Junior Lauren Romard creates handmade scrunchies that she sells to her peers. What started off as a small hobby, has blossomed into a source of income.

Romard started sewing in the eighth grade after her mother gave her her first sewing machine as a gift. She decided to learn by fixing holes in clothes and her Renaissance Faire costumes.

Romard decided to put her sewing skills to use to raise money for a field trip with a theater company. She would have traveled to London to see a West End musical at the Globe Theater and perform in some workshops.

Unfortunately, Romard said, she was unable to attend the trip after the director who invited her passed away from Leukemia.

“I decided (to put) the money I raised from the scrunchies… towards my college fund and (the) school’s New York trip,” Romard said.

Romard creates her scrunchies from scratch with materials she buys herself, selling them 1 for $3 and 2 for $5. She can also create unique, personalized designs to her customers’ liking.

“I order the elastic from Amazon in bulk. It’s very easy to customize the scrunchies by whichever fabric your (buyer) choose(s),” Romard said.

Senior Audrey Scott needed a scrunchie one day and heard Romard was selling. She made a purchase and was happy with the result.

“I bought one for I think one dollar. It was yellow, it had little stars on it,” Scott said. “The quality was great – the scrunchie lasted a very long time. Only recently little stitches are coming out, but I wear it pretty frequently,” said Scott.

Similarly to Scott, junior Shelby Davis heard about Romard’s scrunchie business and made a purchase.

“I bought two for a deal, one of the limited editions, a pink one with roses and a purple one with stars,” Davis said. “They’re really… cute and good quality, if they break she’ll fix them for you for free.”