Attending weddings as a groomsman or as a guest is an honor but the journey to getting the perfect tuxedo can be daunting. Here, with Jamie Wolfer and Heather Loree Fier, is Nathan Bellah whose company offers a solution to bring the right tux without wasting time driving to the rental or on fittings. In this episode, Nathan, the VP of Marketing for Generation Tux, amazes us with how they are ditching the brick and mortar for a digital-based business. He notes how logistics is a powerful tool for their growing business and how vendors can partner with online-based solutions to create a win-win for vendors, clients, and awesome resources. He also talks about the icon of the suiting space, George Zimmer, and the vision for the future of the industry.
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About Nathan Bellah
Nathan Bellah is the VP of Marketing for Generation Tux. He started his online-based suiting career as the co-founder of Menguin. He’s a dog lover and an expert on the wedding experience on the guy’s side of the aisle.
How Generation Tux Is Shaping The Online Tuxedo Rental Industry With Nathan Bellah
Heather: In this episode, we have Nathan Bellah from Generation Tux. We are excited to get down and talking with him about how their company has chosen to shy away from having a brick and mortar store, completely going into a digital space and why it’s one of the best things that they could have done for their company and how you can take some of their tips and techniques and implement them into your business as well. We hope you enjoy this episode.
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Heather: Nathan, thank you so much for joining us. We are excited to be chatting with you.
Nathan: I’m excited to be here.
Heather: First question right out the gate, what made Generation Tux decide to start as an online-based format? Why no brick and mortar store?
Nathan: To be honest, it’s all about the consumer. Picture yourself at home, you’re planning your wedding and you’re thinking about all the things that you have to do. Just because of your wedding planning, it doesn’t stop your normal life. You have work. You have friends you’re hanging out with. You’re trying to keep your sanity. The fastest way to lose your sanity is going back and forth to a store, sitting in traffic, doing all these things that soak up your most valuable thing in life, which is time. It’s one of those things where we’re sitting there thinking, “There’s got to be a better way. Why would you want to spend all your time not enjoying life?” At the end of the day, that’s where all this whole idea was created around was the consumer and giving them a better experience.
Jamie: I know, Heather, we have a list of questions but now I have a follow-up one to that because I’ve never rented a tux or a suit. If you could give us a quick brief overview of that, because that sounds like all of a sudden, if you’ve never rented a suit or if you have rented a suit, you think of all the seventeen steps you go through at a physical store and you’ve got to figure out how to do that at home. How did you pass all these hurdles?
Nathan: We see a lot of younger guys now that have never rented a suit or tux that are using us and we’re their first experience. Back in the day, when I went to my gambit of weddings, which is usually in your mid-twenties. You can’t do anything for yourself. You’re going to go to a wedding. It goes like this. You get invited and you are a groomsman. You have to go to whatever store was chosen. You have to go to that store and do your measurements. First of all, you’re a younger person. You’re at work so you have to figure out the time to leave work or spend time on the weekends to go there and get that done.
The next thing is it’s not like you pick up the suit right there on the spot and hold it for a few months. You go back home, wait the day before the wedding and you go pick up the suit or tux. That is your final fitting is the day before the wedding. Picture this, it’s a Friday. You’ve got to go get on a plane because you’re flying to your buddy’s wedding or maybe it’s in town if you’re lucky. You got dinner that night for the rehearsal dinner. You’re getting off work at 5:00. The shop closes at 7:00 or 8:00. You got to drive over there and pick it up. You hope it’s okay, just because they did the measurements doesn’t mean the suit is going to come out perfect or anything like that. You have to go and shower, get ready and go to this dinner.
It is a cluster. You’re picking it up the day before. You’re hoping everything is all right. Typically, everything is polyester fit. It’s usually an ill-fitting garment, these suits and tuxes. Again, if you’re renting right now, it might’ve been around since I had to wear it last. You go and your party has a great time. The next day you have to return it, which is again, if you’re catching a flight or if you’re hungover, which seems to be a lot of the guys, it could end up being a pain. That’s what we are here to change.
