Brian Lieberman doesn’t have a background in fashion, which makes him an odd choice to be the CEO of Twice as Warm, a fashion label based out Washington, D.C. He refers to its early days as a ‘project’, a three month time period he gave himself to see if he could actually make it work. “I recommend to anyone starting out with a company, call it a project and validate the idea first”, he says now. “That way you won’t get as many strange looks from your peers, especially with a fashion company”. An experienced web/graphic designer, Lieberman was struck by the idea of helping as many people aspossible as quickly as possible, an idea in the tradition of Aaron Swartz’s GiveWell. Looking around his Maryland community, he saw a need for winter clothing. So working off the ‘give one, get one’ principle, he decided to sell his own high-quality clothing, giving himself a three-month deadline to get things right.
But, again, Lieberman doesn’t have a background in fashion. So to grow Twice As Warm beyond a project idea, he knew that gaining some knowledge in fashion design would help. A helpful resource for him has been OSFashion (short for Open Source Fashion) based out of New York. He was able to offer up some of his web and graphic design know-how in exchange for some fashion advice, and so his learning process began. With enough knowledge to make clothing, He then had to figure out where to get the materials. It was important to Lieberman to have everything made in America, “to be able to shake the hand” of the people who were making his clothing. This ruled out the numerous international options for fabrics, knitting mills, etc. At first, he got rejected a lot, because his order requests were simply too small for American companies to turn a profit of off. Even among those who rejected him, though, he found sympathetic ears who would introduce to someone else who would reject him who would introduce him to someone who could help. In the early days, he remembers He would drive all his packages to the post office himself, a process which he remembers as “old school”. That first winter, he was able to move over two hundred products, and in turn give over two hundred products to needy in the D.C/Maryland area.
It was a small, but encouraging start. From there, Lieberman has been able to expand his sales, his clothing line — see his latest stylish Circle of Warmth designs — as well as his markets. He’s looking to move beyond D.C and go into New York and San Diego, CA. He’s also been able to expand his giving, helping out at shelters with baby onesies and visiting homeless camps to better understand the nature of his giving, and to make sure it is effective. Lieberman has moved into not one, but two fields in which he had no prior experience. It’s hard not to imagine Twice as Warm becoming Twice as Successful and then doubling that, over and over again.
