A local Navy veteran and mum-of-two is growing an innovative small business that combines her passion for technology and creative flair.
But Sacha de Wit says she couldn’t have done it without the help of Prince’s Trust Australia, a national charity supporting Australia’s veterans and Australian Defence Force family members to explore and start businesses.
The Pomona resident’s venture was born after popping into her mum’s house just to have a play with a new embroidery machine.
Although she had “always created”, up until then, the 45-year-old had never considered doing something creative as a career.
Ms de Wit was accepted into the Australian Defence Force Academy straight out of high school and studied IT, before embarking on a career in the Royal Australian Navy.
She left full-time service in 2002 and last served as a reservist in 2010 at the rank of lieutenant.
Now, the mum to a 17-year-old and a four-year-old is building a business that works around her family – and it began with a burning desire to push the limits of that embroidery machine.
“It came with this really great software,” she said.
“I found it intuitive straight away. You can do amazing things like shading with threads so that you get that 3D effect from a 2D object.
“And having that computer background, it just ticked so many boxes for me.”
She began creating wedding keepsakes with her mum but demand for the products just wasn’t there yet.
“There was a little shop in town that took some of our creations and so we had a little bit of success,” she said.
“Then we got another embroidery machine that allowed us to embroider t-shirts, which was game-changing for us.”
In 2021 she started Swaggy Threads Star, a bespoke machine embroidery company that re-creates images and logos on fabric.
“We started by going down the avenue of putting my designs onto t-shirts,” she said.
Ms de Wit creates the designs while her mum operates the embroidery machine.
“The design starts as a drawing on a page and then I digitise the image, which allows me to send the file to the embroidery machine. Instead of printing in ink on paper, we print in thread on fabric,” she said.
At the start of 2022 she got an extra boost of entrepreneurial confidence when she joined PTA’s Launch Lab online program.
She said the program allowed her to network with other veteran business owners and helped her move through and focus the “millions of ideas” running through her mind.
“During the program I also learned to identify a change in tact as a redirection and not as a failure,” she said.
With 40 per cent of PTA participants living and working in Queensland, the charity – which began eight years ago – recently ticked over 1000 participants through its program.
And while her new business seems like a world away from being a Navy officer, for her, both roles are at heart about service.
“Whatever the service or product is, it’s about what you can do with it for other people,” she said.
“That’s the driver coming from that service environment.
“Recently I was working with a girl who had a medical incident that completely changed her life.
“Using her art work, I recreated the images for her onto t-shirts.
“I was looking out the side of my eye and I could see the joy in her face. It was so nice to do that for her.”
She said she planned to continue growing Swaggy Threads Star and potentially work with some ex-service organisations and other veteran-owned businesses through the networking opportunities PTA provides.
To register for the PTA enterprise program click here.
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