Jay Alvarrez was born on the beautiful island of Hawaii and raised by parents who always supported him. When Alvarrez was just 14, his mother passed away. She had an incredible impact on his life and taught him how to love others well. After her death, Jay got the phrase “let’s live” tattooed on the inside of his bottom lip, a memento he lives by and will never forget. After his mother’s tragic death, Alvarrez made the decision to drop out of high school and live the life he knew his mother wanted for him. He began experimenting with film, and started to document his adrenalin including adventures, capturing beautiful footage of his experiences and travels. Posting these incredible videos to social media, Alvarrez began to accumulate quite a following. This was the beginning of his path to stardom. Producing increasingly impressive content, Alvarrez’s work began to catch the eyes of companies such as Calvin Klein, Bonds Swimwear, and Hyundai and participated in high paying advertisements, and sponsorships. These new sources of income blessed Jay with more opportunities to travel the world and build a brand of himself. This is how Jay Alvarrez is an entrepreneur. He wisely gripped his wide array of talents and turned them into an outstanding source of income. His fashion and self-developed trends have spread across the world, and he has inspired million to go out into the world and go live. This is a perfect example of a rags-to-riches situation. He was handed nothing, and became a self-made millionaire. Fast forward to the present, Alvarrez boasts a hefty 5.9 million followers on Instagram, he has travelled the world several times over, and is now a designer and primary ambassador for DoucheBags, a luggage business whose mission is to create “Better journeys through smarter travel gear”. Learn from this and apply it to your life. Recognize the areas that you have been blessed in and use that to your advantage. Use your gifts to help other people and you might make a little money in the process.
Wow it is incredible the unorthodox path he took to become a very successful entrepreneur. Well dropping out of high school would normally be very frowned upon, it paid off huge for him. It goes to show just doing what you love and doing it very well can lead to huge success.
This story is so inspirational, and for the good as well. I have never really considered dropping out of high school an option for successful individuals, but this is an exception. I enjoy that his heart and energy is into living out what he and his mother stand for. His mind was not about traveling on the unbeaten path, but that he wanted to live out his mother’s wishes.
This is a really inspiring and unique story. In the digital age there are an array of new forms of entrepreneurship that have begun to emerge, one of which is being a brand ambassador. Alvarrez really demonstrates this form of entrepreneurship. He took something as tragic as his mom’s death and used it as inspiration to follow his passions and beyond that, he made himself a profitable brand through it. Excellent post!