You guys didn’t think I’d go to China and forget to bring you back something, did you? Sillies.
My last day in Shanghai I met with Peter Crawfurd and Michael Yang the baby-faced founders of ShirtsMyWay.com. (Pictured here.) ShirtsMyWay allows you to customize a men’s dress shirt with trillions of possible combinations of details, from the material on the collar to the stitching around the buttonholes. Shanghai-based tailors whip it up, and it’s mailed out to you for $65-$95, including international-shipping.
Right now, the site is running a buy-two-get-one-free Father’s Day special, but TechCrunch readers are getting an additional 10% off their entire orders placed before June 7. Because they aren’t normally set up for this kind of promotion (ahem, I was a little pushy about it all), you have to email your name and the promo code “TechCrunch 10%” to support@shirtsmyway.com within an hour of placing the order to get the discount.
So here’s the bad news for some of you: Right now, the site only makes shirts for men, although the guys awkwardly measured me on a hutong in Shanghai to make me the first-ever women’s shirt. (I still haven’t gotten it, so no word on the results.) For other ladies out there, I figure this is at least a good idea for a cheap and very personalized Father’s Day gift.
Crawfurd and Yang haven’t raised any outside capital to date, and this wasn’t the easiest business to start-up. It took Crawfurd more than a year to find the right tailors and fabrics. Meanwhile, Yang tried twice to outsource the building of the site itself and both times was disappointed, so finally he rebuilt it all himself. In February 2009, they finally launched.
Apparently, it’s going well. In April, they sold about 300 shirts, and with just a handful of employees they break even on way less than that. (They wouldn’t let me say how much less, but it’s substantially less.) Every once in a while, it’s nice to see a business model that doesn’t need huge volumes to work, isn’t it?
Cool!, I believe I saw the asian guy in a documentary on Pbs.
Wanted to share my experience of ShirtsMyWay. I got my shirt a few days ago and I must say I am in love with their site and shirts.
The fabric was great. It was what you could expect from a shirt that is double the price and the fit was spot on (I took body measurements).
Shipping took about 2.5 weeks which I think is within what they promise on their site for the free shipping option.
I love this! Custom shirts that aren’t terribly expensive is fantastic in my book.
good job
who the hell doesnt accept paypal? ahah Worldpay. cmon man!
Step your payment game up!
shirts!
tailors – is that what they’re calling sweatshops nowadays?
Wait. You can get labor intensive products from silk and cotton for cheap? From China?
Stop the presses
Good luck guys!
WOW – this is a genius idea! I shop all over trying to find the right shirts, and often times your at the mercy of the current store. And these shirts are not even priced that bad. A nice shirt runs you about $200 depending on where you go. Sometimes $400 if you go really high end. Good luck guys.
Id say the only thing to fix is the UI – it needs to be more user friendly.
$200 for a shirt?
Yep, $200 for a shirt. I’ve found that if you pay much less than that, you have to take them to a tailor to have them cut up and redone anyway (yes, I’ve been there). Fit isn’t an easy thing to get right.
I just got one last week and like it so far. I posted a full review w/ pics here:
http://amateure...rt-arrives.html
This is marketing communication.
Indochino (http://www.indochino.com/) is another great company that does custom suits, shirts and coats.
It’s a good idea, and one that is being used by a few companies in the States. I was excited by this post because I thought I’d be saving a good amount of money, but the prices aren’t that much better. I’ll spend my money at home. Still, I like this kind of thing in general and more power to them.
Exactly. This is not that great a deal. You could already do this at sites like bestcustomshirt.com.
How many “make custom clothes in china” companies do we need? Seems like every year a new one pops up. Is this 1999 or something?
Doesn’t scale.
Yeah, genius.
Scalability will always be finite.
What matters is if it scales to a sustainable, comfortable level (unless you are trying to pump and dump) that works for the owners.
I bought 3 shirts from them when they had a sale like this for Easter. Even though I had a few issues (some technical on their part, some on my own part for bad measurements) they were very helpful and answered all questions within 24 hours.
