We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Yari Copt. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Yari below.

Yari, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

When I was 19 years old I decided to open a skateshop in my town. I was a passionate skateboarder and I was missing a shop in my own town (Lugano, Switzerland), so I decided to open one myself. Some years after that I pushed the city to build the first skatepark and together with my crew of friends we funded a skateboard company called Warriors Skateboards.
in 15 years of skateboarding business I discovered that what I loved the most was having a brand.
It helped to release my creativity 360 degrees.
I sold my shop and my skate brand and decided to start something new.
I love dress shirts and I thought there was a gap in the market. Any good quality shirt brand was boring and every cool brand was not high quality and not really sustainable.
I also discovered that my region (Ticino) was a huge producer of shirts in the 60’s and 70’s with different factories and more than 700 employed.
I decided to produce locally hand made Swiss made exclusive dress shirts in 2016 and called my brand Old Captain Co.
Exclusive cause I develope with different artists the patterns of the prints and develop different sustainable fabrics.

Yari, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I always been an hyperactive, productive, creative person. I like to learn and have good ideas I like to develop them.
I just love to create so much. Just because, as humans, we can!
So I would say my main talent is ideas.
I started to sing and writing songs since I was a teenager, I started to host music festivals pretty young, I started to work as a dj speaker on the radio since 2016, i started 3 businesses that are all still going, I dj for weddings and parties, I sometimes act for small roles in movies and tv series and I started to take photos 4 years ago and got passionate about astrophotography and storms.
This year I had my first photo booklet and exhibition with my lightnings photos and the project “The Lightning’s Valley”.
Old Captain Co. is my main job with the radio.
Old Captain Co. is a one man show, so I take care of every aspect of the brand. From designing the collection, to sell it, to pack and fulfill the orders, to the marketing and social media etc etc
It’s a lot of work but I love what I do and I always have freedom, that for me is the most important part of life.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

I love to use social media channels because It’s great to have a plattform where all my creations can be shared and liked. I focus on instagram and facebook and I started to comunicate in a very friendly and honest way.
I was talking about the love I have for my products and the beauty of being locally produced, Swiss made, having unique fabrics and prints, working as a one man show, being sustainable in so many ways..
Also I started to post 2 photos of products and 1 of Switzerland landscapes. To show also the beauty of my country and the place where we produce our shirts.
The key is not to try to sell you products. just showcase the beauty of it and the passion of what you do. the money will come naturally with it.

What’s been the most effective strategy for growing your clientele?

Being everywhere, talk about your project to anyone, be positive, honest and passionate. I went to a lot of events around Switzerland, I organized a lot of event around to promote the brand, i traveled a lot to meet shop owners and potential clients, i never said no. I went for it all the time.
This create contacts, word to mouth, positive feedbacks, visibility, reviews, synergies and a lot more.
At the beginning is very important to be everywhere you can, possibly with a big smile on your face :)

Contact Info:

• Website: https://oldcaptainco.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/oldcaptainco/
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/yaricopt
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/yari-copt/
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/yaricopt
• Other: https://linktr.ee/yaricopt

Image Credits
portrait by Yuri Catania factory pics by Luca Crivelli