Save Opie Way: Support The James' Family Business

Opie Way is a small, handmade footwear company established in Fletcher, North Carolina in 2019. Justin and his wife Amanda built the business from scratch, embarking on a journey to preserve an all but dying art in the United States: making quality sneakers using the highest grade of materials possible.

Recently, Hurricane Helene destroyed their factory, located inside the Diamond Brand Gear facility in Cane Creek Industrial Park, as Cane Creek rose to historic levels, flooding the building upwards of 6' inside.

This is going to be a total loss, and only some items can be salvaged. This family-run, family-owned business will have to recover from the loss of the machinery, the loss of the materials, employees that will have no place to work, and outstanding orders that can't be fulfilled.

But the worst loss is that this is a family business. This 18-20hr a day grind to keep a trade alive in America puts food on the table for employees' families and the three little James girls.

The sense of community in the MiUSA (Made in USA) is strong, and there are thousands of avid supporters of brands making things stateside across the globe. Now more than ever we can show our support by banding together and sending donations to help them not only keep their lights on and food on their plates, but also to have a fighting chance to recover and again produce sneakers.

I am Evan Morrison, co-owner of Hudson's Hill of Greensboro, North Carolina. Justin James is my best friend. I would do anything for him. My goal is to lighten his and his family's load however possible. This week I will be driving a car full of gas tanks and water to them, and every week until they're back up and running I will dedicate hours to help them get back on their feet. We were lucky here in the Piedmont, we had hardly any damage. It is heartwrenching to know just a couple hours west people are boiling contaminated water and defending themselves from looters, and trying to make sense of where to even begin picking up the pieces.

Update (9/30): Wanting to reiterate that any pairs of sneakers bought from the Hudson's Hill website will redirect 100% of proceeds (not net profits, literally all of what we receive after Shopify takes their cut and taxes) to Opie Way. This is the smallest way to show our store rallying behind the James family as they now plot a trek up an even steeper slope, as if American made sneakers wasn't already steep enough! So, if you're interested in supporting but not wanting to simply donate money, consider buying a pair of ready-to-wear stock in the three colorways we have available on our site. We may be posting several pairs of samples onto social media to raise money as auctions later in the week/next week.

Please donate anything that you can to this fundraiser for Opie Way, so this effort can serve as a torchbearer for others enduring hardships from this storm, to shed light on the fact that our community supports its own.

All proceeds (100%) will go directly to the James family to use for rebuilding their business and surviving on their homestead during this difficult time. Godspeed.

Love,

The Hudson's Hill Team