It all started few months ago when these two optimists, Izza
and Hafidz shared their ideas to me about starting a clothing line. They notice
that most of their secular female friends from JC and university are having a
hard time looking for a hijabi-friendly sports wear which is of dri-fit
material and is knee-length. Even if there is, those dri-fit tees are usually from
mosques’ youths or full-time madrasahs AND THEY HAVE THEIR LOGOS ON IT. So,
selling something that we can hardly get off the rack (and is of a demand
within the minority) would be good. And I couldn’t agree more.
Hence it all started. A group of 3 souls, working towards
selling dri-fit tees for the hijabis. I am mainly in charge of designing the
tees and posters for marketing purposes. Izza is the administrator slash accountant
and Hafidz is the IT guy.
What about the name Hiya Tees, you ask? Here’s the story:
“Hmm, what should we name our small
company eh?”
“Let’s make it simple but relatable.”
“Nak name in Malay or
English or… Arabic? Hmm.”
“Ahh what about Hiya? It means ‘she’ in Arabic!”
And there you go, Hiya
Tees
Hiya Tees was launched last week on the 1st of
April just because we thought Friday would be a good day haha. It’s the 4th
day today and Alhamdulillah, I can say that we are doing great in terms of sales.
Izza had just mailed out a total of 40 parcels in the morning! And oh, we
currently have 4 designs in our collection named ‘Simplicity’. The designs are
really simple, with a mix of basic colours as we wanna make it easy for the
ladies to match it with their pretty shawls! Hehe. I myself am keeping each
design for myself. Mom says that they’re versatile and can be worn to many
occassions, especially when you’re travelling around and just wanna feel comfy
but still look good.
Honestly, this was not the first time someone approaches me
for a business collaboration. So, when they did, I actually had the thought
that this is just gonna be another short-term “thingy”. But hey, lets be
positive, I hope that we’ll be able to expand our clothing line and make this a
“real” business in the future. Insya Allah. J
www.hiyatees.com