The shirts are nice; quality is pretty good but the $65 material isn’t as good as a $65 brand name dress shirt. On the other hand, you’re also getting to custom design the shirt and have it custom fitted.
Another dull TC post ;P
I like the idea, and the amount you can custom it – but not being able to SEE what the shirt looks like on the preview makes it tough to know what you’re getting (yes, the outline selecting thing helps a bit, but I have no idea what the color button holes really look like on the color shirt I chose…)
Also – I don’t see a way to determine the thickness of each cloth type (and they don’t have any heavy). You can see it at the top if you click, and yeah, I have a 24″ monitor in portrait so I can actually see the entire cloth selection screen at once… but most people won’t be able to.
Too bad dear-old-dad is retired. Got any ideas for the man who not only has everything, he bought most of it from QVC and so has 800 of it?
This is honestly my favorite thing on Techcrunch in months. If you aren’t into it, you probably don’t have to dress up a lot.
Or the price isn’t that competitive. ok? I have a friend in Thailand who can get shirts for 10% of these prices!
These guys sponsored a contest on AnyLuckyDay.com and provide an EXCELLENT product. Kudos to you guys for such a great concept.
Um, how do you show fabrics on a website?
Also, as someone who’s lived in Shanghai (and had clothes made here) as well as in other points in Asia, I can say that Shanghai tailors usually offer poor quality tailoring at expensive prices.
I buy my shirts in the US — its a better deal.
Metric measurements only? – you’ve got to be kidding! ‘mericans never buy shirts measured in centimeters…
too bad my favorite type of shirts are double breasted pocket shirts, and they don’t allow for that.
You guys sell custom shirts, ok? I assume those are supposed to look nice, ok? But the guy on the left in the photo looks like he just rolled out of bed. GADZOOKS!
Amazing… and so simple. How did Web 1.0 totally miss this?
a number of companies are doing this without using chinese labour. techchrunch should do a little more research before running this sort of advertorial
totally photoshopped
I gave this a test drive, but I don’t think it compares to http://propercloth.com whether in shirt quality or user experience.
From what I understand, Proper Cloth manufactures its shirts in the US and sources its fabrics from Italy.
I found the shirt design tool on http://propercloth.com to be pretty sleek. Have you tried it out?
love the idea. however, i just went through the process of designing a shirt only to have it error out when i tried to add it to the cart. now i have to start all over. fail.
I guess twitter proved that you aren’t somebody unless you have a few fail whales.
they may want to change their father’s day Promo slogan – on their webpage it reads:
BUY 2 GET 1
i don’t know if that’s a great deal at all *hehehehe*
ay
carrrramba
I am supporting America and buying from LL Bean.
DON’T SEND YOUR MONEY OUT OF THE COUNTRY DURING A RECESSION!
I lived in Shenzhen, China for 4 months (just across the water from Hong Kong). It’s where virtually all your stuff gets made. There is a gigantic textiles area, kind of like a mall but with lots of little booths, where you basically do this: pick out fabric (they have anything you want, wool, silk, cotton, etc, and every style and pattern) and buy by the meter. It costs maybe $2 for enough fabric for a shirt. Bring all that fabric to a tailor (we used a guy named John Chi, who was amazing), and tell him to make anything you want. Shirts that are a bit shorter and have a certain collar, no sweat. Virtually anything. I had 14 shirts made, 8 pairs of pants and a pinstripe suit ($175) and probably should have had a lot more done. Shirts and pants cost $15 by the way, and I’d be skeptical of anyone getting your sizes correct without a 2nd fitting (it took my fiance and I at least 2 or 3 returns to get our clothes just right). This was one of the only good things about living in China.
http://www.trip..._Guangdong.html
…and… how much was the plane ticket?
Plane ticket? Buy a new waredrobe and get a plane ticket for free! Basically same prices in Thailand too. If you need to buy a couple of suits and some shirts, going to the source can pay for your vavaction.
This is hilarious…there are tons of web sites like this online, but everyone here seems to think that ShirtsMyWay is the first or something.
