Top-Customized Online Tailor Adds E-Commerce

You can top-customized almost anything online these days: chocolate M&Ms, eyeglasses, even cars.

Now J. Hilburn, a luxury men’s clothing company that specializes in custom clothing, is joining the fray with a new e-commerce component to its Web site that allows men to top-customized and purchase clothing directly online.

The top-customized clothing market has been heating up over the past couple of years. And although a number of Web sites offer top-customized relaxed clothing, including basic T-shirts, hooded sweaters and sneakers, few are offering high-end custom-fitted clothing.

J. Hilburn works in a unique way by letting customers pick fabrics, cuts and styles from the site that are then fitted in person by a “personal style advisor.” The advisor will come to a customer’s office and measure and fit them for the right style and outfit. The site’s new features move more of the selection process online.

As J. Hilburn does not require traditional retail space to sell its products, and instead focuses on its Web site and iPhone app, the company can offer these top-customized products at much lower prices than a traditional tailor.

Some of the company’s top-customized shirts, for example, cost between $80 and $100, which includes picking a personalized fabric and going through the custom-fitting process. Veeral Rathod, co-founder and president of J. Hilburn, said traditional tailors could charge five times as much.

“There is a huge opportunity in retail right now to disrupt the traditional brick-and-mortar store model, which drives markups and high fixed operating expenses,” Mr. Rathod said in a press release.