This 22-year-old Calgarian went from HomeSense cashier to hijab entrepreneur

Gone are the days of Muslim women in Canada going out of their way to buy new hijabs. Or at least, that's Dina Ibrahim's hope.

The 22-year-old Calgarian's company, HYAT CO., is the first hijab brand sold at Winners and Marshalls stores across the country.

Ibrahim says her goal is to make hijabs more accessible to Muslim women in Canada. Many hijabis have to wait for a trip back home, seek out ethnic clothing stores or pay steep shipping fees from large American companies to buy new hijabs, she says.

Now, they can run to the nearest Winners or Marshalls store instead.

"Seeing the product that we worked so hard on — we spent hours packaging them — I felt so accomplished," said Ibrahim about the first time she saw her branded hijab in stores. "It just made me motivated to do more."

It's a big deal to Mim Fatmi, president of the Western Muslim Initiative — an organization that aims to bridge Muslim and western identities for Canadian university students.

"It definitely alludes to the fact that there is a need for this type of fashion and clothing to be represented in larger department stores," Fatmi said.

"Clearly, there are tons of Muslim women looking for these options."

It's more important what it represents though, says Fatmi, for young Muslim women to easily pick up a hijab when they're at the mall with friends, during the same trip they'd buy shoes or makeup.

"This feels so much more like we're incorporated in the mainstream Canadian fabric."

From cashier to brand founder

Ibrahim created HYAT CO. during the pandemic, while she was completing her undergraduate degree in psychology at Mount Royal University.

It all started when she realized the hijab brands available catered to women who don't look like her.

"I felt really bad about myself," said Ibrahim. But the lack of representation for various body types and skin tones inspired her.

So she thought, "Why don't I just make a brand that celebrates all kinds of women, and brings in hijabs as well?"

Unlike some other hijabs, HYAT CO. is meant to be flattering for all body types and skin colours, she says. It also aims to follow the trends, like modal hijabs — made from a durable, sustainable fabric — which have become more popular among hijabis in the last few years.

Ibrahim launched HYAT CO.'s online store in 2021, and in 2022, she won $10,000 from MRU's JMH LaunchPad pitch competition for aspiring entrepreneurs.

That funding paid for her packaging, products, shipping, marketing — and ultimately helped her bring the hijabs into brick-and-mortar stores. But she says it was no easy feat.

It was mostly made possible because she had worked part-time as a cashier at HomeSense, another store under the TJX Canada umbrella, for five years while she was building the company.

"I was like, 'Hey, I work here and I realized that a lot of your consumers are actually hijabis and we're not catering to them,'" she said.

"That's what really got them hooked on my hijabs."

Ibrahim's variety of hijabs — crepe chiffon, premium chiffon, premium jersey and modal — can now be found at all 279 Winners and Marshalls stores in the country.

She's hoping to bring affordable modest dresses to HYAT CO., and hopefully retailers, next.

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