The Downside of Popularity: How This Company Dealt With Overnight Success When a menswear rental startup unexpectedly took off and sold out of its entire stock, its founders were forced to tackle a crippling supply-chain issue -- and angry customers.
By Nikita Richardson •
This story appears in the May 2017 issue of Entrepreneur. Subscribe »
Most new business owners worry about getting customers through the door. Not Andrew Blackmon, co-founder of online tuxedo rental service The Black Tux. He was worried about getting trampled by them.
When The Black Tux launched in June 2013 -- born out of Blackmon's own "terrible" wedding experience with the tuxedo rental industry -- the company was equipped to fulfill roughly a thousand orders per weekend. But then GQ magazine gave The Black Tux a positive mention, triggering a surge in demand. Overnight, they sold out for the entire fall wedding season. And the orders kept coming.
Related: Don't Buckle Under Success: 7 Ways to Survive an Overnight Boom
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