jefferson john babasa asked: So you want to start your own business of setting up a fashion clothing store? Well, who wouldn’t? The clothing industry has truly boomed since the start of fashion clothing lines, especially the hip hop fashion clothing lines. Brands like sean john Clothing, the House of Dereon, apple bottoms, are brands that made fashion clothes more popular than ever. This is because of the brand entailing too much publicity made by the brand’s founder such as sean john, Beyonce, and Nelly.
In opening your clothing store, you must be willing to make commitments such as giving up the safety of your corporate job with its steady income, paid holidays, vacations, the opportunity for advancement, and more than 12 hours of working.
Running a fashion clothing store is more than just a full time job, but a life style, doing the same thing over and over again, in every single day of the week and of the month. So you must think it carefully before embarking on this escapade, because there are only two ways in ending this journey, either a successful one or failed one.
In starting your own clothing store, there are two things that you should always take into consideration. The first thing is yourself and your target market. First let’s talk about you.
Things You Should PossessBefore opening the doors of your clothing store, here are some questions that I’m willing to ask of you. Remember, the answers you’ll get from these questions will serve as your basis if you are really ready to start a fashion clothing business.
Are You Experienced Enough?As plain as the question asks, are you experienced enough to handle such business? Experience plays a huge factor in the success of any business. May it be experience in working with other clothing store, or may it be experience in taking up merchandizing classes, or may it be experience in helping your grandparents set up their own businesses. Whatever experience you may have, it will serve to be very useful especially when you’re confronted with problems that you’ll encounter in you journeys ahead.
Are You The Risk Taker?Well are you really the risk taker? I mean, could you take on problems coming in from every side? Could you make life’s worth of sacrifice just to take up your business a notch? Well? Could you take that risk? Could you take the risk that you will loose everything in this tiny decision that you’ll be making? Could you take that? Well, I’m not here to frighten you or to turn you away from this line of business, what I’m trying to do is testing how much risk you can take. And this is the first risk that you’ll be facing in this business.
Any businesses, may it be food service or selling house tools, face risks. These risks are a way for businesses to grow. Let me explain this a little more, lets say risks are an impenetrable wall, if take it as a challenge to scale it to the top and over the wall, then you’ll likely to find a new and brighter future for your business. But remain there behind that wall then your business will remain where it is. So risks, if taken as a challenge, then you might find risks to be much enjoyable to encounter.
Are You a Specialist?Well I didn’t mean for you to become the professor specializing in fashionable clothing lines to start your clothing store. All you have to possess is a keen knowledge in sensing what’s hot and what’s not in the world of fashion clothing. If you’re opening an apparel store for the right reasons, you probably think you’ve got the corner on something someone else in your professional community doesn’t.
Specializing on what to provide is crucial for a business to grow. You should always check what your competitors are selling. No apparel store should be stocking twill khaki shorts if there’s a Gap within 10 miles.
Are You Competitive?A good sense of competitiveness can go a long way in this line of business. Always remember that People can get everything that you sell at their local mall, so you have to set yourself apart other ways.
TIP: Pay attention to the demographics in your area, to the location and available foot traffic, to television and movies and what people are wearing on the street. This way, even when there’s a mall over there; people would visit your shop instead.
Are You Good in Choosing the Right Location?You ability to choose the right location for your shop is very important in this line of business. The volume and quality of foot traffic in the area where your clothing store is located will determine the outcome of your business. Lesser foot traffic will generate lesser exposure, which you’ll in turn gain lesser profit. A perfect location to start your business is on a commercial area.
TIP: Commercial areas are always abundant with foot traffic, but it’s also abundant with competitors.
Just like I said earlier on; a good sense of competitiveness can go a long way. So before setting up a store, do a little research on what your competitors is trying to sell. Let’s say this shop sells sean john Clothing t-shirts, but lacks in pants, or the other shop sells some apple bottoms jeans, yet lacks in skirts. So all you have to do is take advantage on this weakness of your competitors and try to sell what they aren’t selling.
