Kuma Blog

The Kuma Founder Story

Hi, I'm Andrew, the founder of Kuma Sunglasses. I'm often asked how I got into the sunglass business. The truth is that it was only supposed to be a summer job....

It all started with renting a kiosk in a mall and a chance to try my hand at entrepreneurship while between a "regular" job. But once I got a taste of how fun it was helping people choose their perfect pair of sunglasses and the freedom and excitement of being self-employed, I was hooked!

It was while working those long mall hours selling sunglasses that I saw the transformative effect trying on different styles of sunglasses can have on the person wearing them. Try on a pair of aviators and they'd say they looked like a pilot, a cool pair of wayfarers they felt like a rock star, or a vintage cat-eye sunglass and they would strike a pose as their friend would laugh and say they look like an actress from the 1950's.

I began to wonder if sunglasses could help do more than just transform how people looked and felt, but also help do a little good in the world. I'd always been a fan of TOMS and after reading the founder's book, Start Something That Matters, I wondered if I could do something similar with sunglasses? Could I make sunglasses with sustainable materials in their design, could I do something that gave back with each purchase?

After some starts, stops, and stumbles, Kuma Sunglasses was born! Building Kuma has been a journey of hard work, learning, making new friends, wins and losses, growth (both business and personal) and a great deal of fun as I built the brand, and in many ways I feel like Kuma is only getting started! Going forward I plan to share a little more with you about that journey, the people in our community, and what is next for Kuma. But I could not have built Kuma and continue to do so without the support of mostly independently owned stores across North America retailing Kuma, and of course our customers all around the world who made the choice to support these retailers and Kuma by purchasing and wearing Kuma Sunglasses every day!

So thank you, for helping Kuma make a small difference in the world and also for giving me the best summer job for all these years that anyone could have!