Today we’d like to introduce you to Oliver Wilcox.
Hi Oliver, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I grew up in a small town in NC. I grew up surfing and skateboarding but never was never really drawn to the styles that those brands provided. Given it was a surf town, there were no stores that had the things that I wanted (plus I couldn’t afford shit). So, I decided I would make the apparel that I wanted for myself. Started out very grundgy. I made stencils of anything I could think of and spray-painted them onto blank garments. The quality was trash and I knew there had to be a better way. So, I started doing some research (prior to youtube) and found out about silk screenprinting. I asked for a one-color press for Xmas and woke up to it on Christmas morning. I was instantly obsessed! I couldn’t wait to get home from school (I was 14 at the time) and burn screens with all the designs I came up with while in class. I was never good at drawing so I downloaded photoshop and learned how to manipulate images into what I wanted. The designs caught on and I started selling them to people all over my town. After I saw the proof of concept, I decided to invest in a 6 color press. This was a lot more work than the one-color press but offered so much more.
While learning how to create designs for screens, I was also learning Photoshop. By age 16 I was very proficient in photoshop and illustrator and knew that I wanted to be a fashion designer. By the time I was 17 and applying to colleges, I told my parents that I wanted to go to art school, but it was too expensive. So, I went to the local university (UNC Wilmington) and started out in film. It wasn’t my biggest passion but I always liked making movies when I was younger and was pretty good at editing as well. Editing a video and editing a graphic always came natural to me. I was a somewhat popular kid in school but I was definitely a huge computer nerd. I spent most of my evenings and nights in front of my piece of shit laptop reading tutorials on how to edit photos and videos. I learned pretty quickly that film was not for me because I had a way larger passion for fashion. So, I switched my major to business with a concentration in entrepreneurship. Through college, I did not produce many pieces but was ALWAYS designing. When my senior year rolled around, I partnered with a friend and launched a brand called MOB Mentality. The MOB stood for My Own Boss because I knew by that time that I did not want to work for anybody. For my capstone class, I had to write a business plan, so I made it for my clothing brand. I ended up getting an A on the project and actually started pitching the brand to investors. I was lucky enough to find an investor almost right out of college. He gave me 40k (which seemed massive at the time) and let me do my thing. We got some big orders from online retailers and decided that if we wanted to take this seriously we had to move to the Mecca of fashion, New York. So, I packed up a U-Haul at age 24 and drove to the big city with my biz partner.
After a few months, I knew that my partner and I did not see eye to eye. I sensed the business would fail so I found another job in the city working for a fashion company that had many brands. While working there, I learned so much! I was the main designer and learned to wear many hats. I made tech backs, designed seasonal lines, did trend research. Like I said, I am a nerd. When I find something I like I obsess over it. I started to learn about Facebook and IG advertising and pitched the idea to my boss. He was an older guy and did not understand it, so I decided I would just do it myself. That is when i started my 2nd brand Maybe Today NYC. I kept it very simple and used IG as the main vessel to get my brand in front of people. The brand quickly grew and before I knew it I had a distribution contract with a company in HONG KONG that sold to all of Asia. By this time I was ready to quit my day job bc it only paid $600 a week and I was making well over that. Before I could quit my boss called me the day after xmas when I was waiting to board my flight back to NY. He fired me and told me that it was because I started a brand “behind his back”. That was a blessing in disguise because it really put the fire under my ass. I finally had time to focus solely on that and really turned it up. Within two years, I grew Maybe Today into a multimillion-dollar brand. I was traveling the world and doing pop-ups in Tokyo with other brands. Then covid hit and it was devastating. I can dive into this more…
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Not at all. Getting funding. Sourcing material. Working with factories. Getting shitty product made. COVID. China taking over Hong Kong. Filing my taxes incorrectly. Investing in the wrong equipment.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I am a problem solver that happens to be very good with computers and design. I am most proud of my current brand Maybe Today NYC. What sets me apart from others is that I am not scared to fail and I am not scared to put my work in front of the masses. I am also willing to admit when I do not know something but will work 10x as hard to learn it than the next guy.
What has been the most important lesson you’ve learned along your journey?
Just because your business failed does not mean you failed. Life is full of ups and downs and if you take each failure as a lesson rather than a failure then you can never fail. Also, success is not a number. It is a mindset
Contact Info:
- Website: www.maybetodaynyc.com
- Instagram: www.instagram.com/maybetodaynyc
