There’s nothing better than a nicely fitted shirt. However, it’s sometimes very difficult to find a shirt that has such a perfect fit. Some of the worst things that we see are shirts that are hard to tuck in (creating a “poof effect”) and those that are too tight, displaying the infamous muffin top. Can we ever solve this problem? The answer is yes! Welcome to Hucklebury.
Hucklebury is a vertically-integrated crowdsourcing company offering premium menswear. The brand’s priorities are based off of three things: great fit, finest quality and innovative business model.
At FashInvest, we had a chance to sit down and chat with Co-founder Parag Jhaveri, who gave us the scope on how Hucklebury will revolutionize men’s clothing.
“My family has been in the fashion industry for over 15 years, exporting scarves, shorts and white shirts to major brands worldwide like Marks & Spencer and Calvin Klein. So, fashion is something that I’ve grown up with and watching the family business, I was very interested in process and development. I went on to pursue an Engineering degree and worked as an engineer to develop products for a few years that taught me how to remove inefficiencies in manufacturing using lean and six-sigma. I then took a role in product marketing, and am currently pursuing an MBA. I oversee manufacturing & marketing strategies, states Parag.
Co-founder, Dhawal Shah, is responsible for all things on the web. He is very passionate about programming and entrepreneurship, which made us a complete team. Dhawal got his first taste of programming at the age of 8 with QBasic, and since then, he has been playing with computers, robotics and web development. He fell into entrepreneurship when he was 18 and led his team to create the ‘Push-up Pal’ for a class – a product that was later featured in The New Paper in Singapore. He was the 5th employee at Qik in Silicon Valley where he did web development. Qik was later acquired by Skype. Dhawal is Hucklebury’s web guru!
When asked about the inspiration behind Hucklebury, Parag stated, “We were tired of seeing luxury brands demand 3 to 7 times for the cost of their products but often fail to live up to the standards of their reputation- constantly lowering production costs for larger margins, without adding value to the customer. For off-the-rack shirts, we often found the quality poor yet prices high, or the fit was too boxy, giving rise to the awful muffin tops look. We wanted to change all that and so we set off on an adventurous journey to discover new ways of bringing the best of everything for the people without them having to break their banks. Hucklebury popped into being while my co-founder, Dhawal, was engaged in his favorite hobby – reading! Up to that point, we had discussed and discarded a number of names. Whilst perusing The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn for the umpteenth time, he noticed that the protagonist, although rich, has always been fashioned in overalls with a straw hat on the cover. I have always associated Huckleberry as someone who enjoys the simplicity of life and complementing it with an adventurous streak. We came to the realization that these qualities were the same we hope our customers will love about our products.”
Every entrepreneur has someone in their life that has helped drive their desires to create their own business. For Parag, it was his mother, who had an extensive background in manufacturing and social responsibility. “While my mother herself was a very artistic person, her motivation was to empower poor women in being entrepreneurial and building their future. She therefore started her business with a handful of poor women who were very skilled in the craft, and over time grew her social enterprise into two manufacturing factories with 75 women that exported to designers and retailers worldwide. She is the inspiration behind Hucklebury being socially conscious. We want to give back to the community by bringing back jobs to America that were lost by outsourcing and providing people with affordable high-quality products that are built to last,” Parag explains.
So many brands claim to offer the best fit and quality when it comes to men’s fitted shirts, but how many are actually doing this? Parag comments, “We don’t just talk the talk – we walk it too! We have backed our claims with a never before seen 365 Day Guarantee. No one else even comes close to offering such a return policy. Why can we do it? Because we are that confident in the quality of our product! We have done tremendous research on fabrics and ordered samples from various mills from around the world. We decided on the 100% Egyptian cotton fabrics from the best mills in Italy that have been in business for more than a century and are known for their fine craftsmanship and supply to world’s best brands in the world like Armani, Zegna, Neiman Marcus, Burberry,etc; These fabrics are so comfortable that your shirt will feel like a second layer of skin on your body.”
Made in America is become quite popular this day and Parag has several deciding factors that pushed the Huclebury brand in this direction.” First, the Bangladesh factory collapse brought to our attention that although outsourced factories may claim to have ISO standards for their workers, we had no way to verify without actual physical presence. We are a socially conscious company and it is important to us to be assured of working conditions. ‘Made in America’ gives that assurance.
Second, we maintain the highest standards of quality for our products. There are a burgeoning number of ‘Made in America’ companies claiming superior quality – and the reason for that is that it’s true!
Finally, outsourcing has affected the American economy, resulting in a loss of jobs and cutting partner factory’s operating hours from 5 days/week to 4 days/week. As a socially conscious company, we want to do our part to bring jobs back to the US,” he stated.
Hucklebury’s ideal customers are men from the age of 29 to 55 years, who are haberdashery-hungry and are quality and price conscious with an annual income of $70,000 and above. He is the one, who believes that the American economy is here to stay.
As far as marketing strategy, the founders are building a brand by telling an authentic story. They use grass root campaigns to spread the word of mouth via niche bloggers, forums, mainstream media, social media and pop-up events. They also experiment with Facebook ads and technologies like retargeting amongst others.
The founders are also open to partnering with retailers in an effort to expand. “Partnering with retailers would allow us to reach a mass demographic that is not as price conscious and wants American-made great fitting shirts off-the-rack!”
Is there an exit strategy for the Hucklebury brand? There just may be. Parag states, We started Hucklebury with a long-term view, so our exit strategy is to focus on growth, and stick to it. We want our story and brand to be household name that people trust and share our story with friends and family. Having said that, if an offer where we have synergy and feel it can help bring the company to the next level, we would consider it.”
When asked about the future of the brand, Parag explained,” We are going to launch with dress shirts for men on our crowdsourcing platform to begin with but we are aiming to own the man’s closet and become the ‘go-to” company for providing high-quality clothes that are Made in America.”
By Lolita A. Alford