Column: The Uplifting Story of One Park Ave Shop
Column: The Uplifting Story of One Park Ave Shop
How boobs equal business for local entrepreneur
By Bob Morris, Columnist
Hello, hungry people.
I was out for a morning walk the other day — it was 7:30-ish — and Winter Park’s main drag was largely deserted except for us early a.m. pavement pounders
Then from the block ahead came a loud commotion, lots of cheering and shouting.
And I saw a dozen or so women dressed in red and waving signs that said: “Go Braless!” and “I ❤️Boobs!”
I picked up the pace.
From a distance, it had all the signs of a 1960s-era women’s lib demonstration, but for the fact that the participants were better dressed. And not angry. They were smiling.
So, being a creepy old guy, I stopped and gawked and asked what was going on.
Turns out, it was a photo shoot for a Labor Day sale at the store where they work.
“We specialize in clothing that women can wear without needing a bra,” said one of the women in front of the store.
This gave me pause. I had reached a point where I could not hold up my end of the conversation.
And yet, I persisted.
“Can’t women go braless in any type of clothing?” I asked.
This got laughs and indulgent smiles from the women in red.
“Sometimes that’s too revealing,” said one of them. “And jiggly.”
“And sometimes it’s too scratchy,” said another.
“Plus, bras aren’t comfortable,” said yet another.
Again, not my field of expertise. But I wasn’t finished being a creepy old guy.
“OK if I take a photo?” I asked.
They were, as you can see, all for it.
“We love encouraging women to go braless,” said one. “In the right kind of clothes.”
Said another: “We love spreading the word on social media.”
And so, friends, here we are.
The name of the store is — klassy. — and that period, apparently, is necessary.
Yes, it looks like a comma in the photo below. But that’s a shadow. It’s really a period, And it has a purpose.
Other brands — JOANN. and Marc Jacobs., for instance — employ periods, too. It’s a design thing. The period, I am told, “sends a psychological cue of confidence, completeness, and finality — communicating that the brand is the ‘definitive’ word on what they do.”
And the lowercase presentation, I am further told, “mimics modern texting habits, making a retail storefront feel more human, direct, and casual rather than corporate.”
Who knew?
Now for the klassy. origin story. (Actually, that period is confounding and we will henceforth dispense with it.)
The klassy co-founder, Natalie Rogers Soto, grew up right here in the Orlando area. She got tired of uncomfortable bras that weren’t flattering to her outerwear, and she couldn’t find built-in bras that felt right. So she started designing her own.
In 2018, she and her husband, Jacob, launched klassy online. It was slow going at first. But they posted twice daily on TikTok. And in 2022, klassy went viral with its summer “brami” (a hybrid bra and camisole) and hit $1 million in sales in a single day.
They opened the first and, so far, only klassy retail store in Winter Park at the tail end of 2025. And in March 2026, Natalie was honored by her alma mater with induction into the University of Central Florida College of Business Hall of Fame.
How’s that for an “uplifting,” story?
“It’s all about body positivity and feeling good in your own skin,” one of the women outside the klassy store said.
It reminds me of the origin story of another clothing line, Lululemon, which has a store just down the street from klassy.
Back in 2002, when Lululemon launched its first shop in Vancouver, the owners advertised that they would give $200 worth of clothing to the first 30 people who showed up naked on a specified morning. Being Vancouver, it was rainy and very cold. Yet, way more than 30 people stood shivering outside in bathrobes that day and, after they stripped down, Lululemon let them all inside and gave them free stuff.
I have searched for photos of this historic event. Sadly, I’ve come up short.
Fast forward to present-day: Lululemon now has 811 stores and, in 2025, rang up sales of $11.1 billion.
Far be it from me to suggest that klassy is on the same trajectory. But to think that you could become a billionaire by helping women go braless? Surely it would boggle the minds of 1960s-era feminists.
I kinda wanted to take a peek inside the klassy store. Just so that, years from now, I can say I knew it when.
“Come back at 10 o’clock when we open,” said one of the women in red. “We have a little coffee shop inside. You can try our specialty, a ‘matcha k.’”
Maybe another day.
And so I carried on, just a guy on an early morning walk who set out with no expectations, learned a little something, met some lovely women, and came away with a bounce in his step.
Is this a great country or what?
WinterParkVoiceEditor@gmail.com
This commentary originally appeared on Bob Morris’ Substack. A former newspaper columnist and magazine editor, Bob is author of the Zack Chasteen series of mysteries set in Florida and the Caribbean, along with several non-fiction books and collections of essays. A fourth-generation Floridian, he lives in Winter Park.
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