From running UNTUCKit out of a spare bedroom in Chris Riccobono’s apartment, they now have 88 branches generating millions of sales. UNTUCKit LLC is an American apparel catering casual men’s attire that was established in the year 2011. The founder, Chris Riccobono, came up with this idea while still working at GE Healthcare. In February 2011, Riccobono asked his Columbia Business School classmate and friend Aaron Sanandres to help him develop his ideas into a standalone business model. With the help of their market survey, they were able to establish and form the length of the shirts, which is halfway through the belt and the bottom of the zipper.
With this length of the shirt, the front pockets of the pants can still be slightly seen. The company’s main selling point is their casual shirt that is not designed to be tucked in and cut shorter than the usual men’s shirt.
Chris Riccobono, together with his team at the time, was just running the business at Riccobono’s apartment in Hoboken, New Jersey, and ships out of a local storage unit. Untuckit soon opened its first store in September 2015 in SoHo, New York, on Prince Street. With the success of their first store, they have opened brick-and-mortar branches in Los Angeles, California, Chicago, Illinois, Austin, Texas, and San Francisco, California, in 2016.
The Success of UNTUCKit As A Brand
A post shared by UNTUCKit (@untuckit)
The continuous success of the brand was unstoppable, and soon, they have opened additional 20 stores in the year 2017, which included three other branches in New Your City and then additional 26 branches in 2018. In 2019 they had a total of 73 stores which consists of an international branch in Canada at the Sherway Gardens, which was opened last September 12, 2018. Their flagship store is on the Fifth Avenue of New York City and has branches across North America and some in the United Kingdom.
The journey of UNTUCKit seems smooth sailing, but like any other successful businesses, it was full of setbacks, struggles, and hardships. After Riccobono graduated from Columbia Business School, he was eager to start his own business. Still, he just started working as a healthcare sales representative for the company GE in the meantime. He always wanted to start his own business, but he needed a sustainable business idea. So in the years 2003 to 2010, he worked through different business ideas, trying it all while working his day job at the GE.
The Struggles Of Riccobono In Starting UNTUCKit
A post shared by UNTUCKit (@untuckit)
Throughout these years, he was trying. Nothing seemed to work, and he even considered going into finance. However, he decided against it because of the collapse in the markets in the year 2008. He also tried blogging as well, tackling his passion for wine. This led him to learn more about marketing products online and the use of social media platforms.
Then it hit him, the entrepreneurial epiphany – men’s casual shirts that have shorter tails in them that can be worn untucked. The idea is brilliant, and it is what all men would understand. Moreover, it is a product that he could definitely see being a hit online. Though he was already sure about this business idea, he still did not resign and continued working his day job. Of course, it was not easy, considering it would require giving all his free time to the business. Still, he made it work.
RELATED: Kim Kardashian Is Officially Worth $1 Billion, Thanks To Her Business Empire
How Aaron Sanandres Came Into The Picture
A post shared by UNTUCKit (@untuckit)
After he made the prototype sample of the shirt he came up with; he tried to meet up with all the manufacturers in New York to pitch his idea; however, after meeting up with different people, he realized he had a lot to do to learn on making shirts. He knows he needed help, and that’s when Aaron Sanandres came into the picture. After he pitched his idea to Sanandres, he loved it, and soon they were the partners in crime in the multimillion business.
Aaron Sanandres has also been working tirelessly for the company and tries to innovate the products they offer. The Chief Executive Officer of Untuckit has developed an idea, socks that can be expanded into other products that will launch for the spring and summer season next year. The idea came to Sanandres during the pandemic when he was trying something to keep himself busy. A month in after the lockdown in his home, he found himself burning through piles of socks, and that’s when it hit, the guilt of throwing away a pair of socks.
READ NEXT: TikToker Turned Businesswoman: How Charli D’Amelio Turned Her Fame From TikTok In To A Multi-Million-Dollar Business
Sources: Kustomer, WWD, Entrepreneur
Source: Read Full Article
