Italian Fashion, Customized Online
Her face appears in the global advertising campaign of Huawei, the Chinese cell phone maker, alongside that of other enterprising people. Monica Calicchio comments on the ad: "They wanted to tell true stories about people who were able to turn their passions into professional activities". Monica is from Naples and holds an undergraduate degree in Business Administration and Management, and a Master of Science in International Management. She's become CEO of Tailoritaly, the first Internet platform that enables the online customization and purchase of women's couture clothing made in Italy.
"I started working on the business idea three years ago and we started the company about a year ago," says Monica. The idea is "to allow clients to select a garment on our portal and customize a basic version according to preferred color, length, and more. Customizations are made by a professional tailors and craftspeople." The result are fashionable, high-quality dresses sold at competitive prices. Fashion and finance have always been Monica's twin passions. On one hand, she was reluctant to join a major fashion company, and on the other her first job experiences in finance proved unsatisfactory. "I missed the creative aspect and the human touch," she says, "I even turned down attractive offers. I instead moved to Sydney to work at Rocket Internet, where I learned how to start a company, since I worked alongside people from whom I could learn a lot."
After gaining experience in fashion marketing in Germany, three years ago she returned to Italy: "I won an investment grant and from there my journey as startupper began. Tailoritaly is now a firm employing around fifteen people; 51% of the company is owned by the Miroglio Group. Our strong point is a very sophisticated 3D configurator that allows users to see how their garment will look like after the customization requested." Monica concludes: "Our customers are essentially of two types: on the one hand, people who love Made in Italy products and appreciate the possibility of personalizing fashion garments, but do not necessarily buy fashion on the Internet; on the one hand, there are millennials, who tend to favor e-commerce purchases. What do I see in the next future? The internationalization of our business."