By Francis Chan

WHEN Mrs Fong Loo Fern took over the struggling family business 17 years ago she was literally at risk of losing her shirt.

The firm - CYC Shanghai Shirt Company - was on its last legs, barely afloat after a stark fall from the heights of the local apparel trade.

'We were a ship with a lot of holes, slowly sinking when everybody else was on fast boats,' jokes Mrs Fong, now CYC's managing director.

It was a humbling experience for a company founded in 1935 by Mrs Fong's late grandfather, Chiang Yick Ching, which produces made-to-measure men's shirts.

CYC became a blue-chip brand, famous for custom-made shirts that had the perfect fit, quality fabric and outstanding workmanship.

But the appearance of department stores in the 1970s selling cheaper, mass-produced clothing meant fewer shoppers went to tailors like CYC to get shirts made.

'At first, we had six shops all over Singapore and were one of the first retail chains here but the retail boom didn't help us as we were stuck in the dark ages and had to close some shops because business was so bad,' recalls Mrs Fong.

The business, managed at the time by her father and uncle, was also unable to keep up with fast-moving fashion trends.

'My dad was a very good salesman and my uncle... was good at wholesale,' she said. 'But when it came to fashion, the trends just overwhelmed them because they were from an older generation.'

By the time Mrs Fong took over in 1992, CYC was down to just two stores and, like an old shirt, fraying at the edges.

'When my father passed away, there was a vacuum,' says Mrs Fong, who was working for the United States Department of Commerce as a commercial specialist here at the time.

'So I decided to return and run the business because... I felt that we had had CYC for so long, we had done well, and I still saw a future for it,' she added.

'You don't just start something and let it fail just because it has gone from the top of the mountain to the lowest points in a valley.'

Mrs Fong's affinity for CYC went back to her childhood days, when as a 12-year old she would help at her granddad's shops.

After graduating with an accountancy degree from the National University of Singapore, she worked at CYC as an administrative manager before taking up the job at the US Embassy.

CYC was in crisis when she took over in 1992, but it had faced its share of turmoil over 74 years, including the Japanese Occupation in the 1940s.

Not long after Chiang Yick Ching arrived from Ningbo, China, and set up his first tailor shop, World WarII broke out. Business dried up when the Japanese invaded Singapore and it took the company almost two decades to get back on its feet again.

But, by the 1960s, CYC shirts were starting to make a name for the company in Malaysia and Indonesia, where it began to build a strong following among the wealthier locals.

'We had a lot of Indonesians who came to buy from us because they liked our shirts,' says Mrs Fong. 'But in the '80s, things started to become difficult because of low-cost imports from other Third World markets... (and) business started going downhill.'

Reviving the firm would take the mother of three close to a decade and nursing it back to better health meant going back to the company's roots.

Mrs Fong did not go down the logical route of mass-producing menswear but instead chose to tap the legacy of her grandfather, who was a skilled tailor and essentially the man behind the CYC brand.

'I felt that (custom tailoring) should be our core business, because that's what we were good at doing; not the ready-to-wear stuff because producing here in Singapore was too costly, even in the 1980s and I did not want to outsource to other countries,' she said.

Mrs Fong started a rebranding exercise that involved changing the company logo and refurbishing CYC's tailor shops.

'Our financials were in pretty bad shape but we were blessed that we had assets such as a factory along Macpherson Road, which we sold,' she said.

'That helped generate the cashflow needed to revive the company.'

The Methodist Christian says her faith helped her through the early years.

'I also had to make a lot of changes and I had to think of new business models... but it was God who sustained me through all this. It was really tough but by His grace, and a lot of prayers, we managed to save the business.'

Decisions to tailor for women and to produce corporate uniforms also helped the firm claw its way back.

'Customers of wives came along and asked us, 'Why you don't tailor for us?' and so we decided to conduct some product development in that area,' she added.

Designing and making uniforms for corporate clients also paid off.

'That was another area we felt there was potential in... but it was difficult for our production people at first, because they needed to learn how to do new things, especially the detailing for women's shirts.'

Today, CYC has a more diverse business with an almost equal balance between corporate, women and menswear, a mix that is helping the firm navigate the recent recession.

Like most retail businesses, it has taken some knocks, recording a 15per cent drop in earnings over the last quarter.

But Mrs Fong, who is in her 50s, remains unfazed and continues to chart the next course for CYC but with some help this time.

'We're looking at new outlets in Singapore and we're looking to grow our Internet business, and that's where Jan comes in,' said Mrs Fong, referring to her eldest daughter, aged 27.

CYC has been developing a customer base in Britain, where Jan studied, since a reseller arrangement was set up in 2005.

Mrs Fong now hopes to break into the lucrative Japanese market and will be counting on new ideas from Jan.

'We're already in the process of building a platform where people can just go online, pick their materials, pick their style, and pay for their customised shirts online,' said Jan.

'They don't even need to come into our shops anymore and obviously we can use that platform to grow in the UK and other foreign markets.'

CYC has a customer base of about 16,000, including corporate clients. It employs over 50 production and sales staff, operates two outlets - one at Raffles Hotel and the other at Raffles Place - and manufactures out of its 8,000sqft factory.

Although Mrs Fong would only disclose that CYC generates 'millions' in revenue, she confirmed that the company has seen consistent 10per cent annual growth between 2003 and last year.

She hopes Jan will 'drive the next phase of the growth' at CYC as the fourth generation takes over: 'I'm someone who hardly ever thinks of retiring because I'd think 'what am I going to do', but I am prepared to let go.'

When asked if the future of CYC lies in Jan's hands, Mrs Fong replied with a smile: 'I hope so.'

This article was first published in The Straits Times.