By Christina Bivona, News Staff
It started with a promising idea and a driven, ambitious attitude that turned Sam Sisakhti into the creator of one of the Internet’s leading indie fashion clothing websites, UsTrendy.com.
Currently a hot spot for striving fashion designers everywhere, the website hosts over 15,000 independent clothing lines from all over the world – making it the perfect marketplace for designers looking to make it big in the fashion industry.
On Feb. 5, Sisakhti visited Northeastern’s style guru club, Haute Fashion, and gave his business advice on how to survive in a cutthroat industry.
The idea started when Sisakhti took an escape vacation to Las Vegas after quitting a job he has only worked four days for. Having no idea what his next step would be, Sisakhti listened intently as an old friend told him of his struggles as a new fashion designer in Los Angeles – and that’s when the idea hit him. Although he had no previous background in technology or fashion, that didn’t stop the well-dressed businessman from chasing after his dream of being a successful entrepreneur and launching a site that would not only help his friend and other struggling designers make money, but also himself.
Despite the idea, it was a long trek until Sisakhti finally made a name for himself. During his lecture at Northeastern, he credited his success to numerous business basics such as making a company big enough to be investable, finding a co-founder that compliments you, writing a solid business plan and raising funds.
“Don’t count the dollars until they’re in the account,” Sisakhti joked.
Getting an investor to support his business idea was one of the hardest parts of the journey. With over 100 rejections, it wasn’t until Sisakhti reached out to one of America’s most successful venture capitalists, Tim Draper, that he was given a chance (and a check) to launch the fashion business.
“It showed how much I stuck with it and battled through. It was a solid story and they bought into it,” Sisakhti said.
Less than five years later, UsTrendy.com makes up to $20 million in sales each year, has relations with many different “fashion week” events and has offices based in California, Cambridge and Brookline.
Designers that are affiliated with the site do not have to have previous designing experience and do not need to pay any extra fees to be shown on the site, giving every designer a chance to be successful and upload their products to the website. Once a designer makes a certain amount of sales, UsTrendy.com offers them to become a premium service member, which gives them more promotions on the website as well as runway shows.
“There’s no filter, everyone has an equal chance to make it,” Sisakhti said. “I don’t want to make money unless the designers make money.”
Recently, UsTrendy came out with a list of “Boston’s 50 Most Fashionable,” which brought them an enormous amount of press from magazines such as Forbes and Businessweek, and radio and TV stations like Kiss 108, JAM’N 94.5 and Fox25. Sisakhti’s plans for the future of the business are to change the way people shop online, making it a completely personalized website for each shopper, going off the idea of “letting the people decide the trend.”
“We’re just focused on fashion and we’re trying to be more than just a marketplace,” Sisakhti said.
See the full list of UsTrendy Boston’s 50 Most Fashionable People at
