Tommy Hilfiger

Thomas JacobHilfiger is an American fashion designer and entrepreneur and founder of the Tommy Hilfiger brand.

Short biography

Tommy Hilfiger was born on March 24, 1951 in Elmira, New York. He was the second child in the family, where then seven more children were born.

After graduating from high school, Tommy worked part-time at a clothing store on Cape Cod.

Despite his parents' attempts to force Tommy to get a college education, he dropped out of college, using the $150 he had saved to open a small clothing store called People's Place in his hometown with a friend.

Tommy and his friend bought clothes in New York, where they traveled on their own.

Subsequently, he began to personally model clothes, but eventually the store went bankrupt.

Then Tommy still decided to get an education in the field of fashion business. To do this, he moved to New York, where he began working with various companies associated with the production and sale of clothing, including Calvin Klein and Perry Ellis.

In 1979, Tommy founded his own company, Tommy Hill, and began working with Jordache, a company specializing in jeans.

In 1981, he opened 20th Century Survival, and in 1982 - Click Point, which produced women's clothing.

During the development of his own business, Tommy began traveling to India, where he learned technological subtleties directly on the production of clothes.

In 1984, he was lucky enough to meet Indian entrepreneur Mohan Murjani, with whom he agreed to create his own brand. Having received investment from Murjani, he founded Tommy Hilfiger Corporation in 1985.

The firm managed to make an immediate name for itself through aggressive marketing.

In 1989, the company was reorganized as Tommy Hilfiger, Inc. with investments from Silas Chu of Hong Kong and Lawrence Stroll of Canada, while Moorjani went out of business.

In 1992, the company went public and launched its first menswear collection.

Three years later, in 1995, Hilfiger was named "Best Menswear Designer", receiving an award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America.

Subsequently, the company grew into a billion-dollar business, employing several thousand people.

In 2006, Tommy Hilfiger sold the brand for 1.6 billion dollars to the investment company Apax Partners.

However, he remained the chief designer and retained control over the creative process in the company.

In 2010, the brand Tommy Hilfiger was resold for 3 billion dollars to Phillips-Van Heusen Corporation, which owns such brands as Calvin Klein and Timberland.

Personal life

Tommy Hilfiger has been married twice.

In 1976, Hilfiger met Susan Cirone, an employee of People's Place in Ithaca; they married in 1980. Together they had four children: one son and three daughters. In 2003, Hilfiger's daughter Ellie appeared on the MTV reality series Rich Girls. His son, Richard ("Ricky Hill") is a musician. The couple divorced in 2000.

On December 12, 2008, he married Dee Ocleppo. The couple had a son in 2009.