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

Jeanne, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. 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 got married, I had been working as a technical designer for apparel brands for about 10 years. When it came time to look for tuxes for my fiancé and his 9 groomsmen (including 2 of my brothers) we went the obvious route: rentals. This is what everyone did when getting a large group dressed in black tie attire affordably. The only thing I didn’t realize was that the rentals actually weren’t affordable (they were over $250 for a one-time wear), and they didn’t fit well at all!

My fiancé was unphased by this poor experience, because this was the reality of what most men went through time and time again when standing up in a wedding or attending a formal event. The only other option at the time would be to spend 4 times as much to purchase a tuxedo. I was so disappointed and immediately thought that there had to be a better option, but there wasn’t. 

This experience is what started the idea for SuitShop. With my design and manufacturing background, I thought that there had to be a way to design and manufacture a high-quality tuxedo for around the same price as a rental but that customers could actually keep and wear again, which would mean exponential savings, not to mention way less hassle.

Soon after we were married, we moved from Columbus, OH to New York and started new jobs. I couldn’t stop thinking about my idea and researching ways to test the concept without investing a ton of money. That’s when I learned about Kickstarter. Kickstarter created the opportunity to test the idea while also raising money to help invest in an inventory order.

My business expert best friend (now Co-founder) and I partnered together to launch the Kickstarter concept called “The Groomsman Suit” in 2017, and that’s when the fun began!

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I always loved fashion, so I attended Fashion Design School and quickly got a job as a technical designer (basically an architect of clothing). I loved everything about creating apparel from start to finish, working with the factories, creating the patterns, and seeing a garment come to life and get sold in stores. Over time, I loved the idea of starting my own business, but after seeing how many teams of people and it takes for a retail brand to operate let alone the expense, it didn’t seem realistic. One thing I learned was that core styles that we made over and over again like classic t-shirts and jeans were the bulk of revenue, while the time-consuming fashion styles that we would work on for months would look amazing but sell very few.

After going through the rental process for tuxedos while planning my own wedding in 2013, I realized that if I could figure out a way to manufacture a higher quality tuxedo and sell it for around the same price or less than a rental, it would be a no-brainer. But it seemed like a daunting process, I had to try to find a manufacturer, get samples made, launch a website, figure out how to get people to purchase them; it was a lot to consider. 

The idea followed me for a while. When my husband and I had the opportunity to move to New York in 2014, I continued to work as a technical designer but researched this idea on the side. Once I found a manufacturer in the city and a way to sample products affordably, I reached out to my best friend who had recently graduated from MIT Sloan School of Business (who better to ask for business advice?!). She loved the idea so much, it really validated the concept for me, and we started to work together on it. We launched the business concept on Kickstarter in 2017.

We worked hard to avoid spending too much money on marketing, since we really had no money except personal savings and a few credit cards that we quickly maxed out. Instead, we decided to reach out to wedding planners and ask them to try a sample and if they loved it to refer couples to us for ordering. It worked; the business was starting to grow and referrals from planners were flowing in. After 7 years, we have grown to outfit thousands of weddings each year. We have an incredible team and 5 showrooms (Denver, Chicago, Philly, Houston, and Boston) and more planned for the future. We love helping couples get their groups suited up affordably, knowing that they get to keep and wear the suit or tuxedo again.

We rebranded The Groomsman Suit to SuitShop in 2019 and offer suiting for all! We could not be prouder of our team for building such an exciting brand that people love!

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I had a habit of wanting things to be perfect before sharing them. Anything from ideas to products, I wanted to wait to share them until they were fully ready. Through starting this business, I realized, sometimes you just have to go for it and waiting until things are perfect will only delay progress.

Have you ever had to pivot?

Renaming and rebranding the company from The Groomsman Suit to SuitShop in 2019 seems like an obvious decision now, but at the time it was a huge risk. We had built The Groomsman Suit brand online for nearly 4 years and had a strong flow of visitors to the site, brand awareness, strong SEO, and all of our items were labeled with the brand name. Rebranding seemed like a daunting task but also risked us losing a lot of what we had worked so hard to build.

We knew it was the right thing to do for the long term, so we went for it. After a lot of planning, we changed the name of the company to SuitShop and watched our SEO dip down. Day after day we worked hard to keep our momentum going and we started to see things come back, level out, and soon after we started to grow again. 

Then, 2020 rolled around and threw us another curveball, being a wedding-focused business during Covid-19. Weddings basically stopped happening across the globe. We had two showrooms at the time and around 10 employees. We immediately pivoted our primary focus to creating a virtual option for couples that were still interested in planning a wedding or small, intimate gathering. While sales didn’t grow for us in 2020, we were able to keep our entire team intact, launch a virtual fitting/consultation option, and people who wouldn’t have normally looked for another option needed us and found us. While it was a challenging time for us, we stayed focused on customer support and giving our clients what they needed: great service and amazing suiting for their special events.

The most challenging moments in growing our business have made us better and stronger. 

Contact Info:

• Website: www.suitshop.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/suitshopofficial/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/suitshopofficial/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/10890164
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/wearesuitshop?lang=en
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OzR_e9BKTWQ