Mateo Telfer has been interested in art for most of his life. He’s also had an eye for, one day, starting his own business.
Founding a company to sell his artwork before even starting high school wasn’t necessarily on the 13-year-old Whistler local’s to-do list.
That idea was sparked by Telfer’s Grade 8 entrepreneurship class at Coast Mountain Academy (CMA) in Squamish. Other classmates are selling their baking, or making jewelry, soaps or bath products this semester, but Telfer knew immediately he wanted to build his business around digital art. He founded NeoCreative earlier this year, an online business that sells mugs, T-shirts, hoodies, and tech accessories like iPhone and AirPod cases adorned with the colourful, Whistler-inspired designs Telfer creates with the help of artificial intelligence.
“Probably in early November, my mom showed me [AI tools] like Dall-e and ChatGPT,” he explained. “Over winter break I was playing with Dall-e, and I found that quite interesting. Then we had the assignment of making a company about whatever we wanted, and I thought art would be a good way to do it.”
The school-year-long entrepreneurship course begins with studying existing corporations and dissecting their business practices. In the second half of the year, students are tasked with starting up a full-fledged business of their own, from creating a brand, mission statement, logo, business plan, and product line to generating sales and delivering product. It all leads up to a Dragons’ Den-style pitch presentation Telfer and his classmates will deliver to a panel of “dragons”—also known as CMA’s principals—in June.
“It's a competition throughout the entire class to make the most revenue, so it gets pretty intense sometimes,” Telfer said.
In just a few weeks, Telfer built an e-commerce website through Wix, and found an on-demand print shop and manufacturer, called Printful, where he’s been sourcing his apparel. “They make different kinds of shirts, sweaters, pants, socks … and then you can put your designs; your art onto the [products],” he explained. The company has a warehouse in Canada, meaning the turnaround time to receive an order after placing it is usually only a week or two. NeoCreative’s prices range from $30 to $75.
Starting up any business has its challenges, but founding a company at 13 comes with a particular set of hurdles: for one, Telfer’s not allowed on social media, making it tough to advertise or see how other businesses use the platforms for marketing purposes. He also doesn’t have a marketing budget (the on-demand printing helped eliminate the need for hefty upfront costs), and is working under the tight timelines of his class assignment. Plus, it was Telfer’s first time building a website—there was lots to learn, he said.
But Telfer’s main obstacle, at first, was getting a handle on creating art with AI. Telfer’s passion for art stems from his time at the Whistler Waldorf School, where he learned to draw, and paint in acrylics and water paint between kindergarten and Grade 5, but incorporating tech into his creative process required a whole new approach.
“It's almost kind of like programming [the AI]. You're giving it every detail you would want and also giving it examples, and then it will make, for instance, a first draft. Of course, if you like that you keep it, but then you can iterate off of that to make [the images] you actually want,” he explained.
“That was quite challenging at first to get good at.”
Featuring highly-detailed images of wildlife, athletes and naturescapes, Telfer’s art is unmistakably inspired by his outdoor adventures growing up in Whistler.
In an effort to capture the feelings associated with those inspirations, the 13-year-old has leaned into rich, vivid colours in his work. He described his artistic style as ”surrealism,” or “almost like dream-like,” he said.
Telfer also takes custom orders, and has a form available on NeoCreative’s site customers can fill out if there are particular products they’d like to see available.
Regardless of the grade he receives on the project at the end of the school year, Telfer plans to keep NeoCreative running into the summer and beyond.
“Now that I have it all mostly set up, I can just once in a while add a new product,” he said.
Asked about his goals for NeoCreative, Telfer said “It’s my very first business, so I want to prove to myself that I can both set up a business but also grow it and keep it running.
“When I collect the revenue from this assignment, I'll most likely reinvest money into the company—like most of it,” he added. “Eventually, I would love to see my clothes being worn outside of Whistler, and I’d love to see some people wearing it actually around Whistler this summer. That’d be pretty cool.”
See for yourself at neocreative.ca.
