MASK Maya Kornyeyeva
Six billion dollars. That’s the projected worth of the United States mask market in 2021. Etsy, Carolyn and In hindsight, it seems painfully obviEmma Wang, the founders ous how this product skyrocketed to its of CE Scrunchies, were able to current value. Over the past year, masks hop onto the mask trend after noticing have become a staple in every household, the huge demand for masks in March of transforming into one of the simplest 2020. ways to protect against the coronavirus. The initial goal for their business was And at first, that is all they seemed to be. to make handmade scrunchies and other “I think that it’s really Fast forward a few months after the products to help fund the purchase of nice to be able to give back to pandemic hit, and suddenly masks are textbooks and desks for schools in Tanthe community because we are all not only a safeguard but also a way of zania. Since the start of CE Scrunchies in this together. Every time we donate personal expression. Large fashion comin 2018, Carolyn and Emma Wang have panies and small individual retailers beaided numerous causes with their variety a mask, more people are going to wear protection, and our city is going to gan offering a wide range of designs for of products. become a safer and safer place,” Emma everyday wear, accelerating the adoption “When we created our organization, Wang said. of reusable masks over standard-grade our primary goal was to support differLike CE Scrunchies, larger corpodisposable ones. ent communities. I think when COVID rations like Adidas, Uniqlo, and Gap To put this upswing in perspective, hit, we saw mask making as an extenaccepted the challenge of creating a new one can look at Etsy, an e-commerce sion of our brand, which is ‘Handmade product line focused on masks. They did platform focused on selling individual Helping A Hand.’ We want to continue so at record speeds, launching design handmade products. Between April and helping those around us, and making after design until their shops and online June of 2020, 29 million masks were sold masks was something that could have a stores were filled with masks of all colon Etsy, with a mask-related search being direct impact,” Emma Wang said. ors, shapes, and sizes. made every 11 seconds. During these According to the Wangs, a majority, “You’re going to see people wanting to three months, Etsy earned close to $350 if not all of their profit, was going into make bolder and bolder fashion statemillion in mask-related gross merchanmaking more masks to donate to nearby ments with their masks [...] You’re going dise sales. nursing homes, schools, neighbors, and to see people wanting to try out the Similar to the small businesses on essential workers. 14 HIGHLANDER FEATURE
