Program helps veterans suit up for success

WILMINGTON, Del. — Emmett Taylor was shopping for another suit to wear to his second interview with a potential employer.

The broad-shouldered Taylor, who served in the Army, Air Force and Marines for 24 years, picked out a jacket, shirt and slacks, then got some personal assistance from a man with a measuring tape draped over his neck.

Jack Doyle, a retired clothier, took the dark brown sport coat Taylor had picked out and hung it up, open-faced. He slipped a dress shirt onto the same rack, tucking one shoulder into the coat to display them together, just as he would in a retail store. Turning to eye the tie rack, Doyle picked out a light brown patterned tie and laid it on top of the shirt and coat. Taylor nodded in approval.

"That's good for me," Taylor said, chuckling. "Because I can't match that well."

Taylor, 57, and his brothers Joe and Rodney, also veterans, came down from Camden, N.J., to the Wilmington office of Suiting Warriors, a nonprofit that outfits — at no charge — veterans in need of that professional look for a job interview.

The group is the brainchild of Star Lotta, a Wilmington native who came home from Florida to work, was laid off from a teaching job, and found her calling. She helps veterans — most of whom leave the service well short of retirement and often in difficult financial straits — get a good start on a second career.

"It is definitely a rewarding and feel-good experience, every day," said Lotta, who describes herself as "president, CEO and secretary" of the young nonprofit. "My grandfather always says to me, 'Those who give always feel like they found their purpose.' And so I guess he's right."

The concept was born in 2010, when Lotta attended the funeral of her cousin Jimmy, an ex-Marine suffering from PTSD who died from a heart attack at age 23.

She'd expected his buddies to be wearing suits or dress uniforms. "Neither happened," said Lotta, who did not serve. She later learned that many troops leave the military without a lot of money, and wanting for dress clothes.

Eighteen months ago, Lotta was selling men's custom clothes out of her home. Many customers, she came to learn, had older suits they no longer wanted.

"I got the idea to collect the suits to donate them to veterans," she said. "And it turned into ... this," she said, smiling, stretching her outstretched hands over the many racks crowding the rooms and hallways of her north Wilmington office space, donated last March.

Lotta, born and raised in Wilmington, made the effort her full-time job. Suiting Warriors became a nonprofit fund under the Delaware Community Foundation. Lotta has applied for tax-exempt independent 501c status.

At least once a week, usually Wednesdays, she suits veterans at the office with the assistance of Doyle, a former clothier with Macy's and the Greenville Jos. A. Bank store. Doyle came last July to donate some old suits; when Lotta asked him to join her, and he agreed to volunteer.

"It's just a way of kind of giving back to guys who are serving our country," said Doyle, a former Army finance clerk. And it's a lot more fun than working on commission, he said.

"I don't want the guy to walk out without buying a suit — I don't make any money," he said. "Here, I don't have to worry about not making any money. Plus, I know it's for a good cause. And they're gonna wear it with pride."

The Taylor brothers browsed through the racks, with Doyle and Lotta helping them navigate.

"There's a lot to choose from," Lotta said. "So it takes a little while to have them pick out something that fits them the best." The suits and sport coats are arranged by size; there are dress shirts as well. "We just had a whole bunch of donations, so that's why it's a little crammed in here," she said.

One small side room is stocked with womens clothing. "We don't get a lot of women's donations, for whatever reason," Lotta said. "We provide professional wear for both men and women. People just tend to think 'men' when they think military.

"Most of the women that come to me are from the veterans homeless shelters," she said.

Overall, she said the typical veteran is 23 to "40ish." "But with the economy, I've been getting a lot of older gentlemen that have been coming in, trying to go back into the workforce."

Lotta gets her clients through word of mouth and by putting herself out into the communities. "I do a lot of outreach," she said. "I try to go to all the job fairs in Delaware, in Pennsylvania. So I keep track of what the government job fairs are offering to veterans."

Typically, job fairs charge exhibitors, even nonprofits, as much as $300 for a table, Lotta said. This restricts her appearances to some extent. So, she's seeking sponsorships.

At the same time, the abundance of inventory is sending her farther afield — she's going mobile. Lotta has a new 14-foot box truck — donated by a local dealer who "doesn't want his name out there" — that she can stock for "suit-gifting days" at locations such as Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., where events are scheduled for May 6 and July 29.

"Right now, I'm still trying to create my connections in each state," Lotta said. "New Jersey has been the first one to really respond to having me come there with the program." She'd love to make the same connections in Pennsylvania, Maryland and, of course, Delaware, she said.

She's also stretching her efforts southward, with a suiting event Apr. 1 at a local custom tailor shop in McLean, Va., outside Washington, D.C., not far from the Pentagon.

For Jason Elias of The Tailored Man, the idea percolated during a conversation with a client — a U.S. senator who is also a veteran. "We've always been looking for an initiative that we could get our clients involved with," said Elias, whose family-owned business — there are two shops — has operated in northern Virginia for 44 years and counts ranking military officers as well as members of Congress among his clientele.

A web search for suit donations to veterans turned up Suiting Warriors. Elias now collects old suits from clients, giving them a $50 gift certificate in return. And he'll add these to what Lotta brings down Apr. 1, when he will turn over his McLean shop for the entire day.

At the base formerly known as Fort Dix, Lotta will be serving troops leaving the service and using the Transition Assistance Program, known as TAP. Interested troops pre-register so she can schedule them, and she'll use local volunteers to help suit the troops, she said.

She'd ask troops for sizes so she could best stock the truck, she said. But, "generally, most of them have no idea."

Another issue: "When you come out of the military, you're much thinner than you will be three months later," she said. "Your body changes." So she holds suit-gifting events a few months following the end of a TAP class.

She's only visited a few TAP classes in the region, but word has gotten out. "I get e-mails every day from veterans across the country," she said. "I'll show you." Lotta scrolls down her inbox: They're from Texas, Arizona, Hawaii, even Afghanistan, "wanting to know if I can save a suit for them, or when am I coming to their town."

Lotta has dreams of going nationwide, and serving those needs. For now, she's growing her base, with the help of Wilmington attorney Craig Martin, chairman of the nonprofit's board.

"I think the idea is a great one," said Martin, who specializes in finance law but also represents disadvantaged veterans on a pro bono basis. "I think it's providing a great service. I view what I'm doing as trying to help her focus on the business aspect, the money aspect of it. She doesn't need any guidance from me on passion and her vision for the organization."

The Taylor brothers each left the office with a couple of outfits, and appreciation for the gifts.

"I think it's really good that they have something like this," said Emmett. "Because there's a lot of veterans that I ran into in the (state unemployment office) in Camden who don't have suits and can't afford to get suits to go to interviews in. ... Something like this helps out so much."

McMichael also reports for The (Wilmington, Del.) News Journal