Meet Grace Habib of Central Phoenix

Today we’d like to introduce you to Grace Habib

Hi Grace, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
Shop Refugee began simply as a sewing class. Shop Refugee is part of GoTEN, which has offered English classes for refugees for years. A group of seamstresses were looking for a way to volunteer using their sewing skills, and in the summer of 2021, the first Shop Refugee was born. It took place in an English classroom and every week, on Thursdays, we would set up 6 tables, 6 sewing machines, fabric and sewing notions, have class, and then tear it all down again. It was highly successful! The women who were attending class loved it and their skills were rapidly improving. By nature of the class, they were churning out beautiful products. That’s where the idea to make the class into a small business came from — it seemed like the natural next step when amazing hand-sewn products were coming in, week by week. I was brought on that fall to scale the business and run the class. We created a logo, branding, beefed up our website, and Shop Refugee has continued to expand since then. We currently sell on our website, have a full social media presence, and also sell in small shops around the Valley and even in Tucson. We are looking to expand those relationships and offer our products in even more locations. As for the class, we currently offer a beginner and an advanced class, each of which can teach 10 students a week. We have dozens on our waitlist, and we hope to start another beginner class to help those waiting to get in class sooner. We allow our seamstresses to stay with us as long as they like, and we strive to be very accommodating to refugees. Our class is structured to overcome barriers to beginning a new career, such as language barriers, childcare, and allowing most of the sewing to be done at home. We send our seamstresses home with loaner sewing machines, and each week they bring in beautiful creations they’ve sewn throughout the week that we then list and sell.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It’s been fairly smooth, but our business model is not common and maybe not precedented, so it has sort of felt like reinventing the wheel at times! As part of a larger nonprofit, many of our expenses are paid for through fundraising, and we have given all the proceeds – 95% – to the seamstresses. As it continues to grow, we are re-examining this model and considering what it would look like to adopt a more typical business model in order to cover costs, but also hopefully expand and make our classes more lucrative for our seamstresses. By nature, working with refugees also has its challenges, like having 4 to 5 languages represented in a class and potentially no conversational speakers to do translation. The great thing about sewing though is that you can show things almost more easily than you can tell things. Figuring out how to offer a childcare during our classes has also been important, just to make sure that kids are safe in an environment full of pins and scissors. These challenges are totally worth it to overcome so that we can offer this program to mothers and refugees that are early in their resettlement.

Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
I’m hoping this won’t be a big feature of the article because I’m currently transitioning out of the position so that Marissa Cano can transition in. Maybe she could answer just this question? I’m answering the rest because I’ve been with the program almost from the beginning!

In short, I joined GoTEN as an English teacher about 6.5 years ago with the goal of serving refugees. I love to build things, and once the English classes became a well-oiled machine, I knew it was time for me to move on. The sewing class was new and needed a committed manager, so I transitioned to manage the program and scale it. I love building something from nothing and I love all the possibilities of a new project. I’ve loved my time building the Shop Refugee program, and I’m excited to see where Marissa will take it.

Pricing:

• Our seamstresses currently receive 95% of the retail price when a product sells.
• Our costs are low because most of fabric is donated and repurposed, making the production of our products affordable and sustainable.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://ShopRefugee.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shoprefugee/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/shoprefugee
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@shoprefugee?_t=8kblj18jWgx&_r=1