John Smith, an investment banker working in Beijing, wanted to buy a few shirts for spring, but he was too busy to fight the bad traffic and shop in a crowded department store.
Instead he dialed the number of Beyond Tailors, an online shirt-tailoring store. Two hours later a fashion consultant arrived, measured Smith's sizes, offered different fabrics for him to choose, suggested styles that suited him and consulted about the latest in fashion. A couple of days later, the shirts were delivered to his door.
With Smith's personal embroideries and designs, the shirts are unique and tailored only for him.
He is among the millions of men who face problems with size, style, and selection when buying shirts at retail outlets.
Many men are looking for shirts that are tailored specifically to their size and style, with the quality of a luxury brand, yet at a price that is not too expensive.
With the concept of "enjoy you" and a business model that is customer-oriented, Beyond Tailors, the first Beijing-based company offering made-to-order shirts on the Internet, lives up to the term custom tailor.
In addition to making a phone call to place an order, clients can also order online. The service starts with the design, then fabric selection and finally measurement profiles. Customers can choose either secure online payment or cash on delivery.
"We help customers care more about themselves. A unique shirt, with the personalized design and extra individual features, connects their body with outside busy world as a middle layer and makes our customers stand out in a crowd and move with confidence through all business situations," says Dong Lu, the founder of Beyond Tailors.
Dong says that unless men fit perfectly into an off-the-rack shirt, they can find that mass-produced shirts are often too long in the sleeves, or too big at the neck, or too narrow in the torso.
The online custom tailor fits shirts to individuals, including hard-to-fit types with broad shoulders or a narrow waist, or are tall and lanky or short and stocky and their preference in fabric and style is also accommodated.
The company's website and database keeps track of past purchases and creates a comprehensive record of every customer's measurements and personal details to simplify future orders.
There are currently five styles available in the newly established online store: British classic, British modern, British fashion, British new classic and French classic.
Customers can also choose from different collars and cuffs. Personal monograms are also offered.
Beyond Tailor's target consumer group is men working in bank, accounting consulting and multinational companies, for whom shirts to wear in a professional office are a daily necessity. They are often too busy to go shopping and may balk at the idea of shirts made by a tailor due to the time involved and higher prices, Dong says.
"Customers have to go to the shops by themselves. After the shirt is made, they have to go to the shop again. It is very time consuming for businessmen with tight daily schedules every day, so we offer them the convenience," he adds.
It also takes couple of tries to find a good tailor. In fact, people usually find tailors by word of mouth, he explains.
Dong stumbled into the idea of starting the operation two years ago after talking to one of his friends.
"My friend only has an elementary school education, doesn't know anything about marketing or branding, but makes good shirts and offers good customer service to make his small business profitable."
"I thought if I leverage all my past experience and knowledge in business management and foreign markets, together with my passion for fashion, I could grow the business into a totally different scale," Dong says.
Their sales channel is from factory to customers, so costs are lower, leading to a competitive price edge.
The entrepreneur says that in the long term the challenge for his online store is how to maintain high quality while scaling up production.
Dong loved drawing, sketching and Chinese painting when he was a child in Beijing, and dreamed of becoming a fashion designer. He started making his own clothes in junior high school. But reality forced him to change his track. He earned an MBA at Stanford University School of Business and went to work for an investment bank.
"Stanford was a huge influence in my life, I understood that in order to be successful, I must find my own field that fulfills three criteria something I am passionate about, something I am good at and something that can make profit," Dong says.
