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| Inspired by NBA greats like Anfernee "Penny" Hardaway, Xavier Winston squashed his dream to play in the NBA to launch his own t-shirt business. (Photos by Wiley Henry) |
Can anything good come out of Binghampton, a community marred by
blight, crime and poverty? Xavier Delanne Winston, the 31-year-old founder
of Kencade Apparel, thinks so.
With roots deeply planted in the community, he is not bothered
about the perception that skeptics may have about Binghampton – except when he
tried to invite a female acquaintance to his home a few years ago and she declined.
“I told her where I stayed and she said, ‘I’m not coming to
Binghampton,’” he recalls, adding, “Binghampton was notorious for the bad
stuff. [Now] I’m trying to shed a positive light on the community.”
Winston saw the light at East High School, where he began
designing sneakers and clothes. He graduated in 2005 and went on to study
architecture at Southwest Tennessee Community College, and then on to MCC-Penn
Valley in Kansas City, Mo.
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| After launching Kencade Apparel in Binghampton in 2013, Xavier Winston plans to stay in the community to inspire the youth. |
“I switched my major over to graphic design, and I actually fell
in love with it,” he said, but didn’t graduate from either college.
Rather than follow the wrong crowd down the path that converges at
the intersection of drugs, crime or gang-life, he set out to do something
starkly different: follow the path to entrepreneurial success.
“For me, I stayed on the straight and narrow,” said Winston, whose
dream of NBA stardom once superseded his innate talent for artistic expression.
“I just wanted to go to the NBA. I didn’t want anything to interfere with my
dream.”
Does he regret surrendering his hoop dreams to a desk and computer?
“No,” he said with assurance that he’d made the right decision. Succeeding as
an entrepreneur – not a hoop star – has since been his primary motivation.
“If it wasn’t for basketball, I don’t know where I would have been
today,” said Winston, describing himself as a leader, not a follower. But then,
he added, “It’s tough growing up in a neighborhood when everybody is doing
everything else.”
Dreaming of NBA stardom may have kept Winston out of trouble, but
it was his creative energy and desire to become self-sufficient that led him to
found Kencade Apparel, a home-based business.
Another impetus that spurred Winston to seek his own fate was
growing up in a single-parent household with five siblings. A brother, Milton Winston, played a part, too, at the onset of Kencade
Apparel.
“I wanted to work for Rocaware, because (Shawn) Jay-Z (Carter, a
co-founder) is my role model; and Reebok, because of Allen Iverson (a former
NBA standout for the Philadelphia 76ers),” said Winston.
Milton Winston suggested they start a company and name it “Fly
Boy,” said Winston, who pondered his brother’s idea of creating movies, plays,
and music. “But he never puts any action behind it.”
A couple years later, the Winston brothers talked about launching
a clothing line. They needed a name for the company. “Coming up with a name was
like the hardest part,” said Winston.
He thought about the name a former co-worker suggested he use: “Delanne,”
his middle name. When he tried to copyright it, it was taken. So the brothers
went back to brainstorming.
It then occurred to Winston
that his brother’s middle name would be perfect: “Kencade.” “I instantly fell
in love with it,” he said. “Everybody knows Ralph Lauren. Everybody wears Polo,
no matter what your occupation is... That’s the status I’m trying to get to.”
Winston started selling t-shirts in 2013 for $10 to $20 each, all sizes.
Sales vary – about 300 so far since his official launch – he said, adding,
“It’s been up and down, but, for the most part, I do pretty good.”
To supplement sales, he works part-time at Target.
Though Kencade Apparel is fairing relatively well, Winston wants
to give back, perhaps to defy those who still think that nothing good can come
out of Binghampton.
His cousin, the late Desmond Scott Merriweather, for example, won three
state basketball championships with his friend at Lester Middle School – local
NBA legend Anfernee “Penny” Hardaway.
He also coached boys’ basketball one year at East High School. The
residents in Binghampton can’t – or won’t – forget his exploits.
Merriweather grew up in Binghampton, now a community on the
precipice of change. The Broad Avenue Arts District is proof that a beleaguered
community can come back from the brink of decay.
Winston wants to leave a legacy, too. Just like Hardaway, whom he
admires, and his cousin, he hopes to grow Kencade Apparel beyond the boundaries
of Binghampton without leaving his roots.
(Some of Xavier Delanne Winston’s t-shirt designs can be viewed on
his website at www.kencadeapparel.com.)
