Being an entrepreneur is difficult to do. It’s a life sentence. It’s like being the captain of a ship without a fixed destination. The goal is to keep looking for the next viable stop and to survive. It’s not always smooth sailing. I found it the hard way being an entrepreneur in fashion business, and there are 4 things I think I should have known when I stepped into the world of fashion business (accidentally), which I feel like you should know too. I’m not a fashion graduate. I simply became deep into fashion accidentally with everything I was doing since graduating from college up to this point, being able to work and meet with so many people in the industry. So everything I will be sharing with you stems from good and bad experiences with the brands I help create, then eventually get acquired by larger companies.
I wish I knew these 4 things way before I even started:
1. IT’S FUCKING HARD! – Running a brand that is popular, known and makes enough profit to stay in the business for a very long time is not easy to do. Especially if you don’t have huge funding when you’re starting out. It gets harder too when you stumble on some bad stretches of not being able to sell your products at the pace that you want it to.
2. THINGS DO NOT HAPPEN OVERNIGHT – So many great fashion brands and their owners fail many times before reaching some sort of success. The journey to the top is not always glamorous like what you see on social media. It’s always difficult and very long. Overnight success is a real lie. It’s more likely to take a lot more money and time than you think.
3. HAVING GOOD DESIGNS ARE JUST PART OF THE ENTIRE BUSINESS MODEL – It takes a well balanced mix of being creative, hard working, smart decision making, social skills and some luck. It’s a combination of skills needed to be a fashion entrepreneur.
4. YOU HAVE TO KEEP GOING – There’s far too many circumstances that can come unexpectedly with being a fashion entrepreneur. You will never be 100% ready. You have to be ready to take 2 forward steps for every step backward that you take.
It’s not an easy road to becoming a successful fashion entrepreneur, but I’m here to make it a little easier for you as we go along. I’m going to write more articles on everything I learned in 10 years of failing and making it in the fashion business. I want you to never stop believing in your dreams. Don’t let any obstacles discourage you because there is nothing in this world that can replace the happiness that comes from achieving your life long goals. It’s a real life changer. It changed my entire life unexpectedly, and I hope it will change yours too.
You ready? Find everything about Fashion Business as an entrepreneur under the category “Fashion Business”.
Question of the day: Are you thinking about starting your own fashion brand?
January 11, 2021 Author edward
Be creative by finding unique ways to popularize your new brand. But I can not stress enough how important the brand platform is because it determines all actions brand can and can not do. Even when popularizing you have to align all actions with the brand idea the unserved need, the values, the attitudes your target group shares, that form the core of your brand idea.
Your brand idea has to be focused, easy to understand, and super-relevant to prospects. And since a brand is a personality, it must be consistent or else it will die. But the most important thing, uniqueness is the heart of all brands. So be unique or be not at all.
January 11, 2021 Author aldwin
Express your brand everywhere. Through clothing design, logo, and website. Stand for something relevant but unique. And stay consistent. Be simple. Understandable and connectable.
January 30, 2021 Author Jane
It is extremely difficult to start and successfully maintain a fashion brand especially in today’s day and age. First of all, market is overly saturated in the entire world. All the established brands that are still on the market have been around for some time and have found its loyal target market and niche. Nothing new of the past decade has been able to break into this market and stand its ground.
January 30, 2021 Author Janeth
Too many people are starting their own clothing lines and clothing brands and competition is too high. Unless you are extremely rich with a lot of money to burn on initial marketing, I would not suggest you start yet another clothing brand. This world does not need another clothing brand on top of the five million clothing brands that we already have to pollute our planet.
January 30, 2021 Author edward
Starting a fashion brand can be complicated, especially if you are not passionate about it.
The facts: the market is overcrowded and it is going through a little crisis of its own these last few months. There are still good opportunities though (e-commerce is still a major one for example).
On top of a perfect fit, good finishing, breathtaking visuals/pictures/photos/website, you need to be passionate, understand who you are as a brand and have a unique fashion angle that differentiates you from the other brands. You also need to have the right strategies that perfectly fits with your branding strategy.