But it is also advisable to stay clear out of site of those big shops that sells almost everything from sean john Clothing, to House of dereon, apple bottoms and Rocawear. Choose a place where you’re at your level with your competitors. So in choosing your location, you must have that ability to make a research about your competitors.
Your Target Market Now that you know what you must possess before starting you clothing store, now let’s learn about your target market. Clothing stores are different from each other, there are those that specializes in bridal and wedding gowns, there are those that specializes in business and formal attires, some specializes in providing urban clothing lines such as the sean john, House of dereon, apple bottoms But all of these fall in three categories, the Women, the Men, and the Children. So before you start your clothing store, you must choose where to specialize on.
So here is some tiny information about the three different markets you’ll be choosing from.
Let’s first start with the hardest, the
Women. If you’re going to open a women’s apparel store, you already know that the tastes of the “fickle” female customer. Every expert has agreed that the very first thing a prospective women’s apparel retailer must do is decide where the “market-vendor” gaps are. In other words, which customers in the store’s trading area will you serve, and what apparel can you provide (and at what price) that can’t be found easily elsewhere? Once you’ve determined this, you can buy accordingly.
Here is a short list of the brands that women usually want a clothing shop to possess:
o sean john Clothing for Ladies
o apple bottoms
o House of dereon
o Rocawear
o Makaveli Ladies
o L.E.I
o Mudd
o Seven7
o Steve Madden
Now when it comes to the
Men,
men are often single and usually has money to spend–but typically still has to be brought by their girlfriend or wife to spend their money on clothes. His job may not require a coat and tie, but unless he’s working in the Silicon Valley with hipster entrepreneurial types, he still wants to look good. If given the choice, most men would rather throw a bridal shower than shop for a new sportcoat. The only good thing about the casual dress trend, however, is that because of the trend, men seem more willing to be dragged into a clothing store.
Here is a short list of brands that men would want to spend their moneys on in clothes:
o Phat Farm
o Makaveli
o Rocawear
o sean john Clothing
o Snoop Dogg
o Coogi
o Hypnotic
o Miskeen
o Southpole
o Gino Green Global
Now clothes for
Children are where the money really is. In this market, you’re not really targeting kids here; you’re aiming more for their parents. The children’s apparel market is estimated to account for $20 billion to $22 billion in sales every year and is considered among the fastest-growing segments of the overall retail market. The more financially stable parents are, the more they’ll be willing to spend on boutique clothing for their children.
The bulk of children’s clothing sales (up to 60 percent) come from those cute matching outfits, like matching top-and-bottom coordinates. When it comes to colors, seasonal trends like animal prints come and go, but the consistent top sellers are still–no surprise here–light blue, pink and green.
Here is a short list of brands that Children usually want for their birthdays:
o Rocawear
o sean john Clothing for Kids
o G-Unit
o Phat Farm
o Ecko
o Enyce
Now that you know and have planned all your plans, its time for you to finally open the doors of your clothing shop. But before doing that, here are some tips on how to make your grand opening truly grand.
Before opening your doors, it’s important that people around you know that you’re opening your fashion clothing store at this day and at this time. This can be done by advertising your store. Weeks or months prior to your opening day, ensure that you have mailed or distributed fliers, set up ads in the advertising section of your local newspaper, post bill-boards and flashy signs at a corner near your store. If you could, you could hire people to distribute fliers to passing people, or just seek some help from your families and friends.
By the time you open up your store, make sure that you and your sales people (if there is any) are ready to take in the customers.
Put on a big smile, but not that big. And always assist every customer that has a question about your collections. Never let your customers unattended, make sure that they are getting what they want and how they wanted it.
If you want to learn more about the prices of those brands I talked to you about, visit Streetzwear at www.streetzwear.com to learn more about it.
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