LADIES ONLINE FASHION BOUTIQUE... Wholesalers help!!

[Fashionaddict1]

Hi

I’m looking into starting a ladies online fashion boutique.. so far I have a few name ideas but what I’m struggling with is wholesalers... there are wholesalers online but I feel if I buy with them I will just have the same stock as most other online and physical boutiques. How do I find wholesalers in London/Kent/Essex that I can physically go to so I can see the products? I’ve googled it but I know a lot of the best wholesalers don’t have an online presence. Do I use the same wholesaler for my whole inventory or is it best to use different wholesalers? This is an idea I’ve had for ages and I really want to make a go of it now but I feel like I’m stuck at the first hurdle... any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

 

[Mr D]

Wherever you buy from wholesale there are likely dozens of others doing the same - else the wholesaler cannot sell the stock.

Finding local wholesalers - its an art. Look around industrial estates, ask people - they may not know fashion but will likely know some of the other businesses on the estate.

Tucked away are often suppliers that you are unaware of unless driving past and seeing the name. And recognising it.

Look in the trade mags (if there are any). Ask the local chamber of commerce. Search the phone book. Google for brand names in the area.
The trade bodies may know, certainly the brands will know who they sell to in the area but may not know they are retailer or wholesaler.

Or look at previous trade shows for the industry. See who exhibited, at the very least it gives you a name to google. Ok, perhaps a thousand plus names to google most of whom won't be relevant.

Visiting at the moment may be hit and miss - some suppliers in a different field I am in have stopped showroom / warehouse visits but will allow sales online during lockdown.
One last spring limited trade visitors by appointment so only 4 customers in a 6,000 sq meter warehouse at a time. So expect some limitations currently.

It can be a good idea to have accounts with multiple wholesalers for the same field. If one sells out of an item you find is popular maybe another has it in - and don't need to spend time joining when you are in a hurry to get the item.

 

[ClothingRetailer86]

I can answer this and it's tricky. I will go through a few options.

Like Mr D said, generally wholesalers will be selling to many people who all end up with the same stock and then there's too many online sellers of the same thing and not enough customers.

It's a bit of a catch 22 with dealing with the manufacturers direct. You need to be well established and have money, but to get to that point, you need the have the stock to become established and have money. The same goes for industry trade shows, they pretty much don't want to deal with small time sellers who sell from their home, they want established businesses they can initiate contracts with (agreements in advance to buy x amount of Spring/Summer and x amount of Autumn/Winter stock for x amount of years). Sure, there could be a few start-up clothes manufacturers there to deal with, but it's a gamble and you might end up buying a load of their stock and end up being unable to shift it as buyers know nothing about the brand.

Customer returns auctions.... There's several of these sites online. A bit of a mixed bag though really. Sure you can get a load of stock (many brand names) which will sell, but for starters you don't know the condition of the goods, there's hefty fees such as commission and there will be loads of bidders getting carried away so the price goes up too high.

I bought a customer returns clothing pallet to sell and it really is a gamble. I paid £800 for the pallet (after commission and delivery it was more like £1400). Some bits were too damaged to sell or repair. I turned a profit of about £400 from the rest, which just isn't much after all the work involved and the only reason I managed that was because there were about 20 unlisted items on the pallet. If those "freebie" items weren't there, it would have been a loss.

Then we have vintage.... I'm no expert in vintage things but there are wholesalers online who sell bags of mixed vintage clothes. It could turn a profit....but.... I'm not experienced enough with it to comment.

The best way I've found and really is a huge basis for my business, but is the most difficult would be to become a clothing expert.

The internet is filled with money if you know where to look. You can snag clothes in sales, at special prices, with voucher discounts, you could even potentially walk into a shop such as NEXT and buy things to sell on for profit if you really know what's what. A bit like how an expert in antiques can walk into an antiques centre and knows what to buy to turn a profit.

You have to really know your products via this method though as you could end up with a load of items that cant be shifted.

Apart from that, the only other way I can think of would be to browse facebook groups and marketplaces for people selling clothes and buy from them to sell on.

I wish you all the best with it. Honestly though, it's a very difficult industry to get into and make a success off.

 

[Paul Norman]

I actually started by deciding which brands I wanted to stock.

I think researched those brands and found out how they distributed their stock - who their appointed wholesalers were.

I accepted that a lot of the more desirable brands were going to stone wall me - and to start with they did. Some still do. But having done this research I then courted the relevant distributors until I found a couple that would speak to me.

There was a play off. To get stock of the brand I wanted, I agreed to take some of a more risky brand. But with a few brands on board, the responses got better, slowly.