Victor Ozomoge: A Different Kind of Tailor

Victor Ozomoge, founder and chief executive officer of Zomoge Inspired, a high class tailoring outfit, is a tailor with a difference. Ozomoge whose firm offers unusual and refined outfits most creatively  would rather be called simply a tailor than being referred to as a fashion designer as other colleagues  of his in the same field would prefer. In this interview with MARY NNAH, the seamster who has spent  well over 18 years in the fashion industry, reveals how he has distinguished himself as a tailor

Generally, people think that fashion designing goes beyond tailoring now you are saying tailoring goes beyond fashion designing. How?

I am a tailor. I don’t like to be referred to as a fashion designer. I prefer a tailor because I do tailor stuff. Yes, fashion designing can be restricted but tailoring goes way beyond just sewing. So, I like to be referred to as a tailor.

When you say the word fashion designing, it could be home interior designing, it could be cloth making, it could be anything but just imagine God tailoring human beings; tailoring lives, tailoring minds and hearts, it is total. When I make clothes for you, it goes beyond me just making pieces of clothes for you.

The kind of clothes you make is not the conventional kind of clothing. So, tell us what inspires your collection.

The essence of creativity, originality, class, excellence and all the attributes of greatness are what inspire my collection.

At a time when Nigeria is facing an economic downturn and people trying to survive with hardly enough income to get quality clothing, you on the other hand are making quality clothing. Now, how do you balance that at the expense of not comprising your quality?

We know it is a very tough time and a lot of people have asked me the same question, wondering how I intend to get my money back. What I’m doing is from my mind; it is passion. Everyone in business is profit-orientated so am I. But as much as I am profit-oriented, I want to do something that makes me go to sleep at night knowing that I am fulfilled. It might take a while for me to make all the money back like I tell my friends but there is something about knowing that you have this inner peace in you and that is what inspires what I am doing.

Do I compromise? I don’t have to compromise but that does not mean that I have to place my product in a place that my target audience can’t reach. Every business does have a target market and so I have my target market.

So what is your target market?

Well,  I cannot leave behind the low economy class, of course, they are the owners of any economy. They buy in bits and might buy cheaply but they buy more. I cannot leave them out of my target market. But then, they are not my main target market. My target market is those who can afford my products, I do not care who you are but as long as you love quality, you are my target market.

What is the cheapest rate for your cloth?

In an economy like ours, where we don’t produce our fabrics and production materials, it might be difficult to answer that question. Sincerely it is what I buy that I will sell. So, if you come to my outlet, what you pick determines the price. However, the cheapest I have here is a little above the minimum wage.

How do you source your raw materials?

I have friends all over the world and I try as much as possible to reach out to them to help out. First, you need to understand something, in developing countries, even in the western world, and in well-developed economies, most of these high brands don’t even have their products made in their countries.  They take them to countries like Asia where they have low labour rates and this, in turn, makes their products a little bit cheaper compared to if they had done them in their own countries. So, based on your question, I guess you can take my answer from there.

Considering the fact you spend a whole lot on transportation and incur a high cost of the exchange rate, do you think sourcing your materials outside the country is more cost-effective for you?

Government is the driver of any economy that survives. And our government is not doing so well for entrepreneurs like me. We don’t have good raw materials especially when you want to deal in bulk. Our textile mills are closed; companies, where fabrics are produced, are not functioning anymore. Even if they do function, the local materials they produce in good quality are so expensive. So, you will even get them cheaper if you source them abroad than buying them in Nigeria. So, it is not my fault that I am not buying from the local vendors, government should try and fix the economy. I don’t like the fact that I invest so much in bringing in quality materials from abroad and people are just coming to price and go because they feel my products are too expensive but because I must retain quality, I will rather source my raw materials out there.

How exactly does sourcing raw materials outside the country affect your business in totality?

It affects my business negatively and positively. Negatively is the cost.  At the end of the day, you calculate the cost of the flight, foreign exchange, and other expenses you incur and you find out that when all these are added to the cost of production, the cost of our products becomes so high. Positively, when we source these materials abroad and bring them into the country, we can make clothing that is of international standard because we can work easily with imported materials.

