From Stinky T-Shirts to Glamorous Masks and U.S. Military Contracts, a Young Texas Entrepreneur Keeps it Clean
How Megan Eddings' Accel is Building Lululemon Type Buzz
BY Shelby Hodge // 11.05.20Accel Lifestyle will hold a pop-up in Tootsies Friday and Saturday customizing its Prema fabric anti-bacterial masks, an entrepreneurial success for a Houstonian.
Since its launch in August of 2019, Houston-based Accel Lifestyle has become the darling of the sweat set, perhaps on a fashion trajectory to emulate Lululemon. Operative word here is “sweat” as it was Megan Eddings’ husband’s “stinky” T-shirts that led her on a remarkable journey creating an anti-bacterial fabric for workout apparel that has been embraced by groups as diverse as Tootsies’ clientele and the United States military.
Pulling no punches, Eddings, Accel Lifestyle founder and CEO, tells PaperCity, “It’s disgusting. If people only knew what bacteria grows in their T-shirts and socks.” And of the germs harboring in their well-worn COVID-19 masks, Eddings notes, “It’s gross.”
After contemplating the problem with those T-shirts that after many washings still quartered a locker room smell, Eddings pivoted from vending high-tech medical equipment in the Texas Medical Center to investigating the “stinky” problem.
As she notes on the Accel website, “Over time, no matter how much you wash that shirt, traditional detergents will not help. If your clothes look clean but smell bad. . . they are not clean.”
Having studied chemistry and biochemistry at the University of Virginia and Brown University respectively, Eddings launched a scientific investigation of those “stinky” clothes, a three-year exploration that resulted in the creation of Prema, a trademark-registered fabric (trademarked in 120 countries) that blocks the bacteria emanating from perspiration.
“The science is knitted into the fabric that inhibits bacterial growth,” she explains.
Accel Lifestyle launched in August of 2019 manufacturing T-shirts, tanks and hoodies for men and women from the Prema fabric. Last January, Eddings began holding pop-up shops for her athletic wear at Tootsies in tandem with the boutique’s exercise mornings.
When COVID-19 hit, Accel expanded its product line to include masks, adding children’s, crafted from the anti-bacterial fabric. Since then the company has sold more than 400,000 masks, 100,000 of which have gone to the military and have garnered her a government contract for mask production. Currently, Accel is working on anti-bacterial apparel for the Navy SEALS.
“It’s been a wild journey,” Eddings says.
The Accel CEO and her team will be at Tootsies Friday and Saturday customizing the anti-bacterial masks and Accel athletic wear with monograms and patches. The patches include handlebar mustaches, lipstick, ice cream cones, stars, roses, pizza, French fries, a bulldog and more.
In recognition of her entrepreneurial success, Eddings was recently honored as one of Houston Business Journal’s 40 Under 40.