I spent about a year in China, and visits to the tailors are right up there with visits to the Great Wall and Tienanmen Square. Obviously, this company seems like a good deal, but keep in mind the following:
I got a suit jacket, pants, two shirts, and a tie – all custom made to my specs – for $75. Granted these guys are doing all the work, paying for shipping, and all that. But still, I can only imagine their margins are huge.
Next time you’re in China, try to find a tailor that speaks English and won’t rip you off – easier said than done, I’m afraid. If visiting Beijing the fashion mall on Sanlitun nanjie has a few places. I recommend Wonderful Amy’s. She hooked me up and I’m always looking dapper for such little dough.
Gotta second Will’s post – I prefer the general look and shirt designer from http://www.ProperCloth.com/ much more. Good luck with this one though.
I like that Sarah got felt up for the story. now that’s reporting!
“So here’s the bad news for some of you: Right now, the site only makes shirts for men, although the guys awkwardly measured me on a hutong in Shanghai to make me the first-ever women’s shirt.”
Why in the world are you complaining? There are plenty more women’s exclusive clothing stores than there are men’s… Get over it lady.
Not unique. We built one like this for a tailor here in the U.S. years ago. Check it out.
http://www.garytailor.com/
well if the rumpled shirt the chinese dude is wearing in that picture is any indication… i’ll pass
LOL
Ha! Great photo!
300 shirts! wow. anyone can get a review huh. how is this at all interesting or business worthy
can i pay an extra $5 to have an armani or D&G logo sewn on the dress shirts in a professional manner.
Shirts my way: Ten bucks at Target.
My thoughts exactly. I’m wondering how mis-proportioned some of you guys are that you have to get a shirt and have it retailored to fit you perfectly. I agree a well fitting shirt is a good feeling, but $200 and $400 shirts? are you kidding me? If it costs you that much to get it to fit right, you’re doing it wrong.
With fathers day and graduation parties approaching I found a coupon for a cool gift. Its called a TickleMe Plant and it is a real plant that you grow that will close its leaves and lower its branches when tickled. My students love it and 99% of the people that I give TickleMe Plants to have never had their own house plant that moves when tickled. You can get a kit to grow your own at http://www.ticklemeplant.com and use the coupon code Holiday to get two dollars off.
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STAY AWAY FROM THIS SITE!! I ordered three shirts (paid $150 for two and got one for “free”). I had my wife take the many required measurements in centimeters and sent them in.
I got a response suggesting that they make one shirt first so that I could try it on. Good thing, it didn’t come close to fitting (shoulders too big, sleeves too long, shirt body too short). I suspect they’ve had trouble getting these things to fit. Furthermore, it took a month to arrive. They gave an excuse that my shirt got caught up in customs.
Now, I need to send the shirt back to China if I want to get it fixed. I asked for a refund instead, but they won’t give it to me. They insist I measure a shirt that fits me instead of taking body measurements (so I can wait another month and get two more shirts that won’t fit).
This is ridiculous.
I guess I’ll try a couple more emails then complain to my credit card company. I ordered this before Father’s Day at my wife’s suggestion. I’m out the money (they hit your credit card when you place the order) with nothing to show for all the time and anxiety.
Avoid this site.
Tom
That’s funny, I have the exact opposite opinion of this site.
I love it, I’m not going to buy shirts from anywhere else from now on.
I came back to this post to compliment these guys when I saw your post Tom.
I think you were unlucky.. and sounds like you might have taken some wrong measurements.
I got that same offer of getting 1 free first and thought that was a great service.
Although I had a good fit the first time, I had one adjustment of 2 cm and know the other two fit even better, I’d actually say perfect!
Overall, I am impressed by their service and end result… I’ve tried a few of these types of sites in the past and this was the best result.
shirtsmyway is too confusing. check out these two instead…
1. http://www.tailorstore.com
2. http://www.deoveritas.com
i agree that the shirtsmyway app is too confusing.
i recently came upon http://www.blank-label.com which has a fairly simple program compared to shirtsmyway