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Whether it’s selling clothes, creating and selling technology, or simply selling a product for a quick profit, many Diamond Bar High School students seem to have an endless amount of entrepreneurial spirit.         

For junior Jolleen Mejia, selling clothing and accessories using Depop, her personal vanity-selling marketplace, is the primary way she earns money. Her account @digs_etc shows off the products that she sells, ranging from handbags to sneakers.

“Most of the products are pieces that are my style or a style I admire,” Mejia said via Instagram. “I sell clothes for all genders so I also judge a piece based off of the name brand and its quality.”

Mejia stated that in order to determine the price for a product, she looks up the product’s retail price and sets the cost at about 50 percent of it; if the product isn’t new, she sets it at 25 percent of the retail price. She usually finds these clothes through thrifting.

“I’ve always been interested in fashion and thrifting, and this shop is just a fun way for me to turn my hobby into an income,” Mejia said. “The increasing popularity of marketplace platforms gave me the idea to start my own online shop.”

Another sophomore student stated anonymously that they also followed this pattern of buying items  as cheap as possible and selling them for the highest amount possible, or “flipping” in simple terms.

“I usually just buy and sell pretty small things like clothes, shoes, or even things like toys; for example, Supreme drops a lot of clothing that you could flip,” the student said via Instagram. “To see the price to sell at, you can usually just go on a site like eBay and see what other sellers are listing the item for.”

Meanwhile,  junior Alan Zhang sells drone electronic components instead of clothing on his dropshipping store FPV creator. He also designs his own drones and lists them for purchase.

Zhang had different inspirations from the other two DBHS students for starting his business, since he stated that income was not the main motivation.

“I didn’t come after the money, and I started this because I personally really like flying drones myself; the drones I fly are all custom made,” Zhang said via Instagram. “My shop is for experience, and it is quite time consuming learning the knowledge of marketing, but it’s going to be worth it.”

Zhang also stated that he might switch up his business’s structure to maximize income.

“I may have to switch my business model if it’s not profitable enough,” Zhang said. “As of right now, I’m thinking about switching [my business] into a business-to-business model to make it more profitable in a shorter timespan.”