Jamie: You literally spelled out our exact experience. My husband’s best friend got married in Colorado, but we couldn’t pick up the rental too early so we could get it before we started to fly. The closest location for us was 45 minutes away from the wedding venue. That means we’re flying into Denver and driving to our hotel. The next day we’re driving to the place where we can pick up his suit. That was quite ill-fitting, but it’s the day before the wedding so we have no choice. Driving to the venue that’s 45 minutes away and had to bring it back the next day. For us, our entire trip was dictated by this one rental.
Generation Tux: The fastest way to lose your sanity is going back and forth to a store, sitting in traffic, doing all these things that soak up your most valuable thing in life, which is time.
Nathan: It’s one of those things and we’re at the back of wedding planning, but it plays an important role not only in the pictures but the time allotted for these guys. Especially nowadays, we are traveling to spend the time with the groom and all of a sudden, 70% of the time is carved up by having to take care of the suit or tux. It’s an awful experience.
Heather: What Jamie mentioned, that was a three-hour stint of driving to go pick up, drop off, go back and forth. Not to mention the miles and everything you’re putting in there, but the time and the stress of all that compacted over that important timeframe where you’d rather spend the time with your friends.
Jamie: We changed our flight plan so we would be able to return this.
Heather: Nathan, I love that you are solving this super inconvenient problem that people are facing in this space. I know that you personally founded a company that was doing this called Menguin and that’s where you started in this space. Is that right?
Nathan: Yeah. Justin Delaney, who’s a dear friend, CEO and Founder of Menguin.com brought me on early in and I co-founded there with him. It honestly came down to his wedding. This is where this vision came from in terms of the ideation around. He had gotten married. We wanted to create a better experience. With Menguin.com, we were one of the first ones in the space right behind The Black Tux. It’s also out there and right before Generation Tux. With what we learned and everything we put together at that time, we were early on. Anytime you’re early on in anything, there’s this adoption that needs to happen. Right off the bat, we got great responses to what we were doing. It takes time to build because again, there’s this trust factor and everything that goes into like, “I don’t understand how this can work. How can I get fit and such?” That was a little bit of conquering that aspect. Everything is growing and growing. It’s the only way to do it if you ask me.
Heather: Menguin still exists, but you got a call from George Zimmer and his company to come in and join in with them, which is a huge thing because he’s a figurehead of the suiting space. Can you tell us a little bit about that and how you guys joined together?
Nathan: George is an icon. There are a lot of synergies. It’s interesting when you put good people in a room and a conversation can happen, it feeds itself with good ideation and good minds. That’s exactly what happened from the first time that Justin and George got together. From there, it grew within their team and our team. There were so many synergies. It made sense. What we received right off the bat is not only an icon from a branding point but the experience. Here’s somebody that has created something so monumental and has been a part of all of our lives, “You’re going to like the way you look. I guarantee it,” that whole thing. How many times have we seen that? Also having the mindset of you built something that was brick and mortar and saw what was happening in digital. This is the way it’s going to be. This is where it’s headed. He’s one of the few to do it, to be able to do the crossover of the old way to do things and successfully bring it to the new.
Heather: It was a little bit of a shakeup when you left Men’s Wearhouse and moved into this. I feel like, “Is that adding fire to your guys’ bellies to prove that this online-based concept is the way?” The customers are showing that they love it.
What's happening in the marketplace is not changing and everything is going online. At the end of the day, simplification is a key. Click To TweetNathan: You need to tell me you have an entrepreneurial spirit and alpha, to a certain extent, in terms of the way that you handle your day-to-day is going to put fuel in the gas tank for us. They’re a big brand. They’re still are probably our biggest competitor. Every day we get up, we know there’s a fight. We’re not publicly traded on Wall Street. We don’t have those types of budgets that they do, but we know that we’re doing right for the consumer. That’s what’s going to put us over the edge in the future.
