A suit business tailored to customers' needs

Many Wharton graduates go into i-banking. Others hope to make their fortune from the stock market.

But one Wharton senior is looking to make money from the most basic principle of business: Wear a good suit.

Alex Avendano started a custom-suit company called Henry Davidsen, and this recruiting season, he's hoping almost every Wharton undergraduate will be wearing one of his pieces.

Avendano - along with company co-founder and College alumnus Brian Lipstein - is banking on the fact that undergraduates have not yet developed brand loyalty to a particular suit.

"Once you buy a suit, you establish a relationship," Avendano said. "We want to get people before they establish those relationships" with other companies.

So Henry Davidsen - named for Avendano's grandfather - is doing some on-campus recruiting of its own.

The company is working with a Management 100 team to investigate exactly what Wharton students are looking for in their business attire and to develop a plan to market their suits to students.

What makes Henry Davidsen unique, Lipstein says, is that it brings quality service to its customers' doorsteps.

Company representatives fit clients in the privacy of their own offices and deliver custom-tailored suits at a price company officials say is competitive with those of similar quality from elsewhere.

"It sounds like a very convenient process," said Wharton and Engineering freshman Geoffrey Kiderman. "Buying a suit is a very annoying process, and you usually have to tailor it anyway."

But the suits, however personalized they may be, are still pricey. They can cost anywhere between $899 to over $4,200, depending on the line.

With the opening of both its first line of suits for women and its first store at 17th and Spruce streets scheduled for early April, the company is looking to expand in more than one direction.

While the company's list of clients is still relatively short, its founders hope that some of the names on it - including the Philadelphia Flyers' hall-of-fame goalie Bernie Parent - will help get the word out.

Already, the company has received some positive feedback.

"I enjoyed being able to just describe what I wanted in the comfort of my home," said frequent Henry Davidsen customer and School of Medicine professor Ruben Gur. "It saves me a shopping trip, and the quality of what came was excellent."

But not everybody is sold.

"I would have no real incentive [to buy a suit] unless the price was substantially lower," Wharton senior Jessica Sullivan said.

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