Anything Goes

There's nothing original you can do with uniforms, right? Au contraire. Consider 36-year-old Sandi Richter. After an emergency appendectomy brought her up close and personal with the rather impersonal nature of hospitals, the former pharmaceutical sales representative designed a line of patterned scrubs for medical professionals. Her Littleton, Colorado, Crazy Scrubs Inc. now sells scrubs featuring everything from pink flamingos to surfing Santa Clauses.

"I think patients like to see a human side to their doctors," explains Richter, who is confident she's doing her part to calm patients' fears. With 1995 sales of $100,000, why shouldn't she be?

Rochelle Huppin Fleck is confident, too-confident that her and partner Kathleen Magee's contemporary chef clothing is taking a bite out of the restaurant apparel market.

"Every year, we seem to be doubling [our sales]," says Huppin Fleck, 33, who co-founded Chefwear Inc. in Chicago with Magee, 36, in 1990. The company's contemporary baggy-style uniforms appeal to cooks worldwide.

"We just felt we needed to do something a little bit different, a little bit more comfortable and fashionable," says Huppin Fleck, who, like Magee, formerly worked as a pastry chef. Fashion, in this instance, translates into a veritable feast of patterns-from chili peppers and tropical fish to wild mushrooms.

Hail to the chefs!

This article was originally published in the January 1996 print edition of Entrepreneur with the headline: Anything Goes.