Meet Armani Smith | Entrepreneur & Student

We had the good fortune of connecting with Armani Smith and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Armani, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
Honestly starting my business at such a young age , I didn’t have much of a thought process like I should have. I knew I wanted to make money and quit working for people so I went straight to YouTube and started looking up how to make money on my own. Everything after that was pretty much go with what I know.

What should our readers know about your business?
I started my journey at 15 years old in the Desoto drill team locker room. I had the idea of selling lashes with the name Pretty ‘N’ Mink through a video on youtube and as a drill team girl who had to always buy lashes for games and pep rally’s I thought hey why not! I started off at $5 not really knowing to much about profit but I started gaining more customers as people around the school heard about it and then later the city.

I stopped after a while because of a hectic school schedule but when I got to college I started taking things more seriously and business has just been booming ever since.

I am most excited to see how far this will take me and what exciting things I can do with my businesses. My main struggle throughout this journey was money but I worked two jobs towards my high school graduation all the way up until my freshman year of college at Texas State. With that money I saved I slowly started to invest into my business but being in a new city it wasn’t going as good as I would like so I started working again as Hooters Girl. It was a hard process but eventually with that money and other side gigs I began to eventually to save more money and I had the ideas to sell clothes knowing I could get more profit and customers with that. And ever since then it has been great!

I learned to keep track of what i put in and what I get out and to also market myself better. I just want to let people know whatever your visions are anything is possible it may not happen when or how you want it to happen but it will. I knew I didn’t want to work for anyone so I am making a way.

Who else deserves some credit and recognition?
Well for starters I have to thank my mother and my grandmother (nana), they played the mom and dad role in my life and always showed me a hustler’s mindset. My courageous and outgoing mother always had a hustle whether it being doing hair, selling cheesecake jars in high school, event planning or her daiquiri business. She’s super independent and I learned that from her.

I always want to thank my best friends Altonay & Makayla because they supported me from the start and always gave me helpful ideas, created flyers and pages and even continue to shop with me. I love my support system because they know how rocky this has been for me.

Website: Officialprettygirlboutique.com

Instagram: Shop.prettygirlboutique

Twitter: Xoxoitsarmani

Youtube: Xoxoitsarmani

Image Credits
@shotsbycam