Sophomore Peter Schaefer, a student and a businessman, took the school by storm when he created his own business “Pick Pocket Tees”.
“I basically made pockets out of different fabrics and sewed them into t-shirts,” Schaefer said. “Eventually I learned how to embroider and so I moved into that as well in order to personalize the product more.”
Because of Schaefer’s vast amount of free time, he decided to put that time to use. “I wanted to start it honestly because I had a lot of free time then,” Schaefer said. The main inspiration for the business was none other than Tina Schaefer, Schaefer’s mother, who is an entrepreneur of her own. “I got the idea because my mom owns a business and so I thought it’d be kind of fun,” Schaefer said.
Schaefer works the entire business by himself. He single-handedly was the only person behind the idea, but also the maker of the products as well, where he takes different fabrics and sews them on the shirts themselves.
“No one else was really involved in it, but I had started a business with people in the past before,” Schaefer said.
Considering Schaefer’s profit from these Pick Pocket Tees, the money was spent for fun. “I didn’t have much profit, I didn’t expect it to be so expensive [the equipment, the fabrics],” Schaefer said. “But with the profit, I just spent it for fun.”
But owning a business is never just fun and games, with it comes hard work, perseverance, and time.
“The hardest part I would say was making sure I had new products to get people who previously bought a shirt to buy something new,” Schaefer said .“I tried selling sweatshirts once, but the t-shirts were by far the most popular.”
The T-shirts were in high demand, with the most orders he’s ever gotten in a day being around 50 when he once went to a craft fair. But overall, the orders would be a couple a week.
Most businesses have to come to a close, and unfortunately, Schaefer’s job of manufacturing trendy T-shirts was one of them. ‘It was a lot of work and I wanted to make more money so I just got a job… I don’t own it anymore, but it was fun when I did and I would love to do something like that again,” Schaefer said.
Just because the business shut down doesn’t mean Schaefer isn’t proud of his accomplishments, including being an entrepreneur of a once flourishing occupation, “I’m proud of myself because I took just an idea and actually turned it into something that was profitable,” Schaefer said. The possibility of being a future businessman might even be something Schaefer is considering. “I don’t know what I’ll do in the future,” Schaefer said. “But I’ll definitely keep something like that in mind.”