“Get ready with me to launch my very first merch line,” says Hailie Jade Mathers at the start of the Instagram video she posted on May 19. The 27-year-old daughter of Eminem did her makeup while telling her 3.1 million Instagram followers about the new clothing line for her podcast, Just A Little Bit Shady. The new line, like the podcast title, pays homage to her father, since Eminem, 50, is also known as “Slim Shady.”
“I have been working on this for, like, almost a year at this point,” explained Hailie. “I wanted to make sure that whatever we put out was not only going to be super comfortable and cute but also could almost be worn as just a regular clothing line and not look just like merch. So, pretty much to accomplish that, we just went with this tone-on-tone embroidery on this black pigment-dyed set and another tan pigment-dyed set. And I know you’re probably thinking, ‘That took a year?’ But, I literally went through several rounds of suppliers, trying different products to make sure that whichever one we went with was so comfortable that I could literally wear it every single day.”
“I’m also a raging perfectionist. So much so that I actually designed every single thing you’re going to see on the site, including the site itself,” she added. The line includes a JALS Tee (almost completely sold out) in White and Cream. There is also a JALS hat, joggers, and sweatshirt. Hailie also got her fiancée, Evan McClintock, to model the men’s part of the fashion line.
“So, I was actually thinking, I have to press ‘go live’ when it’s time to ‘go live’ at noon. So, let’s do it together. I’ll film it,” said Hailie before she showed herself launching the new clothing line. During the chat, Hailie also noted that while she attended Michigan State University, she also took courses online at Parson’s Design School, helping her figure out the kind of clothing she wanted to bear her brand.
On the first episode of Just A Little Shady, Hailie reflected on growing up with a famous dad. “It’s so fun to look back … thinking back as an adult, I’m like, ‘Wow, that’s so, so surreal,’ and those memories of me thinking those were normal things, now I look back like, ‘Holy crap, that was cool,'” she said.
“I remember going on [Eminem’s tour bus], and all our memories of being young were so cool and unique to look back at now,” added Hailie’s cohost and childhood best friend, Brittany Ednie. “At the time felt so normal and not anything strange or different. We didn’t know any better.”