But here is a preview:
In the first few days of 2015 I decided I wanted to launch an online boutique for children, ages newborn – 8 years old. Well, originally I thought I was only going to go up to 3 years old, but the more I search for brands, the higher up in age I’m going! I’m sticking to 8 years old for now! I posted a blog describing the background behind me wanting to do this and why now. If interested read Egreis Gjergjani – Reflecting on 2014 and Goals for 2015 blog post. It may seem like such a sudden decision, but the truth is I’ve been wanting to do something ever since I left Los Angeles and became a stay at home mom.I didn’t really know what. I knew it had to be involved with motherhood or kids somehow.
Before Gio I had wanted to do shoes; a shoe line, a collaboration with a current shoe company, etc. But after having my son, my focus has shifted completely and as much as I like shoes, i just do not care enough for them to want to start a career related to shoes. Maybe down the line, but not now. I played around with the idea of a baby spa. When Gio was 4 months old, we went to London and I took him to a baby spa there. I loved it so much that I spoke with the owners for the possibility of franchising in United States. It’s still something I would like to explore but it requires a lot more work and time than I can possibly give right now. So that idea will have to wait. Then I thought about doing mommy and baby get togethers; I explained a bit of that on my other blog post as well (listed above). I would like to do that too, just not now. I am 6 months pregnant and as much as I want to attack all these things and do them all, I just physically and emotionally cannot. So I have to be smart about what I am capable of doing.I’m the type to put my ALL into something. I either do it all the way right, or do not do it at all. It’s why I’ve let go of some of the projects I started when I was in Los Angeles. But after getting pregnant I knew I just couldn’t focus on them like I had wanted to, so I decided to check out.
Back in September of last year, I was playing around with the idea of a baby boutique. I have a beautiful baby boy that I love dressing up and shopping for. I used to be addicted to shopping for myself back in the day, and now I can’t remember the last time I bought something for me. It’s always for either my hubby, or the kiddos. I tend to shop for Gio often since he’s always outgrowing his clothes. I realize that to find cute baby boy clothing you have to really look. Sure there is the usual Babies R Us, H&M, Zara etc. And I shop there all the time. But so does every other mom. So if you want something unique for your child, you’ve got to search up and down on either Etsy, or Instagram shops. I used to do that whenever I nursed him and had spare time. So I thought about the possibility of opening an online store for children of both sexes, that would include unique clothing you don’t normally see in stores today.
My goal is to carry limited numbers of each piece to maintain the exclusive aspect of it. I’d rather a ton of models and designs in small quantities so that when parents shop for their kids, they won’t see everyone else wearing the same things. So this was back in September. I even thought of the name. I registered a domain and got a hold of all social media pages. I did a bit of research, although not much. This was right before I found out I was pregnant again. Then BAM! Pregnancy test confirmed I was indeed pregnant. So this took me by surprise. I stopped thinking of the boutique and started wondering about life with another baby around. I traveled with my husband to London and Albania. I spent time with family. And then in January, after I settled into this “I’m having another baby” mentality I got on the boutique idea once again. But this time I was definitely serious about it.
Ok enough blabbing…now let’s get to what you really want to read about! Where to begin if you want to start an online store? Like you, I searched online to see if someone had blogged about it. People have, but the information they provide is very general. I was looking for more detailed information. So then I went into books. I read a few and while some of them were useful, most were not really what I was looking for. So I’ll just give you the short version of everything I found and what I did for my own store.
1. BRAINSTORM!
First you have to just sit or lay around and think! Think about what you want to do. Think about your online business and which direction you want to go. Here are some questions to think about:
- Are you planning on doing this full time or in addition to another job you currently have?
- Are you going to hire help or is it going to be just you managing it all?
- What is your starting budget?
- What is your product? What do you want to sell?
- Do you have good networking skills? Are you involved socially with people can help you market and spread the word? Or do you need to start from scratch and learn about paid advertising?
- What is the age group of people you are going to sell to?
- Do you plan on creating an easy and fast setup kind of store or do you want to do a higher end, fully branded boutique?
- Are you going to hire help or is it going to be just you managing it all?
- What is your starting budget?
- What is your product? What do you want to sell?
- Do you have good networking skills? Are you involved socially with people can help you market and spread the word? Or do you need to start from scratch and learn about paid advertising?
- What is the age group of people you are going to sell to?
- Do you plan on creating an easy and fast setup kind of store or do you want to do a higher end, fully branded boutique?
Once you answer these questions, you will have an idea at least of where you are headed. In my case I picked children clothing because I am passionate about it. I am involved daily with it when it comes to my son’s wardrobe and I have an eye for style and fashion so that’s what drove me. I recommend finding a niche that isn’t so available or “common”. There are plenty of children boutiques, esp on Etsy and Instagram. So I understand that I have quite a bit of competition. But I also believe in providing something that is different from the rest. In my case, I plan on bringing designers from Europe that are not so easy to find in other parts of the world. Based on my research, a lot of the children clothing stores out there carry mainly Chinese products, which by the way are GREAT and very affordable. But my goal is to bring some of the other ones. Yes they will not be as affordable as the rest, but they will be unique; they will be different, and of amazing quality. So my choice is to cater to moms that value that. That’s it. I don’t plan on clothing every child out there. I just plan on making happy those few parents that do decide to dress their children the way I would dress mine.
Now in my case, I have dedicated a good amount of resources to be able to do this. To provide great quality means you have to spend the money for it. Not to mention all the costs included with traveling to find these brands, importing them, paying the duties and taxes on each, shipping etc. So before I chose to do this, I knew it was going to take a pretty penny. However, you do not need a big budget to get an online store started. You can start with pretty much anything, just know that it will limit some of the things you want to do. But that’s ok. It can be done! You may not be able to start with a large inventory for example, but maybe a smaller one. That’s ok! What’s important is that you are starting it! It will grow. Slowly but surely!
Continue to read here: http://stilettomeup.xyz/how-to-start-an-online-store-part-i-egreis-gjergjani/
Egreis Gjergjani
No comments:
Post a Comment