East Coast Lifestyle, based in Nova Scotia, is expanding and building its first headquarters in Bayer’s Lake, Halifax.
The CEO of East Coast Lifestyle, Alex MacLean, started the company in 2013 studying at Acadia University. One of his classes focused on creating a design representing the East Coast. With an $800 loan from his father, MacLean was able to buy and design blue hoodies to sell to his friends, family, and people around his school.
“The goal was to only sell thirty hoodies”, MacLean said. But these thirty hoodies turned into the East Coast Lifestyle Brand. After the first hoodies sold, MacLean used the money to buy sixty more, and then 100 more. Suddenly Sydney Crosby asked for a hoodie, and it was a steep climb from there.
“The brand took off like wildfire, “says MacLean. “It was just a steep incline and I had to learn a lot of things on the fly. I was literally having to order hundreds of hoodies. This gave me the opportunity to really put more money into the clothing brand and try different colour hoodies and shirts.”
With Sydney Crosby wearing the logo and national news attention, MacLean had a lot to learn – and quickly. One of the challenges was to find a trademark lawyer so he could secure the East Coast Lifestyle logo.
“We were really getting knocked off by dozens and dozens of people after Sydney Crosby and the news interview,” says MacLean. “People were doing Newfoundland Lifestyle, New Brunswick Lifestyle, Alberta Lifestyle, there was even an E Coast Lifestyle with a piece of toast in the middle, there was everything you can think of.”
With the protection of the trademark, MacLean was able to secure his brand and logo which has since come a long way from just being a class assignment and will be celebrating their 10thanniversary next year.
During Covid-19, East Coast Lifestyle started new projects such as expanding the brand to include alcoholic beverages and chips. So far MacLean says they have sold over 600,000 bags of chips in just over a year, and they are all made locally in New Brunswick.
“East Coast Lifestyle got into 2,000 new stores across Canada, but not with shirts and hoodies, it was with chips,” says MacLean. “It allowed us to sell a lot more clothing because the brand went through the roof with all these new stores.”
The biggest development is the new headquarters for East Coast Lifestyle that will be breaking ground at the end of this month. It will be located on Bayer’s Lake and on the number one bike path in Nova Scotia – the BLT Rails to Trails.
Customers will be able to enjoy the new development as in addition to the main store, it will include a basketball court, a coffee shop, East Coast beverages, picnic tables, and they are “going to make it a very inviting and a hopeful destination for people,” says MacLean.
“The whole premise of the brand was about being proud of where you are from,” says MacLean. “Nobody had really branded the East Coast at all in terms of clothing. There is a lot of Nova Scotia shirts or Newfoundland shirts, but there was really nothing for the East Coast.”
As a sports fan, MacLean wanted to create a brand people could be proud of, just like a sports team has their fan logo – MacLean wanted a logo that represents the East Coast.
“In the East Coast there is no professional hockey teams, basketball teams, football teams, soccer teams, and we don’t have a logo where we can all wear and represent,” says MacLean. “I wanted to create a brand that allowed all four Atlantic Canada provinces to really represent where they are from proudly.”
