Want to start a retail business.

[Massimo]

Hi Guys.

Well I have come to a point in my life where I am feeling somewhat the need to run my own business. I am feeling board with my work and want to get out. Now this sounds good and dandy but I have bills to pay and what not.

So I have decided that well, I will try my luck in the retail business. First reason is because I can start selling online e.g. eBay, this can give me a good idea into the expected volumes I might be able to sell and what kind of profits I can expect. I can also still work my day job to make money. I would be starting off very small with just a few t-shirts, hopefully I can start with a few hundred dollars and use the profits to grow the business.

Once and "IF" it gets to a point where I can give up my day job I would probably switch over to my own web page. This does not concern me so much as I know HTML, CSS and JavaScript, plus I also used Blender for some nice 3D modelling, so I can create my own page no problems.

Now I would like to sell to the motoring enthusiast and have looked around on the net a bit. From what I can see there are a shit load of sites selling T-shirts so that has kinda put a hole into my plan of selling T-shirts. But with some more investigating I find that there is not really one place were you can buy a hole range of T-shirts, Shirts, Pants, Shoes, ect for the motoring enthusiast, I am hoping this is a area where I can move into, bringing it all together in a one stop shop. So I come to R3V because you guys are the coolest cats around, and want to know what you guys would like to see or would buy.

Please provide links if available.

Cheers

[freeride53]

Good luck sir!

[Massimo]

^^
Thanks. I have a million idea running through my head and it is hard to keep up with it all. So hopefully you guys can bring me back down to earth.

[Pantless Spency]

good luck as well, hope to see you make a nice living off of a personally owned business :)

[A.J.]

T-shirts and clothing is a tough business to get into. There's a lot of competition and the car manufacturers may come after you if you violate their trademarks (BMW is know for this in the States). I have a couple of friends that tried the T-shirt thing with very cool designs. They failed, but I got lots of free shirts out of the deal. I'm not trying to crap on your idea, but be careful. I'd suggest surfing e-bay and etsy.com, bookmarking the coolest designs you find, and watching them to see if/when/how fast they sell. It'll give you an idea of how well the stuff that appeals to you sells. I've been trying to find a suitable business to launch too. Good luck with whatever you do.

[frankenbeemer]

I am feeling board

I'll buy a T-Shirt from you, but you have to spell bored correctly. Or maybe you work in a lumber yard. ;)

A linky for you: http://www.sba.gov/

Good luck, I like being my own boss (most of the time).

[Gary Horneck]

An idea that I have had for a long time. A mobile T-shirt business along with brick and mortar. Going out to event sites and printing shirts for sale with customization. Every attendee at an event is in the moment, and wanting to preserve a piece of the day. Digital photos could be added to shirt designs even. Everything could be contained in a small van. Every weekend in every town there are races, walks, runs, bike, car shows and on and on. Nobody sells custom shirts at the events.

[Massimo]

Thanks guys. Yeh I realise this is not going to be easy buy any means, though it wont just be t-shirts just see where it takes me. I wont be giving up my day job just yet. LOL.

I won't be copying any designs like BMW. More looking to sell stuff like sparco shoes, cool t-shirts, pants ect. Like I said early you can buy all this stuff now but you I don't think you can buy it all from one place you need to go to different places for these items. That is where I hope I can fit in.

At then end of the day the market is to big for me to try and win customers on cheap prices so I am going to have to offer something else. If I take a chapter from the book of Blunt customer service gose along way. Hopefully my customer service is just as good.

Anyways if all fails I can just sell adult products online. All the AUS sites I look dodgy as. So shouldn't be too much competition.

Oh yeh you will have to excuses my spelling a bit I try hard to write correctly but I have dyslexia so it makes it a bit difficult.

Cheers Guys.

[s0urce]

Good luck, I have a t-shirt company that's online only. http://shirtsinbulk.com

There's a lot more involved than you think, if you can setup the company to operate itself you'll be much better off.

[Massimo]

Good luck, I have a t-shirt company that's online only. http://shirtsinbulk.com

There's a lot more involved than you think, if you can setup the company to operate itself you'll be much better off.

What do you mean by operate it's self?


I am well aware that there would be a million things that I don't know about yet. Is this your only source of income? Is it a decent profit?

[Fusion]

An idea that I have had for a long time. A mobile T-shirt business along with brick and mortar. Going out to event sites and printing shirts for sale with customization. Every attendee at an event is in the moment, and wanting to preserve a piece of the day. Digital photos could be added to shirt designs even. Everything could be contained in a small van. Every weekend in every town there are races, walks, runs, bike, car shows and on and on. Nobody sells custom shirts at the events.

I've been in the T biz a little over a year now, selling nothing but motoring shirts and a couple jobs for local comapnies. I'm working on being mobile, it really isn't very hard to put the equipment together. NOONE does what you wrote. Someone has to fill that void, best be the first to do it.