Do you export your finished products outside the country?

Yes, I do. I have guys who trust my products in Canada, America, UK and even India. I may not have traveled round the world but my clothes have traveled round the world and it’s not today. It has been a while.

So, how long have you been around?

I have been around since 2004, with a different name but in 2007, we re-branded to Zomoge Inspired. I was in collaboration with someone before but somewhere along the line, the energy was not quite refining, so I had to pull out. And since then I have been operating low-key.

At what point did you notice tailoring as something you wanted to do?

I didn’t study tailoring. I am an accountant by profession, I graduated as an accountant from the Universality of Nsukka. So it was while in the university that I picked an interest in tailoring. I found out that I love to dress properly and it was during one of those very long ASUU strikes just like we have now. The strike lasted for like nine months.  I worked with one of my mentors then, he is late now. Then I used to follow him around. He was a tailor that used to make clothes for Femi Kuti and Lagbaja. That was how I fell in love with tailoring and at a point, I started sewing for people. After I graduated from the university I just felt this was the only thing I could do. It was not easy. I have heard my staff ask if I have ever felt like quitting. And I told him plenty of times.

Today, it’s a different story. Plenty of my friends have been here and they feel like I have done so much here and they wonder if it just tailoring I do to achieve so much. And I have told them repeatedly that I do not do any other thing than tailoring. Every single thing I achieve today, I have made it from nothing else but tailoring. I just learned how to do business differently. Everything in my outlet is the best of quality not because I want to show it off but simply because I want you to see the good chairs that you sit on as a reflection of what I am going to do for you. Some people get intimidated when they come in here while some get inspired. I like to work with those who get inspired.

Do you mentor and train people?

I have a lot of people who look up to me.  I mentor people but people rarely will come and say that they want to be mentored and even those that come, when life happens, they run to what is easy.  

How I mentor is that first and foremost, you need to understand that I am a tailor and not an inspirational speaker, so whoever wants to be mentored has to learn by looking at what I do. Empirical knowledge is the greatest form of knowledge; which has to do with what you have experienced by yourself. But I cannot say that mentoring people is my core. But if you are humbled enough to want to be mentored by me, the best form of mentorship I can give you is you watching how I work and we work together.

What exactly are the challenges you face?

Well, every business has its challenges. So, there are several challenges that I cannot begin to mention. And our economy and government are not helping at all. If you must be in business, just draw a target market chart.

Who are the big names you have worked with?

I have likes RMD, Mudi, Osagie Ize-Iyamu. I have quite a lot of big names.

What exactly differentiates you from other tailors or fashion designers?

My originality, sense of thinking – our mind is our greatest form of a gift – so, I think differently, I see differently and usually when I am designing, I am not only looking at how beautiful it will turn out, I am looking at the result. I am looking at what purpose it will serve; how far it will go and who it is going to reach. When I  have you as a customer, I no longer look at you. I am looking at who you know. It is the people that are at your back line that I will now target.

Some people think that designers are gradually returning to the old era. What is your take on that?

Fashion is revolving. What used to be in the ‘70s comes back in the ‘80s and 90s. So, there is no permanent intelligence; everybody takes from this and adds to that. That is the way fashion is, it keeps evolving.

In everything that you have done so far, how would you say you have added value to the Nigerian economy?

I have reduced unemployment. I have a lot of people who cater to their families just because they work for Zomoge Inspired. People who would have gone into crime and people who would have become nonentities have worked here and they receive inspiration from the fact that I wake up daily and come here and I show them that this matters to me and it can also matter to them if they take their lives seriously.

What is your aspiration for Zomoge in the next couple of years?
I see Zomoge being a top brand, that will be well respected and well spoken about; a brand that people of quality will reckon with. I see Zomoge as a brand that will be competitive in the international market.  I used to say as a joke like 15 years ago, that I won’t rest until I see the name of my brand printed on the street where I am located – maybe I’m on my way there but now I am beginning to aim higher than that. Now, I don’t even want the name of my brand printed on the street where I am located, I want the name of my brand to be printed even on the street where I don’t live.