It’s March of 2023, the spring of Esco Greene’s senior year. Working early mornings and late nights trying to perfect his clothing brand design, Esco Greene finally finds a design that he likes and one that represents him. A sprawling white tree against a black background covers the entire front side of the hoodie. 0808, the name of his clothing brand, is in all red at the top of the hoodie in big letters. To add even more detail, he puts little bats around the tree.
He chose this theme of bats and a big tree because he wanted a nighttime look on the black cropped hoodie. The hoodie is cropped in the style which everyone wants to have. On the joggers, the logo 0808 lines the waist, and there are also bats. But, all of this didn’t happen overnight, so where did 0808 come from?
Since late April 2023, Esco Greene ’22 has been running his own clothing company, 0808, which has only grown since he started attending Eastern Connecticut State University. You are probably wondering where the name 0808 came from. Funny story: Esco was getting his hair done by his mother, who knew that he was struggling and stressed trying to find the right name for his brand. She suggested 0808 because Esco’s birthday is on Aug. 8. August is the eighth month of the year, so it all flowed perfectly.
April 28, 2023, was when Esco’s first piece of clothing dropped. His frustration and overthinking were at an all-time high before this life-changing drop. He was having major problems with his manufacturer. The manufacturer was overcharging Esco and not responding to his texts or picking up his calls. On top of that, the manufacturer lives in China, so scheduling a meeting was difficult. KO took up a lot of Esco’s time; he was balancing keeping up to date with all of his classes and homework while also making sure he was in the gym working out and keeping his skills sharp for basketball. Fortunately, Esco made it work. During lunchtime, he wouldn’t talk to anybody. All you could see was his head down on his iPad, creating designs and styles the world had never seen before. “He’s a kid that you can kind of look at and see that he’s driven by something,” senior Nate Bowes, a good friend of Esco’s, said.
Esco no longer worries about his old manufacturer because he did what he had to do for the sake of his business and made the switch to a new manufacturer. “With my old manufacturer,” Esco said, “I was running into problems like lack of communication, not meeting standards, things like that. But when I switched over and I got this one, everything has been A1 since day one.” Unfortunately, Esco couldn’t share anything about the new manufacturer. It was classified information.
Esco’s quickest sellout clothing drop was his first one in April 2023. Along with a sweatsuit, he also dropped mesh shorts covered in stars. Mesh is a style that was brought back to life by TikTok influencers. They are stylish and comfortable, so Esco knew the shorts would be an instant hit. Every corner you turned there was a kid at KO wearing the star mesh shorts. Students were even willing to get shorts a little smaller or a little bit bigger because their regular size was sold out. The shorts sold for $35, so they were not only high quality, but also affordable. Senior Chief Ebana, a close friend of Esco, felt as if the quality couldn’t get any better, claiming he has had his mesh shorts for a year and none of the stars have faded.
The clothes sold out fast and his brand’s popularity was increasing, an excellent feeling for Esco. The first tracksuit he dropped sold out in no time. It didn’t even take a month. “I guarantee you, go to a New Britain football game,” Chief said. “You will see an 0808 tracksuit. In the summertime, you’ll see those shorts out. I used to hoop at Chesley. Everybody wanted to know what shorts I was wearing.”
Esco gave advice to others who are looking to start their own ventures. “I always tell people, if you want to do something, just do it,” Esco said, with a smile on his face. “Cause I mean, at the end of the day, that was me.” Esco remembers people at KO who he had never talked to coming up to him to compliment his new brand. Esco was delighted and he was glad his hard work was finally paying off. “It makes me feel good,” he said. “I feel like I’m always somebody who likes to help other people, make other people happy.”
Aside from selling his brand, Esco is also a social media influencer with 60,000 followers on TikTok. Esco has been posting TikToks and videos since 2021, posting a couple of dancing videos a day hoping that someday it will blow up. Little did he know he would get multiple videos with a million views. Esco didn’t stop there; he continues to post dancing and relatable content on social media. Yaya Fielder who plays basketball at Baylor College recognized his brand and decided to buy from it. Additionally, RNStray, a famous social media influencer with 2.1 million followers on TikTok, saw Esco’s brand and decided to buy. RNStray even posted the tracksuit he got on his Instagram encouraging people to go shop. Because of this, Esco became an inspiration to many.
While Esco has achieved success as a designer and influencer, he hasn’t lost what has drawn people to him since day one: his great energy and happiness. I remember lunches with him in the KO cafeteria. At lunchtime he made everyone laugh and felt comfortable talking to him whenever they were going through something. Whenever something stressful happened to me, I knew I could depend on Esco to help me stop thinking about it and put my mind somewhere else.
Unlike many brand owners, Esco isn’t in it for the money. He does it because he loves making clothes and putting them out to the public, and he wants other people to have nice things that seem expensive. “The best part about owning my clothing brand is seeing other people wear it or seeing other people excited when they put it on,” Esco said.
Esco doesn’t plan on stopping here. He is on track to drop another tracksuit for the winter with various colors: pink, red, black, and blue. He created a new logo with a splash of paint on the hoodie, cropped of course. The flared pants are almost the same as the top. “A lot of people are texting me about these, like everybody saying that they need them,” Esco said. “So, I feel like this one is gonna be one of my biggest drops.”
This is only the beginning for Esco Greene.
