This Side Hustle Spotlight Q&A features Hailey Weiner, 27, of Miami, Florida. Weiner is the founder of womenswear brand Heiress Beverly Hills, which surpassed $5 million in revenue in 2024 and is on track for $10 million in sales in 2026. Read on to learn how she did it.

Responses have been edited for length and clarity. 

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What was your day job or primary occupation when you started your side hustle?
I was a full-time student at the University of Miami on a pre-law track. At the time I launched Heiress as a side hustle, I had a full course load, was studying for the LSAT and applying to law school. I was in the library between classes, sketching new collections and scaling ad spend. I was accepted to several law schools with full-ride scholarships. It was a massive crossroads, but I ultimately turned down law school to bet on myself and pursue Heiress full-time.

Finding the inspiration to start her side hustle

When did you start your side hustle, and where did you find the inspiration for it?
I started Heiress Beverly Hills at 21 years old. The inspiration came from a place of personal frustration. Most womenswear brands lacked consistency in fit and quality. I felt that clothes weren’t being made for real women’s bodies, and I wanted to create a modern luxury brand that prioritized sculptural silhouettes and “cult-level” fit without the traditional luxury markup.

I commissioned custom mannequins molded to specific, realistic body types.

I didn’t just want to design clothes; I wanted to re-engineer the way they were made. To fix this, I developed a proprietary sizing system focused on sculptural silhouettes that contour the body. Rather than relying on standard factory forms, I commissioned custom mannequins molded to specific, realistic body types. I then shipped these physical forms directly to my overseas factories to ensure that every sample was draped and fitted with absolute precision. This “fit-first” philosophy allowed me to offer luxury-level construction and consistency that simply didn’t exist at my price point.

Investing $20,000 in personal savings to launch the side hustle

What were some of the first steps you took to get your side hustle off the ground? How much money did it take to launch? Where did funding come from? 
I launched Heiress Beverly Hills with about $20,000 in personal savings. Because I didn’t have a massive budget, I had to be incredibly strategic with cash flow. I utilized a pre-order model from day one; I would open up orders before the first batch of production was even finished. This allowed me to fund the final factory payments using the revenue from the orders already placed, ensuring the brand remained self-sustaining and debt-free.

I’d spend eight to 10 hours at a time in the garage personally packing and shipping every order.

I was doing everything myself. I was juggling full-time classes with the logistics of a growing side hustle. Several days a week, I would drive an hour from my college campus to my family’s house, where I’d spend eight to 10 hours at a time in the garage personally packing and shipping every order. I handled everything — designing the collections, running manual ad campaigns (back when scaling required constant daily adjustments to remain profitable) and managing every customer service email. I continued to hand-pack every order until the brand was consistently generating over $200,000 in monthly revenue. Only then did I feel I had the enough runway to finally transition to a professional fulfillment center and hire my first contractors.

Using YouTube as a free resource to grow the side hustle

Are there any free or paid resources that have been especially helpful for you in starting and running this business? 
The most transformative resource for me was YouTube. In the early days, I used it to teach myself the technical side of digital marketing and media buying. This was well before the era of Google’s “Performance Max” or Meta’s “Advantage+” campaigns — automated tools that do the heavy lifting for you today didn’t exist yet.

Scaling the brand to its first several million required me to manually manage every aspect of our advertising. I spent hours every day on “manual scaling,” meticulously adjusting daily budgets, testing specific audience targeting and analyzing data to ensure every dollar spent was profitable. I didn’t have the luxury of a massive venture capital cushion, so there was no room for error. Mastering that manual ad-scaling process via YouTube tutorials was what truly moved the needle. 

Navigating a “perfect storm” of business challenges

Can you recall a specific instance when something went very wrong — how did you fix it?
In 2025, I faced the most significant test to date. We had our largest production order in the brand’s history arriving in the U.S. — thousands of units destined for both our site and a major partnership with Macy’s. Because we operate on a pre-order model for our most popular styles, the majority of these pieces were already paid for by customers who were eagerly waiting for their delivery.

That difficult moment became the catalyst for the $12 million trajectory we are on for 2026.

We got hit by a “perfect storm” of political timing. Just as the shipment arrived, a 145% tariff was implemented. The cost of my goods had more than doubled overnight. I had to decide whether to prioritize my margins or my customers. To maintain the integrity of the brand, I swallowed the 145% tariff cost personally. We didn’t pass a single cent of that cost on to the customers who had already pre-ordered, and they had no idea the “behind-the-scenes” crisis we were managing.

While that move made cash flow incredibly tight for several months, it was a massive wake-up call. It prompted me to hit “pause” and execute a total rebrand in late 2025. I realized that to survive this changing global trade landscape, we had to elevate our positioning and adjust our price points to reflect the new reality of modern luxury. That difficult moment became the catalyst for the $12 million trajectory we are on for 2026.

A 300% growth jump to $1.5 million annual revenue and beyond

How long did it take you to see consistent monthly revenue? How much did the side hustle earn?
The demand was almost immediate. In its first year, while I was still a student, the brand earned over $600,000. I promised myself at the beginning of my senior year, if I hit over $500,000 in revenue, I wouldn’t go to law school. By the end of my senior year of college, the business quickly transitioned from a side hustle to a high-growth startup.

What does growth and revenue look like now? 
We have done over $18 million in sales. After going full-time in 2021, we saw a 300% growth jump to $1.5 million in annual revenue. Since then, we’ve surpassed $18 million in revenue. We are currently on track to hit $10-12 million for 2026.

From a garage side hustle to a full-time business with “pinch-me” moments

What do you enjoy most about running this business?
Honestly, it’s seeing our customers actually wear the pieces in the real world. For a long time, the brand was something I managed behind a screen or in a garage, but recently, I’ve started having these incredible “pinch-me” moments where I’ll go out to dinner in Miami and see someone across the room wearing Heiress. Knowing that they chose my design for their night out is a feeling I can’t describe.

I also find so much joy in our photoshoot days. Models are often our toughest critics because they wear everything, but they consistently tell me that our clothing fits them better than almost any other brand they shoot for. They get so genuinely excited when we gift them pieces after the shoot because they actually want to wear them in their real lives.

But the most special feeling is seeing our customers tag us on social media. When I see a woman wearing one of our statement pieces to a wedding, birthday or other special occasion, it validates all the 4:00 a.m. nights. I want these pieces to be reliable “confidence boosters” in their closets, and seeing that happen in real-time is the ultimate reward.

The founder’s No. 1 piece of business advice

What is your best piece of specific, actionable business advice?
Master every role before you hire for it, but don’t stay in it forever. By doing the work myself first, I built an $18 million brand with only two full-time employees. Being lean gives you an agility that larger teams simply can’t match.

Additionally, find people who have done what you want to. When I was starting out, I didn’t have a network of other founders or mentors to lean on. I was a 21-year-old student working in a garage, and I felt like I had to figure everything out through slow, sometimes painful trial and error. Looking back, I made so many mistakes that I could have avoided entirely if I had just one person to call who had walked that path before me.

Don’t just look for “general” business advice: Look for the person who has navigated exactly what you want to do.