Moziah Bridges: How Mo’s Bows Began with Fabric Offcuts

Moziah Bridges was only nine when a very particular frustration sparked his first business idea: he enjoyed dressing smartly but could not find colourful, patterned bow ties that suited his style and stayed within the family budget. The answer was at home. His grandmother, a retired seamstress, had a room filled with fabric offcuts and taught him how to sew. Just a few years later, Mo’s Bows had generated around US$200,000 in sales.

Why did Moziah decide to make his own bow ties?

Moziah had been interested in fashion from an early age, taking particular inspiration from his father’s and grandfather’s style. At nine, he asked his mother to take him shopping for bow ties, but he encountered two issues: he did not like the children’s designs on offer, while the colourful adult styles that caught his eye cost more than his family could afford.

His mother suggested asking his grandmother for help. Having worked as a seamstress for decades, she first made several bow ties for her grandson before teaching him to operate the sewing machine himself. What began as a search for an unusual accessory became the first step towards a business.

• Moziah wanted colourful designs with distinctive patterns;
• The bow ties he liked were too expensive for the family at that time;
• His grandmother had decades of sewing experience;
• He chose to learn how to make his own accessories.

How did his grandmother’s fabric offcuts create Mo’s Bows?

Moziah’s grandmother kept a sewing room at home packed with leftover fabrics collected during more than 50 years of working with a sewing machine. He was especially drawn to the vintage materials, whose colours and patterns differed from the bow ties sold in shops. Using those fabrics, he made his first pieces and wore them in a range of settings.

When did the first bow ties become a real business?

Whenever Moziah wore one of his creations out, it attracted attention. People asked where he had bought the bow ties, so he began making them for friends and relatives. Once he realised that people were willing to pay for the accessories, he moved beyond sewing at home and started selling them, launching Mo’s Bows with support from his mother and grandmother.

The business expanded quickly. Bow ties were sold online and through shops, while Moziah attracted attention from the American press despite still being a child. By the age of 13, the company had sold roughly US$200,000 worth of bow ties and other men’s accessories, a journey that had started with unused fabrics in his grandmother’s house.

• Moziah initially wore the first pieces himself;
• Friends and relatives began requesting similar bow ties;
• Sales expanded to the internet and retail outlets;
• The company reached around US$200,000 in sales while he was still 13;
• His mother and grandmother remained involved as the business grew.

How did Shark Tank change the young entrepreneur’s path?

At 11, Moziah appeared on Shark Tank alongside his mother, seeking US$50,000 for 20% of the company. He did not secure the conventional investment he was looking for, but he gained something that would prove highly influential for the brand’s development: Daymond John, FUBU’s founder and one of the show’s investors, became his mentor. At the time of filming, Moziah and his grandmother had already made around 2,000 bow ties and generated approximately US$55,000 in revenue.

How far did a company built from fabric offcuts go?

In the years that followed, the venture became more than a small home-based bow-tie operation. Moziah worked as a fashion correspondent at the NBA Draft, was named twice by Time magazine among influential teenagers and, in 2017, secured a partnership to make licensed neckties and bow ties for all 30 NBA teams. Production also had to expand beyond what he and his family could make, bringing in additional seamstresses in Memphis.

The story of Moziah Bridges did not begin with a factory, substantial investment or a ready-made collection. It started with a child searching for a bow tie unavailable in the shops, a grandmother who could sew and a pile of fabric offcuts that appeared to hold little commercial worth. By turning those materials into accessories that other people also wanted to wear, he identified demand before he was old enough to understand every part of running a company, making his first bow tie the beginning of a business that would reach hundreds of thousands of dollars.