Culture Artisan Clothing<\/a> was made possible through earning a third-place finish and $10,000 in last year\u2019s Montclair State\u2019s BulbHead.com Inventors Day for Aspiring Entrepreneurs.<\/p>\n\u201cThe BulbHead.com pitch contest made me realize that it was possible to realize my dream of having a business,\u201d he says. \u201cBeing a finalist allowed me to fund my inventory and marketing efforts to launch my business.\u201d<\/p>\n
Daniel gives credit to his Entrepreneurship minor for influencing and helping him come up with the idea. \u201cAs part of my entrepreneurship minor, we had to brainstorm business ideas weekly. Culture Artisan Clothing is based on a combination of influences and brainstorming sessions with Professor Ross Malaga,\u201d he says. \u201cProfessor Archana Kumar\u2019s courses on e-commerce and retail gave me a great foundation and practical knowledge to develop my business.\u201d<\/p>\n
Prior to earning his bachelor\u2019s degree at Montclair State, Daniel earned his associate\u2019s from the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. From 1986 to 2010, he worked in the fashion industry and designed clothing for companies based in India. He also worked for Miss Erika, a division of Jones New York, and developed clothing for stores such as J.C. Penney, Lane Bryant and Fashion Bug.<\/p>\n
After losing his job in 2010, Daniel found himself at a professional crossroads. Determined to persevere through the rough circumstances, he took on a job as a bus driver for New Jersey Transit. A year later, he applied for a position within the transportation department at Montclair State.<\/p>\n
Daniel\u2019s passion for the fashion industry was what motivated him to go back to school. For four years, he successfully navigated being a full-time student and employee.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have had tremendous support at work. My boss, William Fitzpatrick, worked with me and gave me the opportunity to adjust my schedule in order for me to attend classes,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
Since graduation, Daniel has been working on developing his clothing line which launched in March. Culture Artisan Clothing is a free-trade women\u2019s clothing company that manufactures its products in India. \u201cThe goal of my business is to create beautiful clothing while making a meaningful impact on communities and society,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n
Daniel has been growing the company through his own website, as well as through different social media platforms. He is also preparing to set up temporary locations to sell his clothes as well as some stores in and around Montclair.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An associate’s degree in fashion, as well as losing his job, motivated the entrepreneur and supervisor of the Transportation department at Montclair State to go back to school for his Bachelor’s degree as an adult, and it definitely payed off.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":134,"featured_media":207363,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-207362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-77_alumni-spotlight"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/134"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=207362"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207362\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":209461,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/207362\/revisions\/209461"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/207363"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=207362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=207362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.montclair.edu\/alumni\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=207362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}