Heather: I’m very forward-thinking to make things move in this more convenient direction for the clients. I know the clients that I’ve had, that I’ve referred over to you guys absolutely love the process. They’re shocked by how simple this is and that they do not have to leave their house to do this. Honestly, when you are preparing to travel to a wedding or even doing it locally, that’s one extra thing off your plate that you now don’t have to deal with. Plus, the timing of how you guys handle your process is such a big difference. You guys get suits to people so far in advance that if there is a problem, it can be corrected, which is very logical that was going to please your clients. Kudos to you guys to have clicked that together and make it happen. How are you doing that logistically?
Nathan: There are many things that happen behind the scenes to make this whole ship go. For starters, logistics is a crucial thing as you said. We have 180,000-square feet sitting out in Louisville, Kentucky. A lot of people ask us, “Why Louisville?” We’re there because UPS is our partner. The UPS World Port Hub sits in Louisville, Kentucky which allows us unfettered access directly with them so we can get packages out. We’re shipping things all day long. What we do is we work with them on timelines to get everything to the doorstep of every person at the party, no matter if they’re in Maine or Southern California or wherever they may be fourteen days before the event.
What that allows is, first of all, comfort for the customer. Trying clothes on, especially whenever you’re trying a suit on, that’s a production. It allows you to try it in the comfort of your own home to make sure that everything fits well. It gives us that window if there is an issue, we have a lot of guys, especially during this time of year who order their suit maybe a couple of months early, but fall comes around, they’re sitting on the couch eating hotdogs for a couple of months. This allows them the time to call us and request a new garment, whether it be a new pair of pants or a new shirt or a new jacket or maybe all three. It allows us the time to send it out to them and get that fixed for them.
We don’t do any exchanges. They don’t have to return anything to us to get it altered or anything like that. We simply send out a new garment for them based on the changes that happened. That big shipping center we have is filled with suits and tuxes. They’re all ready to go. Everything we do in-house from service to alterations to cleaning, it’s all done here in the United States. This all comes down to customer experience. It allows the customer to have the best possible experience and get the best possible service. Ultimately, it all boils down to the pictures. You get the best possible pictures.
Jamie: I love that you have things sent out so early in advance because that’s one of the biggest concerns jumping into this is, let’s talk logistics, “When is it going to get to me and how am I going to get it? What if it doesn’t fit when I try on?” You answered probably some of the biggest, most key questions for anyone who’s reading and contemplating renting a suit. Let’s be honest, groomsmen are not known for being on the ball. Coming from a wedding planner, I’m usually the person that’s like, “You should tell your guys to start looking at suits now. You need to start looking at suits now. We’re three months out. You haven’t even ordered. This feels right. This feels fun.”
Generation Tux: Adapting in the wedding industry happens through comfort and education.
Having options like this, it’s already hard to get them to even go to a store. To have this option of, “Measure yourself. Have your girlfriend or your mother measure you or if you’re concerned about it, walk into an alterations place and get professional measurements and send them in,” or however that happens to work. That takes out so much of the pain for me both as a wedding planner and as a wife of someone who does this. I’m like, “Go get your suit.” If I had a nickel for every time I told my husband to go get fitted for his suit, I would have a whole dollar. That’s twenty times.
Nathan: There are multiple pain points whenever we were thinking back to how are we going to create this. One of them is also measuring guys. We could put five tailors in a room with one guy and I can almost guarantee that the measurements would be different from each tailor. You don’t have to go get measured. Our pants are cut jeans, for instance. We asked them, “What are you wearing jeans?” We also back into all the data points of every guy that has ever worn our suit that is your height and weight. Whenever you’re going through our process and for guilty lazy guys or your groomsmen, all you have to do is fill in your fit profile. You don’t have to go anywhere.
That’s the reason why we send everything fourteen days before. If we happen to have a minor adjustment we need to make, we have time. It’s all good. For the bride and groom who are sitting there and are trying to hurt cats, we also provide an event management system that will allow them to see exactly what’s happening with each one of the guys as it goes through their process. If you got someone, me, Nathan, Allen in Texas, he hasn’t gotten measured yet. That information is there so you know exactly what’s happening. The whole time behind the scenes, we’re threatening their lives basically. They better do what they need to do. We’ll threaten to call their mom.
Heather: You know the troubled child out there, that Nathan in Texas.
