ByteZest

“Working with real-life people, different people every day – that’s very alluring to me.”

It was in the shop that he learned one of his most valuable life lessons. When he was 12 his father, Manu Melwani, taught him how to strike up a conversation with clients three times his age.

“You ask them, ‘Hey, did you go to The Peak? Did you have dim sum?’” Melwani says. “Two simple questions. It was profound – it changed me, then and there … This is how you learn to talk to people.”

He took his father’s advice and ran with it.

His signature phrases on his videos and live streams – “gift-wrapping” his clients in his “signature details” and “4D fits” – are almost attached to his name, with users all over the world parodying his videos.

“I feel great,” Melwani says, “because I’ve made it cool for kids to love suits. No clothing company has ever done that before.”

Melwani was born and raised in Hong Kong and graduated from King George V School in 1995 before going abroad to study at New York University. He joined a law firm straight out of university and later worked for two start-ups in London.

“Why would I not go and give my energy, give my passion to this business? Having seen who we were and what we achieved, I wanted to continue to be part of that,” Melwani says.

The third-generation steward of Sam’s Tailor joined the business in 2000 and has since given it his all.

Now, at the age of 46, he continues to make friends online and offline. Melwani is able to work with clients from all walks of life, from Hong Kong students looking for a graduation outfit to former United States president George H.W. Bush.

Melwani calls himself the suit whisperer – “not because I talk to suits, but because I talk to my clients. I bring the vision to life.”

What shaped him the most, he says, is seeing his father’s own work ethic.

“It’s only when I became a father that I realised I have to work very, very hard. Because the heritage that I have, the legacy that I have – it is priceless,” Melwani says.

His children, aged 14, 12 and 11, are driving forces in his life.

Melwani’s youngest child, Riaan, is attached to him at the hip and frequently appears on his posts and live streams. To loyal Sam’s Tailor followers, the 11-year-old’s name is almost as well known as Roshan’s.

Riaan says he wants to be a tailor when he grows up.

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“He doesn’t know anything about it!” Melwani says. “But this boy loves it.”

Suddenly, viewers started ordering suits over the live streams: just like that, Melwani had found a revenue stream the business had never seen before. Now, he live-streams almost every day, interacting with fans and working with international clients.

Despite his internet fame, Melwani says he understands that he sits on a business his father built for decades.

“This is his throne,” he says. “I will always pay homage to my father … He’s a god to me.”

One client gifted Melwani a portrait that had been done of him, while he was in the process of making them a suit.

“Thanks for the amazing suit,” the client wrote on the back of the drawing, which now hangs in Melwani’s office at the back of the shop. “Keep on gift-wrapping the world.”

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