The Professional Clothing Closet’s new online rental model provides students up to six clothing items that can be kept for 30 days. Students can then opt to purchase them at a discounted rate or return them. Photo by South_agency/iStock

Student Life

BU’s Professional Clothing Closet Gets a Makeover of Its Own

The closet has shifted online and now offers professional attire for rent from vendor MyCareerCloset

When most students land a job interview, one of the first things they worry about is what to wear. For students who don’t have the money to purchase professional attire, the issue can be particularly vexing. 

To address the problem, first-generation student Tima Dasouki (Pardee’22) teamed up with BU’s Center for Career Development (CCD) and Newbury Center in 2022 to launch the Professional Clothing Closet, which provided students with up to four pieces of free professional attire for interviews, networking events, and career fairs. The model relied on donated clothing and accessories and students could keep the clothing.

The closet recently unveiled a major makeover, designed to ensure that students have access to the sizes and diversity of clothing they need. It adopted an online clothing service platform, where students can now receive styling services and rent pieces from a wide selection of professional attire provided by professional wardrobe company MyCareerCloset. Students pay $60 to rent the pieces for a month. If they want to rent new pieces for another 30 days, they can place an order and pay the fee again.

Sarah Garibova, CCD associate director for operations, says that the new online rental model is designed to provide more options for students. 

“We can actually guarantee size diversity and quality of the clothing,” Garibova says. 

Because the previous professional closet relied on donations, the inventory was limited when it came to smaller sizes and masculine styles. “We would just have to tell folks, come back next month and see what we’ve gotten in donations,” she says. 

The new online rental model provides students with everything from suits to dresses to professional separates.

Here’s how it works: students can make a reservation online by filling out a questionnaire on the platform. After choosing a masculine, feminine, or nonbinary fit and selecting the field they hope to work in, they enter their size. Students can then meet with a stylist over Zoom. The latter is optional, but is included in the rental cost. MyCareerCloset pairs students with a style consultation tailored to their fields of interest—and even customized for a specific company they’re interviewing with. 

Students then receive up to six pieces of clothing delivered straight to their address within five to seven days. After a month, they can either return the clothes—shipping is included in the cost—or purchase them for up to 60 percent off the retail price. And for those squeamish about wearing used clothes, the rental fee also includes dry cleaning services between users, Garibova says. 

MyCareerCloset normally charges $95 a month for the service, but the BU educational discount brings it down to $60. The vendor’s partnerships with other schools, like Georgetown University and the University of Miami, and the growing number of institutions shifting to online clothes-lending helped convince BU to try the platform, Garibova notes. “Where this has been rolled out at other schools, folks have been very happy with the quality of the clothing and the convenience factor,” she says. 

For those students who can’t afford the rental cost, subsidies are available from the CCD and Newbury Center. Students can fill out a financial assistance application while setting up their account (there’s also a link on the main website) and receive a coupon code to use when renting, says Maria Dykema Erb, Newbury Center executive director.

“What was important to me was that the spirit of the Professional Clothing Closet, the original form, was not lost,” Erb says.

A first-generation college student herself, Erb still remembers what it cost to buy her first suit. 

“It took the majority of my paycheck from my on-campus job to be able to afford a suit,” she recalls. “We want students to feel good about themselves and be able to make a great first impression.”

And while the $60 price may seem steep compared to the original free model, Garibova says students are still getting a deal. 

“The rental price is lower than, say, a competitor clothing mailing system,” she explains. “It is very competitively priced.” 

Log onto the Professional Clothing Closet platform to find out more.