TGIF Shopping: Q&A With J.Hilburn Founder Veeral Rathod

In 2007, Veeral Rathod, CEO and co-founder of J.Hilburn, successfully pivoted from a career in mergers and acquisitions analysis on Wall Street and decided to create a custom shirt business, J.Hilburn.

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In the eight years since its debut, the company has grown beyond custom shirting to include selling custom and ready-to-wear clothing and accessories for men through a combined direct sales and e-commerce business model.

Rathod credits coming at the business from the shoes of the consumer as one of the reasons his company has continued to grow. “Early on, I noticed European professional attire was expensive and being a 20-something guy, I couldn’t spend thousands of dollars on a Zegna suit or an Armani suit.” So Rathod decided to eliminate the middleman, building a direct-to-consumer supply chain.

“Men want to look better but lack a combination of the education and the time to be able to do it,” he explains. “When men don’t understand a product it’s all about price, but when you can tell a story around a product and articulate the benefits, the value, and why they need this, men open up their wallets and it becomes ‘can they afford this?’”

To that end, J.Hilburn offers made-to-measure suits starting at $605 as well as a slew of affordable ready-to-wear items such as jersey cotton polos (currently on sale for $41), pocket squares (starting at $39), and socks (as low as $12.50).

Asked about one simple fix every guy can make in terms of his style: “I’m simple: a great fitting, perfectly styled white, high-quality oxford. I like to do the stitching inside the buttons in navy that way I can wear it under a suit and the tie will hide the buttons or take my tie off and it adds a touch of flair so that your white shirt looks better than everyone else’s in the room.”

Check out everything J.Hilburn has to offer by visiting their website.