A young man launches an unusual initiative

At the age of 22, Juan José Rodríguez Zeiter founded the “Vintage” used clothing company, but in addition to pledging his income, Guy decided to promote responsibility towards the environment and impact society in an extraordinary way.

At first, he had only “two racks” of clothes in his room and a great desire to become an entrepreneur, but more than that, he was looking for a concept that would make a difference. “I started buying sneakers and reselling them. But when I learned that clothes are the second thing that generates the most waste in the world, the idea came to me to venture into a new concept in Puerto Rico and I started buying these clothes by the pound and said, ‘We’re going to sell old clothes!'” ”explained the young man, who is now 24 years old.

Two years later, Jay created his own boutique called Uncommon, an urban clothing company that has gone above and beyond to help the community in very creative ways. “I was selling and doing well, unloading two strips of clothes. So I took a chance and decided to open a small office. I started with a desk and four shelves of clothes and opened an Instagram page (@uncommon.pr),” Rodriguez recalls.

The support of their customers, especially from young adults in ‘high school’ to 30+ (men and women) was the basis for them to start thinking about how they could give back to the community for the support they were receiving. This is how Uncommon for the Community was born.

“One day I was hooking up tennis in a mall and I saw a boy, about 17, who was picking up trash in the parking lot. He was overweight and every time I went I saw him lose weight. One day I sat down to talk to him for two hours and he told me things A lot was happening. At the end of the conversation I gave him $200 and his face was worth a million. It brought me more satisfaction than anything else.”

Since then, Jay has made a very real and creative commitment to helping “everyone who sees ‘falling’ or is in a different situation than I am.” “Not that I am very rich, but I have a lot of sympathy. I have done many things, but we are committed to doing “random” things. Once we walked around the square with four boxes of pizza, one of them had money ($ 100) ) and the other three had pizza and people had to pick a box.” Another of his ideas is for a young waitress to become a model for his shop.

“We knew a waitress, a single mother, who was a friend of a friend and we knew her dream was to become a model. We went to his workplace and gave him a $500 ‘tip’. Today she is a model for my shop,” said the trader, who documents his outings on his Instagram page recently. The latter, through Uncommon in the Community, gives Jay sneakers from her store, some with money inside, to the homeless.In addition, each month give away clothes not sold in your store to the homeless.

This initiative has taken her to both San Juan and Bayamón, but she assures she would love to do it all over the island. “People in networks love content, because we always see such negative things and we see such positive traffic, and we, we’re not a giant company, get people pumped. I’d like to take this part to other levels that people can’t imagine, I’d like to rebuild football fields, help schools, and I would like to do things on other levels, and influence large communities, ”concluded the young entrepreneur, who can be followed on his Instagram page (@uncommon).

The Uncommon store is located at Avenida Luis Muñoz Rivera #988, in San Juan.