If you're a man with a sterling sense of style, or a woman who wants to give a man a stylish gift, one of the prime places to turn in the FiDi is Wingtip. The shop and private club is located at 550 Montgomery St., in the grandiose former Bank of Italy building built in 1908.
You don't have to actually wear wingtips and three-piece suits to be a Wingtip customer. It's a one-stop shop for just about everything for the man with class: high-end casual attire, ready-to-wear business apparel, hygiene products, accessories like belts and ties, leather bags and wallets, hats, shoes, and fly-fishing gear. It even sells some home goods, such as Japanese cutlery, French salt-and-pepper mills and Italian pewter.
It's a veritable toy box for the sophisticated gentleman, and that's not by accident. "They're the things I always enjoyed buying, but didn't necessarily like the process of buying them all," founder and CEO Ami Arad told us. He wanted to put all of the finer things in life under one roof, including a barbershop and an impressive selection of high-end wines, spirits and cigars.
About half of Wingtip's clothing sales are casual pieces—khakis, jeans, polo shirts and sweaters—from popular brands such as Peter Millar, Agave and St. Croix. But on Super Bowl Sunday this year, Wingtip opened the entire 6,000 square feet of the second floor to sell custom clothing. "Custom clothing is the fastest-growing part of our business right now," Arad said.
Though the stereotype of wealthy young San Franciscans involves hoodies, T-shirts and tennis shoes, "even amongst young people, even amongst tech people, everyone has an excuse to wear a suit or a tux or a blazer," Arad said. Men come to be fitted for suits for job interviews, weddings and other special occasions.
About a third of Wingtip's customers work in finance, where suits are common. But another third are in tech, and another third are professionals, such as doctors, lawyers, architects, consultants and creative entrepreneurs.
In addition to its array of merchandise, Wingtip has a luxurious private club on the 10th and 11th floors of the building. It includes a bar and restaurant serving breakfast, lunch and dinner Monday through Friday, private rooms, a rooftop patio, a golf swing simulator, a billiards room, a boardroom and temperature-controlled wine lockers for rent. It's very Mad Men, with a twist: Women are welcome. Arad said about 10 percent of the club's members are female.
Members pay a one-time initiation fee of $1,000–$3,000, depending on their level, and monthly dues of $100–$300, half of which are converted to a rolling store credit than expires after a year. Wingtip currently has 1,200 members, and Arad said he expects to cap enrollment at about 1,500–1,600, which should happen within the next 12 months.
The club is used for everything from business meetings to entertaining (for business or family and friends) to just ducking in for a quiet place to work. Unlike other clubs in town, Wingtip is perfectly OK with letting members work on their laptops.
Wingtip has come a long way since Arad launched it out of a SoMa warehouse in 2002. The website followed in 2004, and he opened a store at 1 Embarcadero Center in 2008. In 2010, he added the club, which was originally in a space on Sacramento Street next to Wayfare Tavern. It moved to the current location in 2012, and now occupies six of the 12 floors. Arad hopes Wingtip will eventually take up the whole building, offering amenities like a fitness center and overnight guest rooms. He also has plans to expand to other cities.
Though Arad worked in tech before starting Wingtip, he's been interested in fashion since he was in college, and that's how he chooses the merchandise. "If I'd want to own it myself, we should probably be selling it," he said.
