Starting a company can be challenging enough for an adult, but at the age of 15, a local Covington teen is defying the odds and has started up his own T-shirt company called RyseUp.

Dylan McDonald has had some what of a difficult upbringing, according to his Aunt, Renee Donovan. She said he has worked hard for everything he has, and will be purchasing his own car soon.

“He knows the value of a dollar and has worked hard already his whole life,” Renee said in an email.

With an inspirational and responsible mindset like Dylan’s, he decided to spread the word that if you put your mind to something, you can achieve great things.

This is why he named his company RyseUp, he said.

“I made this company because people have goals in life that they want to achieve and I myself also have goals. Some goals can be harder to achieve than others and that shouldn’t stop you if you’re goals are hard or not. You should just ‘RyseUp’ to be your best potential and achieve all your goals and just be your best,” Dylan said.

With his motto in mind (RyseUp), Dylan grabbed his laptop and started planning out his company. With a little help from a friend who has done this before, Dylan was set for success.

Aside from a little help here and there, Dylan said he does everything for his company — including but not limited to, designing the logos, making sales and ensuring everything is going well.

The hardest part he said, has been coming up with a design for the T-shirts.

Dylan said the logo for his company is the Seattle skyline with his company’s name under it. He decided on this design because he is from Seattle and liked the idea of having that has his logo, he said.

He choose the spelling of the name of his company because he thought it would was different and more unique than spelling it normally.

So far, Dylan said he has had five sales and around 140 visitors to his website within the last month. To purchase a shirt, Dylan said it’s pretty simple.

“They (customers) would go to my website and to buy a shirt (and) I would get an email from my shirt — I guess you would say developer. (Then) they (the developer) make the shirt and they send it to get it printed,” Dylan explained. “I have to basically like, make sure everything is going smoothly and then when I get a shipping ticket, I send it to the (person) so they could see where their shirt is.”

Dylan said his goal for the company is to not only make a profit, but to have everyone go by his motto.

With the money he earns, Dylan said he is going to buy his first car, make new designs and to change his website in the future.

His favorite part has been watching his company come to life.

“I think my favorite part has been what I think would be cool in my head, I can put on a shirt and I can see people wearing it and going by my motto,” he said.

You can visit Dylan’s website to purchase a shirt at https://ryseupapparel.bigcartel.com/.