by Amanda Curtis
Luck is when opportunity meets hard work. As an entrepreneur, I’ve been working hard to make a better space for fashion at Nineteenth Amendment. I believe so much in our mission to do this, in our designers’ talent, and in giving everyone a voice through fashion but my biggest challenge is always reaching the rest of the world and sharing that vision. However, on Tuesday April 21, 2015, I met Lady Luck face-to-face.
I was standing outside the Glen Cove Long Island Rail Road train station at 6:30 am waiting for my train into Brooklyn, where Nineteenth Amendment is based. In between checking my emails, I looked up and saw a double rainbow. Enraptured, I sharpened my focus and saw that there were actually four rainbows in the morning sky! Under pressure to catch the incoming train, I snapped a picture on my phone and ran. I wanted to share my magical start to the day with everyone but I didn’t know how rare it was. But it was beautiful. Within half an hour of posting my photo to twitter, it went viral.
#QuadrupleRainbow broke the internet in a beautiful and uplifting way. Within hours the picture had spread across the world. There were a few that doubted the authenticity of the photo but scientists quickly verified it. I’ve received thousands of responses from people around the world and have been contacted by global media outlets like National Geographic, The Weather Channel, ABC, CNN, The AP, Mashable, The Huffington Post, Refinery 29, Hello Giggles, and countless others. Even celebrities such as Mindy Khaling and Jimmy Kimmel partook in the rainbow fest, but the biggest celebrity interaction of all was speaking about the meaning of rainbows with Paul Vasquez aka Yosemite Bear aka Double Rainbow Guy! Yes, he is super excited about #QuadrupleRainbow and he even invited me to Yosemite National Park to go rainbow hunting and discuss the meaning of ROY G BIV with him!
I’m grateful that I was able to capture the moment – I was lucky – and I hope that the Quadruple Rainbow has brought luck to others. From this viral experience I’ve learned so much about what resonates with people (honesty, beauty, authenticity) and the experience has served as a great way to get product and messaging feedback on Nineteenth Amendment. Most importantly #QuadrupleRainbow has allowed me to connect directly with shoppers in an authentic way. Going viral was not a ‘go-to-market’ strategy I ever thought would happen. It has been a cost-efficient and honest (no paid ads here!) way to connect and tell the world about my mission. I’m paying my luck forward and giving $25 to NineteenthAmendment.com with the code Rainbow. Have a lucky day!
