Despite celebrating a golden jubilee with the country’s oldest gentlemen’s outfitters, Victor Tana has no plans of cutting ties with his business clientele.
AUSTRALIA’S ageing population may be presenting problems for the federal government’s future economic planning, but one sharply dressed gentleman in Perth is doing his best to help.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, who in January cited the nation’s ageing population as a “major long-term challenge to tackle if we are to keep our economy strong”, would be elated to hear that, after dressing Western Australian men for more than 50 years, Victor Tana has no desire to retire.
Quite the opposite, in fact.
Mr Tana, the proprietor of the country’s oldest gentlemen’s outfitters, Parker & Co, says he is planning further expansion of his historically significant high-end men’s fashion retail outlets.
The original business, Alfred Morris & Co, dates back to 1892 (complete with the three-digit telephone number of 759 at its original Hay Street location) while its current name stems from one-half of the business’s 1901 purchasing partners, Frank Rowland Parker.
Based in Trinity Arcade since 1923, there is now also a more casual fashion offering on St Georges Terrace (presided over by Mr Tana’s commercially savvy son, Christian, for the past four years) and an outlet store on Murray Street.
Mr Tana will open another in Claremont in 11 months’ time and expand the terrace store by 300 square metres to cater for its burgeoning popularity, set to relaunch in June.
“We’re always looking at things to do,” Mr Tana says.
“I have no intention of retiring at this point.
“I still enjoy what I’m doing and eventually I’ll pass the baton over to Christian.”
Christian, who considers his father to be his best friend, fondly recalls a recent visit to the famed Raspini fashion store in Florence, where he spotted a rather mature gentleman who was making his presence felt in a manner reminiscent of his father’s unwavering work ethic.
“There’s an old bloke sitting in the corner who is about 88, just watching the till,” Christian says.
“So I ask ‘who’s that?’ and they go ‘he’s the owner’, so I said one day that will be my dad.”
Despite the half century of service he’s provided to his largely corporate clientele Mr Tana doesn’t overly enjoy taking days off work.
“I feel guilty when I have a day off, I feel I should be there [at work],” Mr Tana says.
“Every time I have a day off somebody comes in and says ‘I came in to see you and you weren’t here’, and these are high-profile people. But most of them ring me anyway.”
Fielding numerous phone calls and acknowledging even more passers-by in Trinity Arcade during an interview is testament to the high level of service Mr Tana consistently aims to provide; but not all calls are fashion related.
His extensive tenure and high-profile client list, including unnamed sultans and presidents, means he often acts as a middle man sourcing specific objects or services on behalf of his customers.
It’s all part of the service at Parker & Co, which Mr Tana says is the backbone of his business and may soon play a crucial role in taking on the nation’s fashion players.
“We are looking over east, but the easiest thing is opening shops,” Mr Tana says.
“It’s making them work with staff that’s the hardest thing.”
While the Tanas have an innate ability to pick a man’s suit, shirt and shoe size through observation alone, expecting this level of skill from employees creates issues around staff training and retention.
“The staff we employ have to be experts,” Mr Tana says.
This means paying his staff well and ensuring an ongoing training program regarding cloth, cut, wool blends and everything else to do with men’s fashion is diligently maintained.
And this diligence has paid off for Mr Tana, who started with Parker & Co as a 14-year-old delivery boy in 1959.
He purchased the suit hire business in 1969 from then owner, Shirley Hugall and then bought the company from her for about $200,000 in 1984, immediately after which he submitted Australia’s largest ever order of Zegna suits.
During the next 15 years Mr Tana tripled the floor size of the Trinity Arcade store and substantially grew the business, with annual turnover now approaching eight figures.
He says the business has survived the impact of the Great Depression, numerous recessions, wars, natural and man-made disasters and everything in between, but it was the introduction of the GST and the ambiguity surrounding it that was the toughest to come to terms with.
But Mr Tana cites the fashions of the 1960s as the industry’s biggest failure to date.
“Look at some of the photos, you can’t stop laughing, they looked like clowns,” he says.
In your 50 years in the business, what has been the biggest fashion faux pas?
I think one of the areas was the 1960s, with the flower people, the Beatles, the flares, the long hair, the platform shoes. That went on for a bit too long. When we look at some of the photos you can't stop laughing, they looked like clowns.
Do you have a mantra or saying you live by?
One of my sayings is the harder I work, the luckier I get.
Do you feel you're a barometer for the economy?
I've found in the past if real estate is firing then agents come in, if markets are doing well then brokers and entrepreneurs are happy, if cars are booming then car salesmen they come in, and the doctors are always there constantly. When everything falls apart you get all the QCs and barristers come in.
What was your motivation for entering retailing?
I left school at an early age and I didn't set my mind to getting into fashion. In November 1959 I went and applied for two jobs and this one came up - the messenger boy or delivery boy with Parker.