Jamie: There’s that one groomsman that you’re like, “He’s probably not going to be able to make it to the wedding because he doesn’t have a suit.”
Nathan: It happens all the time.
Jamie: There’s something that you said that I’d love to take one step back towards. It was something about how George Zimmer did what very few people could do to move from the store version to online, to move into a digital space. What are some things that you could share with potential vendors who might happen to be reading about how they can make those moves from a store, from a brick and mortar, from what they typically do? Maybe it’s not a physical space but into selling things online.
Nathan: The first thing that you have to do is adapt. You have to realize that what’s happening in the marketplace is not changing and everything is going online. At the end of the day, simplification is the key. Once you adopt digital and that understanding and realize that no one wants to leave their house, everybody wants to deliver it to them, whatever that may be, clothes, food or anything Amazon-related, take a look at it. Once you make that decision that adoption has happened, you have to adapt. People, for instance wedding planners, wedding pros, that are adapting is where I see the biggest issue happening. It’s not that they don’t understand that everything is moving digital. It’s the idea of, “How do I adapt my business to it?”
For us, we make it simple. We’re here as an educational resource and a tool for planners. We aren’t going to complicate it. We don’t want your clients. We want your weddings if that makes sense. How we typically interact with a planner is we do an onboarding. We onboard them. We give them all the educational insight into understanding the tools and how we work so that they are comfortable. That’s where adapting happens is through comfort, through education. Once you’re comfortable and you’re educated with what’s happening, especially with an offer like this, you can sell it. You can educate people on it. You become an advocate. That’s where we’re trying to head within the entire ecosystem of the wedding industry is there are plenty of weddings out there for everybody. All we want to do is educate and promote synergy between planners who have the clients and everything. We’re trying to be the best possible vendor we can be.
Heather: I love what you are doing and I know I am one of your wedding planners that are in your network. When I refer couples, you take amazing care of them. You have an awesome little kickback you send over my way, which I am happy to take because I know I am sincerely recommending the best resource I can, which I love. I love those things where I would have recommended you guys regardless, but keep those referrals coming. Don’t cut that plan off, but I’m saying I would because of how happy my clients are, wanting to send them to you regardless. Can you talk a little bit about that program?
As long as you focus on your customer's happiness, you're going to always be dialed into where you need to go. Click To TweetNathan: It’s a reward. Essentially, you’re taking time to educate your clients on our ins and outs. You’re doing the heavy lifting of yourselves for us. There are some planners that don’t take it. Their business model isn’t set up for that and we completely understand. We cater to both. At the end of the day, the client is getting rewarded as well. We do have discounts that are specific to our partner program. There is a reward associated with that for those that want to take advantage of it. At the end of the day, whether you are taking the reward or not, your customer is going to get taken care of. There are things we haven’t discussed like free swatches to the door for all the brides during color matching, a free home try-on for the groom for whenever they choose their suit and think that they have the one.
We’ll do a free home try-on for 48 hours to make sure you love that suit. We have our free rental. With five paid rentals, the sixth is free. That’s the best in the marketplace. We have so many bullets in our gun, advantages to choosing us, ways to get started with us that it goes back to how George has always empowered the consumer within any brand he’s been associated with. You’re going to love us. The customer is always first. You’re going to like your experience with us. You’re going to find a way that you’re comfortable engaging with us. We’ll figure out how to make it work for everybody.
Heather: I see it as your responsibility as a vendor to provide resources that you totally believe in. For me, that’s the foundational step. It’s a nice thing, since I work with budget-minded couples, I’m not charging them a huge amount of money. Having these partnerships with resources that I fully believe in, but that also can send some rewards my way to help bring alternate cashflow options in for the company is helpful because I don’t have to charge my clients more. You’re getting the best experience that I can recommend to them. It benefits everybody by choosing that experience. I don’t know if we’re allowed to say what the discount is, but if you’re a partner with them, you can give your clients a pretty nice discount on top of all the other special goodies that they do already. It’s super awesome.
