Shan Reddy is the Chief Operating Officer at Prabal Gurung and longtime business mentor and friend of the CFDA. Over a decade ago, Reddy became one of the original business mentors for the CFDA {Fashion Incubator} program where he advised emerging designers through various business challenges and opportunities. Coming full circle, Reddy now leads business operations at Prabal Gurung, who is an alumni of the program. Reddy talks to the CFDA for Asian American Pacific Islander Heritage Month about his decades long work of giving back, mentoring, and how he works to empower the AAPI community.
As a long-time business mentor for CFDA affiliated designers and members, why is mentorship and giving back important to you?
I’ve always been into culture, art, and those who communicate different thoughts and/or perspectives. It’s exciting for me to be able to help amplify these voices of change with my knowledge of the business.
I heard Brazilian skateboarder Pedro Barros once say “You gotta give to get.” His lifestyle and approach to supporting his community has always been an inspiration.
How have you empowered AAPI Professionals in their professional journey?
I’ve empowered AAPI professionals by taking on their businesses when many others wouldn’t. I’ve helped them navigate the “foreign” system of finances which many AAPI are not familiar with and which can significantly impact their ability to succeed.
Many AAPI businesses and professionals come into the business with no connections, family money, or family businesses to learn from and build off of. I do my best to fill this gap with my own experience learning the business from scratch.
How have your experiences working in the fashion industry shaped where you are today?
I’ve been shaped in so many ways by the fashion industry, it’s difficult to put in one answer. First off, the industry has been incredibly generous to me with regards to friendships. I’m still in touch with friends from my first job and have formed many wonderful relationships along the way.
The industry has taken me around the world and, more importantly, into the lives of different artists, craftsmen, and factory workers. I would say this is a priceless experience few other industries can offer.
Finally, everyday it challenges me to think about business in a 360-degree perspective: design, manufacturing, marketing, sales, logistics, etc. I don’t know many industries that give one the opportunity to think so robustly and force one to interact with so much of the world around them.
As you can probably tell, I can’t speak more highly of the industry and the people I’ve gotten to know in it.
For someone inspired by your career trajectory, what advice and resources would you encourage them to pursue?
My advice would be simply to find someone you admire – a designer, an entrepreneur, a stylist, a photographer, whomever, and break their door down for an internship. This is be best and quickest way to get to learn from your heroes.
Find a brand, project, a job that you truly believe in. Don’t worry about the immediate returns, these will come. Just get in there and be passionate and learn. Learn about sewing, do an internship in the accounting department, learn about sales during market period. Be a sponge and sooner than later, amazing things will happen.
With regards to resources, use your telephone in your pocket and call to get yourself into exciting places and learn from the best and brightest new voices in the industry as well as the companies that have defined success for decades.
How have you seen diversity play a role in the success of a business?
The New York fashion Industry is the most diverse in the world. We, by a far stretch, represent the richest and most varied voices the industry has to offer.
This has made New York Fashion Week the most important of the fashion weeks in the world while creating $11 billion in wages for NYC and $2 billion in tax revenue historically. Diversity has not only made our industry the success it is, all ships have risen with the tide it’s brought in.
