Since mailing its first catalog in April 1993, Beau Ties Ltd. has grown from a retirement-years diversion into a $2 million-a-year business.
The Middlebury, VT-based company produces about 1,100 bow ties per week in a 6,000-square-foot facility, at which scarves, cravats, pocket squares, cummerbunds and vests also are manufactured. Silk is imported from Great Britain, Italy and the Orient.
Creative is handled in-house, and the catalog mails nine times a year.
The Web accounts for about 40% of sales, said co-owners Bill Kenerson and Deb Venman, the married couple who founded the business. In a presentation to the New England Mail Order Association's spring conference in Cambridge, MA last month, the duo entertained attendees with the story of how the company began.
Bow-tie wearers are a minority, said Kenerson. He wears them because his grandfather did, and has noticed many men have similar reasons for donning the neckwear.
Venman, an attorney, joked that her husband “sweet-talked” her into the business, saying it would be a nice diversion in their twilight years. He didn't let on that he realized all along this had the potential to become a major enterprise.
After hiring a marketing consultant to evaluate the venture's chances, the couple started from scratch. They found an alterations business in Middlebury with several sewers on staff who could be trained to make the ties, bought fabric in New York's garment district, and dropped their first one-sheet mailing, offering eight designs. Initial fulfillment was handled by a textbook distributor who ran the operation out of a closet.
“We had the sense not to quit our day jobs,” said Venman, which ensured there was cash flow early on.
For several years, the business — which began with an office off the couple's bedroom — gradually took over their house, using up more and more rooms for storage and operations. In 1999, it moved into the current headquarters.
For a time, Beau Ties expanded into gloves, scarves and other items for men. The company didn't lose money on the additions, but didn't earn enough to make the added complications worth it. Custom shirts, introduced in 1999, have been a better fit for the catalog's product line.
Beau Ties doesn't rent names for prospecting, nor does it make its own file available for rental. Kenerson said he's found that many customers don't buy any other items by catalog. They're only making the leap into direct because they can't find bow ties at retail.
Prospecting is done through ads in The New Yorker, Smithsonian magazine and Ivy League alumni magazines.
And Beau Ties isn't discriminating against those who prefer long ties. A line of bow and long ties bearing baseball team logos debuted last fall. Based on their success, the spring catalog (slated to drop in April) would be the first to offer long ties in numerous fabrics.
