Collegiate Beads Let You Show Off Your School Spirit in Style

Collegiate Beads Let You Show Off Your School Spirit in Style

One local family is finding success in making college themed jewelry here in Michigan. The product is called Collegiate Beads."They represent colleges and sororities across the country," said David Schowalter. "We've got 25 Pan-Hellenic sororities and we've got 114 major, mid-major and small colleges."We're constantly adding schools to our inventory line, and also we're going after high schools and we're going after custom beads for stores that maybe live in a resort area or they have a particular logo," he added.Pandora Beads - Why It Is Ideal For The Jewelry Creation ?

Schowalter was recovering from brain surgery at Henry Ford Hospital when he came up with the idea."In October 2008, that's when the financial markets plummeted. Here I am with a diagnosis that most people, including myself, it would scare you, and at that time, that was the scariest thing (that) ever happened in my life. When you get on the other side of it, if we look back on this, had I not gotten sick, had the economy not crashed, this idea would never have been invented or discovered, so good does come from bad," Schowalter told FOX 2's Jessica Starr.

His popular beads are added to stylish the Pandora bracelets that are the modern day charm bracelet."It's a bracelet that instead of hanging charms from a link-style bracelet, you actually have beads that represent different things in one's life that you string on to a bracelet," Schowalter said.They are made out of sterling silver, but you can get them in different metals, too."Gold, silver, platinum -- we can even do cooper," Schowalter explained.