Something of Anna's personality and self-confidence is reflected in a letter she sent to E. L. DuPont de Nemours in 1939, following her return from an extended stay in Europe, during which she visited Italian and French factories. She suggested mixing rayon with milk and soya beans to produce an elastic thread for stockings. Anna thought they might be called "MILK TRADE STOCKINGS by DUPONT."(16) She sent the letter by registered mail. Vincenzo (Jimmy) Tirocchi recalled occasionally chauffeuring Anna around town when he was a youth. On one trip she insisted that he double park in front of the Columbus Exchange Trust Company so that she could go in and "show him how to do business." With Jimmy in tow she marched into the manager's office and proceeded to aggressively negotiate a much reduced interest rate for a loan she was seeking.

Anna's two physical disabilities also may have contributed to the aura that impressed and somewhat intimidated her workers. She had some sort of problem with one leg and one arm and used these maladies to her advantage on occasion. An Internal Revenue Service auditor reported that her disabilities justified the expenses she claimed on her tax return and that although there were irregularities, she should be assessed no further tax. Bus drivers also adjusted the Broadway route and schedule to accommodate her "limited mobility."(17)

A certain exclusivity was most likely important for attracting and retaining upper-class customers. Anna's choice to seek an elite clientele probably also contributed to her self-imposed isolation from the larger Italian community in Providence. At a time when Italians suffered from substantial prejudice in the United States, Anna's rejection of Italian customers assured her upper-class clients that they would not have to contemplate sharing their dressmaker with socially inferior women, much less encountering them in person as fellow customers.(18) The young Italian American women who worked in the shop generally occupied the third-floor workroom and did not interact often with the clients who came for fittings or to transact other business. Anna's Italian workers did not always receive respect from the shop's patrons. Her niece and employee Emily Valcarenghi Martinelli recalls the often abrupt or indifferent treatment she received as a young girl while delivering dresses to clients. "They'd just about open the door and they'd chop your little hand off if you didn't get over there and take it out."

Anna's isolation from the local Italian community extended beyond her choice of clients. Other than her family and the women hired to work in her shop, she seems to have had only limited and rather formal contact with her fellow countryfolk in Providence. Her Italian American social interactions were with persons prominent at the state level in Rhode Island, such as lawyer Antonio Capotosto, who became a State Supreme Court judge, and Mariano Vervena, the president of Columbus Exchange Trust Company and Italian vice-consul for Rhode Island. Mrs. Vervena [fig. 70] is the only Italian customer listed in the Tirocchi client books: the Columbus Exchange Trust Company was an important source for Anna's business capital. As Mariano's wife, she was at the top of the social ranking of Italians in the state. The Vervenas were among the handful of Italians who merited mention in press accounts of the wedding of Anna's sister Laura. Included, also, was Capotosto, then an Assistant State Attorney General, who was best man to Louis J. Cella. According to Primrose Tirocchi, Anna's shop made the dress for the wedding of Judge Capotosto's daughter, although the transaction does not appear in the shop records. Primrose also reported that Anna rejected business from Italian women whose husbands had become prosperous in the United States because they lacked the background to appreciate her artistry and status. Perhaps as fellow immigrants they were more aware of Anna's humble origins and less inclined than her upper-class American clients to accept or be manipulated by her strategies for status enhancement.(19)