Say Chaddi- Dont Hesitate

XYXX

“Innerwear is the first garment a person wears everyday and there weren’t enough choices in the market. If my outfits are designed to reflect my mood for the day, why can’t my innerwear do the same - they don’t have to be black or white?” – This was the question that led Yogesh Kabra to establish XYXX.

For men who look for everyday comfort and unconventional variety in their innerwear; XYXX is like your confidante; comfortable, exciting and quirky. Aimed at an 18-35 year old male audience, XYXX is committed to fun and functional products, quality fabrics, and customer experience. The brand places the cool, comfortable, and energetic youth of today, at the center of their product development.

The inspiration

The idea was to make the first garment choice of the day, a more exciting and fulfilling affair for everyone. “I wanted the choice to be a happy choice, which reflected self-expression to some extent just like a t-shirt does, without having to make it a trade-off between quality and cost.”

What is unique about XYXX?

Coming from a textile background, quality is at the heart of everything that Yogesh undertakes at XYXX.

The fabric used for the innerwear is LenzingMicroModal® which is the most premium underwear fabric across the world. It is extracted out of the pulp of beech wood tree in Austria. MicroModal® is 3 times softer than cotton, is feather light, cooler to touch, and upto 50% more moisture absorbent than cotton making it the perfect fabric for India’s weather. MicroModal® is also biodegradable and natural. This means, any clothing made with MicroModal® will return to the earth in one’s lifetime. The waistbands in XYXX innerwear are made using Microfiber yarns, which is very gentle on the skin and leaves no rashes.

The current range at XYXX offers products in Trunks, Briefs, Boxers, Jockstrap, Loungewear, and solid T-shirts.

Collections

Currently selling from their website www.xyxxcrew.com, it is also available on major marketplaces such as Amazon, Snapdeal, Flipkart, Myntra, Limeroad, Shopclues, Paytm, TataCliQ, Fynd, Jabong. XYXX recently launched their new collections Colour Block and Extreme with some fresh prints for Essentials. Each collection serves a different purpose but keeps quality designs constant with dynamic styles. The issuance of COLOR BLOCK brings two diametrically opposite colors together to take over the waistline. EXTREME is inspired by pushing our limits to the absolute extreme. Introducing them in the microfiber waistband has redefined the use of staple stripes in clothing.

Yogesh Kabra, Founder – XYXX

Yogesh completed his MBA from Hult International Business School, Boston, where he was recognized on the dean’s list for academic excellence. He specializes in supply chain management and Design Thinking.

Before pursuing an MBA, Yogesh has spent 3 years in learning manufacturing process of woven fabric at factories across India (Bhiwandi, Surat, Delhi, and Tirupur). The learning’s from working on the factory floor at an early age: starting from how the threads are spun to processing and printing of fabric gave him a unique exposure to the entire supply chain of the manufacturing process. In US, Yogesh worked at the Verizon Innovation Centre on a project to develop solution to integrate customer experience across all mobile and digital channels. After completing his post graduation he returned to India to resume his role in the business.

As per the “plan,” Yogesh joined the family business and during the initial days after he returned he went out shopping and could not find innerwear that were tasteful and did not dig a hole in the pocket. This was genesis of XYXX.

“In America for every $ you are willing to pay more, there is a different culture of underwear you could buy. When I say different culture I do not just refer to the brand but the styling, the fabric, the waistband, the entire purpose and the experience. There is a plethora of options for every kind of consumer taste and requirement. I was just not able to accept that in India where we only made underwear for the masses (Black/White/Blue) or one particular taste and literally ZERO fabric choice. The only options were bigger fashion brands which also sell innerwear but a) they were too expensive: I didn’t want to pay 600 bucks for one brief or 800 bucks for boxer. I knew I could do a better job at a much lower price. And b) They didn’t pay attention to innerwear as a relevant product category: There collection do not change for the entire year  and have extremely limited option of styles and fabric”

2015 was the boom of the E-commerce industry in India.  Niche verticals such as women’s lingerie were booming in both funds and as a category but the bigger question to be addressed was why hasn’t anyone targeted the men’s market? “In my opinion the problem that men’s innerwear category faces in India is very unique from what we have seen in the women’s category. Men’s innerwear segment does not face the discovery or the “long tail” problem like the women’s segment does. I think the most important problem with men’s category is that it does not have enough choices at affordable prices. All the major players in the category are targeting the same customer and offering similar products making it a commodity oriented and mundane segment. We started XYXX to solve such problems and e-commerce is a good opportunity because we could target a larger audience and unlike other apparel you cannot try innerwear even in physical retail”.

Apart from spending most of his time at XYXX, Yogesh is also extremely passionate about teaching. While preparing for competitive exams to get into a business school, he taught Quantitative Aptitude and Verbal Reasoning at PT Education to student appearing for CAT/GMAT and other competitive exams as a full time faculty. He is in the youngest member in the working committee of the Maheshwari Education Trust run by the community to provide education to children with modest economic background. They currently serve more than 3000 students every year.