Nathan: We’ll save that for them to call us and get involved in the planning. We appreciate that. We’re only as good as the intelligence we gather. I talked about that at WeddingMBA. We rely on planners like with your business. Your business is different from X person and X other location that has a different business model. We rely on feedback from all you guys to find the win-win-win. The major win we want is for the customer, a win for you and a win for us. That’s all we’re here to do is find that. We have a great program judging by the feedback we’ve gotten. I do appreciate you also as well, but we have found that win-win-win. We want to keep it under wraps. We don’t want to have anybody else learn about it. We do welcome any type of inquiry into it. We’ll be happy to shed light on it.
Heather: Jamie, how do you decide upon that resources and vendors you recommend locally?
Jamie: First of all, I’ve got to like them. I am a firm believer that people do business with people. If it’s a kind person that I’m chatting with, they’re getting brownie points. I look for people. I look for aesthetic. I look for affordability. It’s a precursor before I start ranting a little bit. The people, are they kind? Do I enjoy spending time with them? Do I like their website? Do I like the products that they offer? I can jump onto a florist’s Instagram and tell pretty quickly if I’m going to enjoy the work they’re going to produce or not and the budget range that they’re in. The fourth and most important is my client’s experience with them. I can love them. I can love their aesthetic and I can love their budget. If my client goes, “What was that?” they’re not going to be on the list. The four things combined for me is where the power is.
Nathan: The power is with your face-to-face relationship with that client too for us. We can’t do business face-to-face with everybody. You guys are the window into that. That’s why I truly believe that there is always going to be a place for the wedding professionals that are there face-to-face and deal with those clients on a day-to-day basis and answer their questions. How many emphatic calls have you guys received on category three meltdowns, overstress and worried? You can’t put a price on that and that’s why we want to partner with you guys. You are the window into all of that.
Generation Tux: It’s one thing to grow a business, but it’s another thing to be able to share with the world what you’re doing and give back.
Heather: If you pick the right partners and you find these resources that are awesome, it makes your job easier to keep things from going off the rails as you’re getting closer to the big day. It’s a benefit. It’s a win-win-win. That’s what I love about this. I have a different model than a lot of wedding planners have of what I’m doing. A huge part of how I built my business out is doing deep research into these companies, referring people and seeing what the response is and going deeper with companies as I see that they are as awesome as they seem to be. It’s something that I pride myself on is providing good resources to my clients and ones that can meet flexible price points, which is something I’d also like to mention. You have pretty competitive pricing for all these other benefits. It’s something that can work for a huge variety of budgets.
Nathan: Coming back to customer experience if you didn’t hear me say it all the time. You have different customers. You have customers that are very much budget conscious. You have people that money is no object. I don’t know what that’s like. You have them. What we decided to do is create everything to where it’s ala carte. Our suit builder, tux builder, you can sit there and you have full control over your costs. You sit there and you add items and it totals up as you go. For instance, jacket pants, the base suit, but if you want to add shoes, a shirt and a belt, you have full control over that. Those items total up to as you go. It allows insight into what you’re paying for and also allows you to have control over your spin.
Heather: It gives a lot of flexibility. No matter what the client is looking for, they can find the bits and pieces that they need. If they want some extra flare, some cool socks with Wiener-Dogs on them, they can get all that stuff and make the magic happen.
Jamie: Do you have Wiener-Dog socks?
Nathan: Those are special socks. Do you know about those socks?
Jamie: I know you guys at least do stuff with ASPCA?
Nathan: We are. We’re partnered with ASPCA. It’s the thing I love talking about the most. George is a very big animal advocate. When we’re at Menguin, we were as well. That was one of the things that we immediately connected on is how can we do something for the world as we grow these businesses. It’s one thing to grow a business, but it’s another thing to be able to share with the world what you’re doing and being able to give back. We reached out to the ASPCA and partnered with them. They’re dog socks. We’re working on a hashtag, #WeddingsForACause. If you want to start showing your cause, you can buy these socks. The proceeds go to the ASPCA. You #WeddingsForACause, get that little pants-lifted-shoe shot and throw it out there. It’s something that is near to our core values, to be able to give back. That’s why we designed them and we’re looking to also do some other things in the future. We have a lot of things coming so it would be fun in 2020. That’s where those Wiener-Dog socks came from.
