SYRACUSE, N.Y. (NCC News) – When Abby Smalley ventured out West to start her life after college in 2019, like so many, she never could have prepared for the COVID-19 pandemic.
By March 15, Smalley had lost her job as a ski instructor at Big Sky Resort in Montana.
“So I lost my job immediately and so did thousands of other people working at the resort,” Smalley said.
Smalley said that at first, the free time was nice. But soon “it felt so draining each day to not have anything to work towards,” Smalley said.
Searching for purpose to fill her time in quarantine, Smalley came up with an idea to make hair accessories.
She made a couple and then posted about it, asking if anyone would be interested in purchasing one. Especially since she was out of a job.
“It just kind of blew up and I got a lot more orders than I had expected to,” Smalley said.
In the 24 hours her Instagram story was live, she had received over $500 from people who had placed orders. While not all of this was profit, as she didn’t charge her new customers for shipping, it was still a substantial amount of money.
There was one characteristic that stood out to many of the people ordering Smalley’s creations.
“Fast fashion has a huge impact on the environment, so I was thinking about doing something that was maybe a little more sustainable, instead of buying fabric just using what I had at hand,” Smalley said.
This environmental-friendly aspect was appealing, and she discovered she could reuse a variety of items.
“I started to experiment with different fabrics from shirts that people had, had but weren’t wearing anymore, like. Like pants and fabrics from like old cushions and what not,” Smalley said.
Besides the extra cash and a quarantine activity, Smalley got one more thing out of her DIY craft.
Smalley’s Instagram post sparked conversations with old friends, and her favorite thing was to see the photos of friends wearing her creations.
