Little Girl, Big Business

Sept 1, 2007

Some 7-year-old girls spend their time making clothes for their Barbie dolls. Haley Schmidt of southern California takes her clothing ambitions to another level. She designs and sells — through her company, HaleyBopTees — boutique-quality T-shirts that kids across the nation are snatching up. She also donates a portion of the profits from the T-shirt sales to charity.

A few years ago, Haley told her mother, Aimee Schmidt, that she wanted to be an illustrator. Aimee Schmidt enrolled her in formal art classes and earlier this year, she had four of Haley's designs printed on T-shirts and took them to an Orange County, Calif., boutique. "The owner loved them on sight and ordered 40 immediately," she says. "[The T-shirt sales are] doing great." Haley and her mother also sell the T-shirts online at HaleyBopTees.com and have sold about 300 in three months.

Haley originally wanted to donate all the profit from her business to a charity. While Aimee Schmidt advised her daughter on the necessity of making a profit, they searched for a charity that centered on an artistic focus to fulfill part of Haley's wish. They found Art With A Heart For Children, a Jacksonville, Fla.-based non-profit organization that provides fine art instruction to hospitalized children. Haley currently donates $1 from the sale of each shirt to the charity.

Colors Inc., Santa Ana, Calif., screen prints the T-shirts with Haley's designs. Upon hearing about Haley's project from her mother, Bill Farnan, owner of Colors Inc., took immediate interest. "He offered us a lot of suggestions, such as doing tie-dye T-shirts," Aimee Schmidt says. "There was a lot of collaboration between us and we became friends."

Check out Haley's designs at HaleyBopTees.com. — Liz Aull

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