Entrepreneurship

Hidden Hills Motor Club is the ultimate passion project for me. It connects the worlds of luxury apparel and motorsports. 

To put it simple, I am obsessed with the heritage, technology, and occasional glamor of the sport. Stories of the great Niki Lauda, Ayrton Senna, Michael Schumacher, and Lewis Hamilton define what it means to be excellent. That is not to dismiss the incredible engineering that racing develops - which eventually trickles down into everyday applications.

Being somewhat into fashion, I looked to find clothes that would represent this passion artistically and creatively. As you can probably expect, this need was not filled and thus Hidden Hills Motor Club was born.

​Through utilizing curated story-telling and social media marketing, the brand has generated five figures of sales across hundreds of orders for five distinct collections. The brand pays homage to the iconic drivers, venues, and cars within the sport of racing. 

HHMC has been immensely challenging due to the physical and international nature of the business. I learned how to work closely with manufacturers in Los Angeles, the Bay Area, and even China. I navigated a fine balance of negotiating prices with manufacturers on turnaround times and quality intricacies. I also gained a lot of logistical experience by packaging and shipping each order myself alongside dealing with customer support inquiries. More than anything, I trained my creative muscles through hand-designing every design and art asset used throughout my website and social media. 

To build my customer base, TikTok played a huge role. At the onset, the platform was a difficult hurdle to overcome as I had mainly used Instagram and FB advertising previously. I utilized a growth-hacking technique where I ran an independent car and motorsport culture page beforehand to build an audience of my ideal demographic. I then transitioned these pages slowly into brand-focused accounts to steadily convert viewers into paying customers. 

Beyond all, Hidden Hills Motor Club has been an amazing opportunity to meet like-minded enthusiasts and further my own understanding of the sport.​ 

Website: hiddenhillsmotorclub.com

Instagram: @hiddenhillsmotorclub

After reselling for 3 years, I became savvy to the growth of the market and a new demand for curated education. I piggy-backed off my expertise as a solo-seller and thus started Cook Legion as a way to "sell the shovels and pickaxes".

​I launched the service on the messaging platform, Discord, and spent hundreds of hours customizing programs to automate various functions of the server. I brought on knowledgable figures in the community to provide additional information and service. Over time, the subscription service grew to over 500 members. I eventually brought on a small team to offer seamless support across the many necessary time zones. With proprietary info on where and how to get limited shoes,  the group as a whole was able to net $85,000+ in revenue within just 2 months.

While the education service market within reselling was relatively new, I still faced a lot of competition from more established competitors. I partnered with adjacent companies to create value synergies and drive traffic toward my own business. 

Through Cook Legion, I faced many growing pains and learned the importance of excellent customer service. In a people-based business, each customer is as important as the last and there must be a consistent standard of output. As the business grew, It became increasingly difficult to address the needs of the several hundred members. I learned how to delegate and automate and ultimately learned that these costs were necessary for scaling. Furthermore, I realized the necessity of cutting specific features (and subsequently, customers) to maintain my desired service quality.

I eventually sunsetted Cook Legion as I finished up High School to focus my energy and resources into new ventures as well as college.

​As a part of my school's business incubator competition, my friend and I pitched a mock plan to help the students of tomorrow get a leg up on the entrepreneurship and general business world. What came as a surprise was the overwhelmingly positive feedback from judges who desired this very service for their own children. The idea made its way to the finals of this event and came to further fruition after an investor judge displayed interest in bringing it to life

We raised a small $1000 seed investment and thus, Fuel the Mission, was born. The company was established as a nonprofit to give back to the community and spread our passion for business to eager and like-minded kids entering high school. I learned to network and venue-hunt to secure a local community center to host the week-long curriculum at an extremely competitive price.

​Beyond just learning how to run nonprofit and legalities of teaching in a classroom environment, Fuel the Mission taught me how to lead in a small team and how to manage and maximize efficiency throughout a busy schedule.