Article by Roderick Ng
The New Order
Fashion retailers, especially owner operator type businesses require you to be resilient. The success of your retail business requires you to constantly find new answers to the challenges of the day to day operations and innovative solutions for your future business plan. In fact as fashion retailers, we are so used to being confronted with challenges everyday, I am sure you will agree when I say we have all come to be great problem solvers!
Post September 2008, the new global economy requires retail businesses to find even more ways to achieve greater success. You might find that you have to work twice as hard now to achieve your regular business goals.
Through my professional experience working in fashion I have had the opportunity to gain insights into both the fashion manufacturing and fashion retail industry in Sydney, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Seoul (Korea) and Guangzhou, China. Based on my experiences both as a retailer and as a wholesaler, I have identified a few obstacles that I see arising in many fashion businesses.
Below are a series of challenges that I have experienced. Having worked with other fashion companies and retailers, I have acknowledged that these are universal challenges experienced by many fashion and retail businesses. I have also addressed these threats with solutions, and detailed why, until today, I still apply them as core business practices to help improve my fashion business. I Hope you find my article insightful.
Weather - How it can affect your fashion retail business.
As fashion retailers, we sometimes take it for granted that the weather plays a very large role in our business. Let me explain.
Unless your business is in a sheltered, air-conditioned shopping mall or somewhere there are lots of parking spaces, shelter and shades, you might find your fashion retail takings a bit dismal during extreme weather conditions. If its too hot potential clients head to the mall or to the beach. if its too cold or rainy they stay in doors and watch a dvd.
In a macro view, the weather can in fact create cash flow issues due to excess stock through lack of sales, or worse, the lack of appropriate stock to match the client's demands.
It is my professional belief that unless you are a meteorologist and you can forecast future weather accurately in your local area, then doing your buying as a fashion retailer twice a year in a standard seasonal cycle for your boutique is no longer effective.
For starters, It does nothing for your cash flow . When you buy for the next season your money is stuck. Even if you do not pay until the stock arrives you will have a lot of stock arriving in one hit. Storage and inventory cost money too. And you will have to pay for that.
Your investment in buying a collection from the designer for next season without having god's gift of knowing the weather, should be taken into account as a threat too. If one winter is not as cold as the last, and you bought coats for the store, then you will be stuck with those coats you don’t need and cannot sell.
Similarly if you bought a lot of summer dresses and the next summer is plagued with rain and all your clients have demanded light weight jackets, which you don’t have , then you miss out on a lot of sales.
You see, the weather can be a threat to the success of your fashion retail business. It is important to address this threat immediately to lessen the damage and turn it into an opportunity.
To further illustrate how weather conditions in another country can cost you money when you are not prepared, it is important to note that you have the power to make these changes and turn threats into opportunities.
The New world we now live in, is a global one. Industrialized countries are now adorned with lots of global citizens. The Internet age has empowered more people with greater knowledge of the world. This new world we live in has many curious people and travel has become more of a regular lifestyle choice. The increase in availability of airline options and the lower price of travel has only fed the desire to travel in more people. Their needs for travel have changed their fashion consuming habits. I believe, if retailers want to succeed in the fashion retail sector, we have no option but to change with the times and cater to our fashion consumer's needs.
It is now a norm for my clients to come in during summer to buy winter coats. I feel that instead of looking at this as an obstacle, it is our duty as fashion retailers to cater to our clients' needs, take advantage of these business opportunities and take charge of our destiny.
Unfortunately I am not god and I cannot help you with the weather. What I can do is propose a way to address this issue and turn it into a positive. I believe this begins with the way you do your buying for your fashion store.
As a retailer you have the power to fix this. By informing your fashion supplier that you find the twice yearly buying cycle too restrictive and unhelpful to your boutique's needs.
You can also tell them you prefer a more flexible way of buying through buying regularly. Instead of buying a whole lot of styles three to six months in advance, you should tell them you want to buy a little of each style to put in your boutique. If weather permits, and you sell out of those styles quickly, you can tell them you also want the option to return them sooner in order to replenish the styles that proved popular.
The advantages of doing this:
A) You are not over loaded with any one particular style that didn’t sell, lessening the risk of money sitting there. In fact you are only buying what you need, and when it sells out you can reinvest and buy newer styles, which not only gives your regular clients fresher style options more often but also saves you money on inventory storage.
B) Most importantly, you can test out which styles moved quickly and go back to the fashion supplier to order the same, again in small quantities, so you can take advantage of that particular style’s popularity.
C) Should the weather change dramatically you can always go back to the fashion supplier and stock up on specific items that proved popular for the current weather. This type of flexibility would enable you to turn the obstacle of predicting the weather into a money making strategy for your fashion retail business; giving you greater control of your cash flow.
Master/slave: Wholesale Business Innovation.
As a retailer ourselves, Master/slave understand the importance of flexibility. Why should your business suffer because of changes in weather? Why are your fashion suppliers not taking more responsibility in helping you achieve your business goals?
As a designer label wholesaler, Master/slave tries hard to give our clients what they want. We believe servicing our clients’ needs is the basis for our business success. We apply the same philosophy when we work with our wholesale partners.
I find that many fashion wholesalers are not empathetic toward their client’s needs. At the end of the day, when something doesn’t sell due to unpredictable weather conditions, you as the retailer bear the brunt. Master/slave believes that we can help. We also believe it is our duty to aid you in achieving your business goals.
When you buy from Master/slave we want you to sell our products so you can benefit from working with us. We believe that this will lay down a lifelong foundation for both your business success and the longevity of our business partnerships.
This is why we let all our retail business partners know that at Master/slave we offer fantastic wholesaling opportunities that are both flexible and dynamic. Master/slave would like to offer you a mutually beneficial relationship by wholesaling to you at your convenience.
At Master/slave you can stock up on the latest wholesale fashion at anytime of the year, all year round to suit your needs. We can either come to you to show you the latest in Master/slave fashion or you can make an appointment with us to visit our show room to pick up some gorgeous fashion! We are committed to offering you a modest MOQ (Minimum Order Quantity), so that your fashion retail business can turn-over more efficiently, thus strengthening your cash flow position. We are here to listen to your needs by offering you greater style options and more exclusive designs, which you can then extend to your customers giving you an advantage over other boutiques. In any weather conditions you can count on us to adhere to your needs and put them into action so we can help you cater to all your clients’ desires.
For all wholesale enquiries please contact:
Master/slave Pty Ltd
Roderick Ng
Darlinghurst 2010
NSW
Tel:02-93809941
E:info@masterslave.com.au
