I have always dreamed of owning my own company and working as a designer. However, I struggled to figure out what I wanted my company to do. In mid-2022, while working as the Creative Services Manager at Evergreen Goodwill, I realized that companies like Apple had a strong brand because they focused on WHY they were doing something, while other companies, like Microsoft, focused on WHAT they were doing. I then began to brainstorm why I wanted to start a company, and everything became clear to me. My passion is to create a better tomorrow through sustainability and education.

I decided to take a six-month sabbatical to focus on my side business, Emayos. I wanted to combine my passion for sustainability and finding new life in old things with my passion for design, branding, and marketing. I chose the name Emayos to honor my Olathe South High School naturalist teacher and personal mentor, Ed May, who taught me that everything in the world has value and that life is bigger than our own interpretations.

After deciding on a name that fit my "why," I worked on the brand and clearly defined who Emayos is and how it operates. I spent hours sketching and conceptualizing, researching ways to incorporate symbols that could represent new life or renewal. However, none of these concepts felt like they fit the "why" of focusing on tomorrow through the "how" of bringing new life to forgotten items.

That's when I realized I could research old brands that have gone defunct and potentially bring new life to them. After weeks of searching, I found a defunct brand for an east coast department store called Bradlees that went under in 2001. I was able to secure the rights to the Bradlees former brand, as well as purchase their old web domain, which will redirect to emayos.com.

After securing the rights to the Bradlees brand, I redeveloped it to work with Emayos, while creating the additional missing letters I needed to make the logo whole. I settled upon a color palette that was warm and inviting, but also uncommon in the business world.

Emayos is still in development, but it is growing in new and beautiful ways. I have worked out partnerships with Lowes for obtaining materials that would otherwise find their way into a landfill. In the process of growing this partnership, Emayos has started to move into a B2B relationship through creating name tags and awards for the local Lowes District out of discarded flooring.

I am excited to continue developing Emayos and focusing on sustainability and education. It may be a small start, but as Mr. May told me when I was young, I can have an impact on the world, even if it's small.