Jamie: We’ve mentioned the affiliate option for planners. I know that we do have a lot of planners reading this podcast. What expectations are placed on planners who do partner with you?
Nathan: A partnership is a two-way street. In the modern day, I’m talking about business as a partner. It’s usually one person giving the other money. That’s not the way we see things. The biggest closet in the world is what I say. You obviously are doing photo shoots and stuff like that. You can have access to that. All we ask is to support our business. Give us a shot. When you’re joining our program, the onboarding, that’s one of the things we discuss. It’s, “How can we work together for your business?” We’d like to see that reciprocated. We’re going to do a good job with your clients. We ask to give us a shot. That’s the only expectation that we have.
Heather: That’s so simple and so easy. It feels very non-threatening and I like it. I already have raved about you guys a lot here. I’m a fan. Jamie, is this newer to you? You haven’t worked with Gen Tux before?
Jamie: No, I haven’t. I’ve raved about them. I didn’t know that the planner thing was a thing.
Nathan: We get a lot of that. This happened at WeddingMBA. If you’re referring to our business, but you’re not a part of our partner program, you’re not only missing out on opportunities for yourself, you’re also missing out on opportunities for your clients. If you’re reading right now and you’re like, “I send people your way all the time,” call us. Let’s get you in the program so you can take the full benefit to your clients.
Jamie: For me, the reason that you guys are a company that I happen to recommend is that you’ve treated my clients well. Every interaction I’ve had with a website or I had to talk to customer service once but it was so long ago that I don’t even remember what it was about, but it was such a great experience. Your aesthetic is on point. The way that the suits fit is so nice. It doesn’t look like they borrowed their dad’s suit or their grandfather’s suit or they rented a suit that was not intended for the shape of their body. Your price point is so great because we’ve all seen those suits.
Where adapting happens is through comfort. Click To TweetLet’s be honest, there’s a lot of those out there. That’s what my husband looked with that suit rental. I was like, “Honey, this is not your best look.” He’s like, “I know. Tell me about it.” You guys hit all those four points for me. My clients have a great experience. I have a great experience. Your stuff looks great and your price point is incredible. I’ve kept talking about you guys and I’ve talked about you before with clients. I’m excited to know that there are growth opportunities included in that and that I could get my clients a discount.
Nathan: That’s exactly what we want to do.
Heather: There are other companies like this. There are opportunities like this. It’s an amazing way to diversify your income as a small entrepreneur and not have to continually raise prices or feel like you’re in a position where you have to go with that model of going for the higher price weddings constantly and upping yourself along that path. You can find other opportunities of ways to keep things good for you, growing for you and also serve a population of couples who maybe you would feel like, “I’m not a newbie anymore. I want to go up the chain a little bit,” because those couples do need your help too. They need the guidance and the love of a great wedding planner to support them.
Jamie: If you think about it, it’s dipping your toes into moving towards the digital space. If that’s something you’re wanting to do with your business, clearly Generation Tux has done that super successfully. If you’re thinking, “I got to pivot. I got to add more. I got to do something in the online space to pivot and increase the number of ways I can make income,” affiliate programs like this are a great option.
Heather: I would definitely say research. Make sure it’s a good thing. Jamie has outlined some very good points to keep in mind with that because you don’t want to recommend people to a company that’s going to make your life more difficult and torture your client. Don’t do that. It’s not worth the commission. If you’re finding amazing resources that also create that win-win-win for everyone, that’s exactly what you’re going to want to look to add to your business.
Nathan: As long as you focus on your customer’s happiness, your client’s happiness, you’re going to always be dialed into where you need to go.
Heather: Nathan, thank you so much for being here and sharing your wisdom. You’re the expert on suits. You’re coming up following George and the icon facing here that many years from now, that will be you. It’s such an honor to have you here, talk with us a bit about suits and the amazing way you guys are grown into the digital age.
Nathan: I appreciate that. This is about supporting this ecosystem of wedding professionals. If I could ever be assistance in any other way, let me know.
Jamie: Thank you so much.
