was a grey crewneck and a red and yellow tie-dye hoodie we’ll have available later on today.
Are your staff made up of professionals in the area, or did you find that it was more beneficial to hire people closer to you personally?
Like family, friends or people that I’ve met along some time in my life that you would have never known that you needed, or they had a skill here or there. It goes to show just what knowing somebody can do for you. I think it being more personable obviously helps me, too, because it’s easier for me to get on the phone and call them and we can go back and forth about the design. Like, “Hey, what do you like?” Or sometimes, I like for people to be their own creative selves. I’m like, “Hey, I got this idea, I don’t want it to be subjective to what I think. You try it and you show me what you like.” And in doing so, I’ve got a couple nice logos and things going with the lion that I haven’t experimented with yet, but this summer I’m going to.
Is there anything about Majestic Stylez that people should know about that we didn’t talk about?
I would just say that this is a brand that can help exemplify who you want to be in life. In doing so, we say be a king or be a queen, and it’s just to feel confident in anything and everything it is that you’re doing. Just always wear your crown, don’t ever get too down, keep your head up and keep pushing through everything.