OP - I started just for fun when I was bored last summer, now I make dozens of shirts every week and have a full blown ecommerce site (I too have script knowledge and did it all myself, this saves you tons of money). I really recommend you first decide on exactly what you want to be able to do, then choose the print type, but basically there's only three options:
Screen print - requires space, is messy, high qual but you have to make large quantities you don't know if they'll sell. SP isn't good for startup, add it to your business later.
Direct digital - a printer that prints right onto shirts, huge startup investment (10K+), expensive ink, there really isn't a reliable printer on the market, no matter how expensive, they all have problems that slow your business down.
Transfers - moderate investment, if you choose the correct setup, most people won't know what technology was used. Don't even think about buying cheap Walmart papers, you'll need the best products the market can offer. You can do individual shirts at regular prices. The equipment will allow you to do other stuff like vinyl stickers, you can get into car wraps, small adverts people need, those little things will help pay off the equipment fast. Modern vinyl shirt transfers offer things that can't be done with screen/digital.

The best approach is to start by outsourcing. Have someone else do it and see what you like best. Do a little spy work and try to have someone take you through what equipment q grown T business has.
If you are really serious about getting into this, go to t-shirtforums.com and read through for atleast a week or two (seriously). There's so much information and you need to decide the route that's best for you. The forum is international and members will be happy to recommend wholesalers and local supply companies in your area.

[mr.vang]

sell girl stuff such as makeup, hello kitty, or something cute. a lot of girls will buy anything with beaver face on it. don't sell anything male related unless its porn or auto related. just my .02

[Massimo]

I've been in the T biz a little over a year now, selling nothing but motoring shirts and a couple jobs for local comapnies. I'm working on being mobile, it really isn't very hard to put the equipment together. NOONE does what you wrote. Someone has to fill that void, best be the first to do it.

OP - I started just for fun when I was bored last summer, now I make dozens of shirts every week and have a full blown ecommerce site (I too have script knowledge and did it all myself, this saves you tons of money). I really recommend you first decide on exactly what you want to be able to do, then choose the print type, but basically there's only three options:
Screen print - requires space, is messy, high qual but you have to make large quantities you don't know if they'll sell. SP isn't good for startup, add it to your business later.
Direct digital - a printer that prints right onto shirts, huge startup investment (10K+), expensive ink, there really isn't a reliable printer on the market, no matter how expensive, they all have problems that slow your business down.
Transfers - moderate investment, if you choose the correct setup, most people won't know what technology was used. Don't even think about buying cheap Walmart papers, you'll need the best products the market can offer. You can do individual shirts at regular prices. The equipment will allow you to do other stuff like vinyl stickers, you can get into car wraps, small adverts people need, those little things will help pay off the equipment fast. Modern vinyl shirt transfers offer things that can't be done with screen/digital.

The best approach is to start by outsourcing. Have someone else do it and see what you like best. Do a little spy work and try to have someone take you through what equipment q grown T business has.
If you are really serious about getting into this, go to t-shirtforums.com and read through for atleast a week or two (seriously). There's so much information and you need to decide the route that's best for you. The forum is international and members will be happy to recommend wholesalers and local supply companies in your area.

Thanks some good advice there. Yeh I don't think I will be producing my own more interested in buying from makers and reselling. I just don't have the time to create my own work. I will get into the T-shirt forums thanks for that.

Mr Vang, yeh I won't just be fore guys want to sell to girls as well. Weather it is motoring stuff IDK but my parter shops online like there is no tommorow so I will probably user her to help with the female side.

Yeh I was originally considering an online adult store LOL. IDK about that though I have heard porn shops have huge markups on there products like 300% so a cheaper online alternative could do very well.

[Fusion]

The problem with outsourcing is (in the case of screen) you'll have to buy stock. There's an easy equation for that - design x color of shirt x sizes x minimum quantity * price per item = can equal a large number.
If you buy equipment, for let's say a similar amount, you won't even have 1 shirt to sell (yet, because you'll produce dependant on orders), but the equipment can always be sold (these things don't lose value because there's not much development in the field). Whereas with shirts in stock, in a worst case scenario when noone buys any, you'll have a very hard time selling the lot. Also as a newcomer, you may not be able to estimate the amounts, especially sizes, and could be selling the stock a long time (slow return on investment).
Unless you do group buys, which is pretty much a pledge to buy (the few that might bail out won't hurt), but that isn't possible with ebay/online store sales, those need to be shipped pronto.

Just one of the many things to consider ;)

[Massimo]

The problem with outsourcing is (in the case of screen) you'll have to buy stock. There's an easy equation for that - design x color of shirt x sizes x minimum quantity * price per item = can equal a large number.
If you buy equipment, for let's say a similar amount, you won't even have 1 shirt to sell (yet, because you'll produce dependant on orders), but the equipment can always be sold (these things don't lose value because there's not much development in the field). Whereas with shirts in stock, in a worst case scenario when noone buys any, you'll have a very hard time selling the lot. Also as a newcomer, you may not be able to estimate the amounts, especially sizes, and could be selling the stock a long time (slow return on investment).
Unless you do group buys, which is pretty much a pledge to buy (the few that might bail out won't hurt), but that isn't possible with ebay/online store sales, those need to be shipped pronto.

Just one of the many things to consider ;)

That is why I want to start very small like 20 shirts maybe. Obviously I probably won't be able to buy whole sale for small orders like that so I will have to take there retail price and mark it up some. As I mentioned I only want to start small and see how things go. If I see potentual in bigger volumes then I will look into big orders and establishing my own web page.

It is just really trial at the moment so I can get figures and numbers.

Cheers Dude. BTW what is your website?