The market is crowded out there and it’s vital that you differentiate your brand and stick out. Too many waste their energy checking out their competition. This can be a good thing in moderation, mostly to see what you should NOT do. When a company does their thing and you end up copying their selection, product, marketing strategy whatever, you
SwatchOn is an online fabric supplier from Korea with a selection of over 100.000 fabrics. To fully feel the selected swatches, they send you them for free. They have no minimum order quantity.
Fabrics are a very big part or your business and your brand’s story. Fabrics are what your products are made of and therefore a huge opportunity for you to differentiate your brand from the competition. By working with suppliers and mills directly you can make your own special fabrics that don’t exist anywhere else. To learn about fabrics and to
Find over 500 garment manufacturers in the Member Zone.
The Garment Price Calculator helps you to estimate your Wholesale Price, Retail Price, and your wanted Margin. It also helps you to estimate How Much It Will Cost to produce your wanted quantity, and What Your Profit Will Be depending on if you sell wholesale or direct to consumer.
Understanding the glossary and terms used in the apparel business will be an important part of your day to day business. Understanding these words, phrases and abbreviations will help you communicate with suppliers, materials and the rest of the teams involved in and around your brand.
If you are not the one designing your collection, you need to find someone that's going to translate your thoughts and ideas into actual products. This means, whomever this person is, he/she needs a clear and detailed explanation to take that idea and put it into a tangible concept, collection, and products.
Are you thinking about starting a clothing brand? Are you already running an apparel brand, but want to revisit the steps involved? Are you already running a business in a different field, and want to expand into clothing? Clothing is a 3 trillion dollars industry, and over one trillion garments are sold worldwide every year. It is a huge market and
Clothing brands need to take a fresh look at all components in the business to become a brand of the future.
We have curated a list of helpful tools and resources that we strongly recommend, for building and growing your apparel business.
Ana from Apparel Entrepreneurship was part of the OutDoor Industry Award jury panel at the 2018 OutDoor show. Watch the process behind it in this short film.
Apparel Entrepreneurship is presenting How to start a Sustainable Apparel Brand at the Functional Fabric Fair in New York, July 23, 2018.
You want your business to evolve, to be successful in order for you to keep doing what you love. Of course you want to make a profit, but it doesn’t happen by itself. Look over your processes and every step along the way to envision how you want it all to enfold. Plan for profit from the beginning and don’t
When designing, revisit your inspiration, the brand image, and your customer profile. The styles should fit in with the vision and identity of your brand. You will have to give the customer the connection between the brand image and the product. They need to correspond.
Being an entrepreneur and running your own apparel business means there is always something to work on. No matter how much you work, you are never really done. At the same time there could be other things in your life that you want or need to do. Maybe you have a family that you want to spend time with or
Are you about to start a sustainable apparel brand? Are you new in the apparel business? Are you a young professional who is just starting your own company with a sustainable profile? Where do you start? What do you do? What’s the process? These questions and more are addressed in this lecture. You will learn about the process and different steps
You have a great idea and a vision of what you want to do with your brand. You are ready to kick off your project and get started with your apparel business. You probably have a picture in your mind how it will go, and it is for sure good to have a clear vision and goal. Before you make
37 mistakes to avoid if you want a successful apparel brand.
Listen to our presentation HOW TO START A SUSTAINABLE APPAREL BRAND & join our guided tour SUSTAINABLE SOURCING @ PERFORMANCE DAYS, Munich.
If you are all new to the apparel industry, you may wonder how much it costs to make a garment? We are now going to look at the product development costs. Here is a typical example of the costs involved in making a hoodie.
Studies show that successful people have reading as a common denominator. There are endless examples of people that have created well-known businesses, who read daily to gain knowledge. Knowledge builds up like compound interest and there is no upper limit. We love reading and we have put together a list of books for you that can do wonders for your
Selling online is becoming increasingly popular. Over 50 % of global internet users have made an online purchase. That is around 1 billion users. Data shows that worldwide ecommerce sales will reach $4.5 trillion in 2021. Read this before starting your online shop.
Do you want to start a sportswear brand? Do you have some great design ideas or a cool new apparel concept? Can’t you find the styles you are looking for? The time could be now for you to start up that brand you have been thinking of. But where do you start? How do you go about to make it
Source material, create patterns, order fabric, create prototypes
We have been entrepreneurs for around 10 years now. On and off we have taken on traditional employments, but every time we have been drawn back to the freedom of entrepreneurship. Once you get the taste of it, it is really tough to do anything else. So what’s so appealing about running your own business? For us, these are the
Early on in your business you need to work on your brand identity. You need to think about the meaning of your brand to your customers. Encapsulate that meaning in your brand name. In this article we take a closer look at picking your brand name.
You know which garments your collection is based on, you know the price for fabrics, trims, and production including prototypes. With this new information that you didn’t possess when you started out, you can remake a more accurate budget. When making the business plan you thought of the price level you wanted to place your clothing brand at. So let’s
Are you about to start an apparel brand? Where do you start? What do you do? What’s the process? These questions and more are addressed in the webinar How To Start & Run An Apparel Brand. Watch it for free at ISPO Academy.
We are launching our mastermind groups for apparel entrepreneurs 2018. Are you ready to take your business and entrepreneurship to the next level? We are hosting live interactive video calls, designed to move your ideas into action, to raise your game in business and life. Secure your spot, only 5-8 spots available for the first Mastermind round. You must apply
Meet us at ISPO Munich 2018. Attend our workshop, visit our panel at the CSR hub, arrange a personal meeting or watch our webinar at ISPO Academy.
In this Sportswear Inc. article about how to build an online shop you will learn how to create a cost-efficient e-com store for your apparel brand. There is no need to pay large sums for design and development of your site. Set up your e-commerce in no time with an existing, well established open source systems.
There are many roles that need to be filled in your business. As a small sportswear brand you can and probably will take on several of them. But ask yourself which roles you actually can fill and which ones you need to outsource. So what are the typical roles you need to fill? Here they are, your dream team.
A very important part of the product development is the product branding. How and where do you want your customers to see the brand identity? This is what you need for your garment!
28th to 31st of January 2018, the world’s largest sports trade show for the sports industry takes place in Munich. We can recommend you to visit this yearly event in Germany for 6 different reasons.
As an apparel entrepreneur you need to be on top of your financials and already from the start keep track of your costs. For you to get the overall economic picture of your business you need to know the cost of producing each garment. To help you keep track of all costs associated with producing each style you use a
As your business grows and your sales increase, your costs for running your business will also increase. Improving old styles and developing new ones will add costs to your budget. You will most certainly come to a point where the sales revenue isn’t enough to finance the growth of your company. You will need to look at ways of financing
Do you want to start an apparel brand? Do you have some great design ideas or a cool new brand concept? Can’t you find the styles you are looking for? The time could be now for you to start that brand you have been thinking of. But where do you start? How do you go about to make it all happen?
11 questions to ask yourself before starting your sportswear brand. Branding is the process of building a product image based on associations, feelings, lifestyle, and identity that is projected by a label. The competition is tough out there. Just look at all the brands that exist on the market.
Let's take a look at the different areas where you need to spend your cash. Of course, to give an exact answer, we have to know the specifics for your brand, such as the size and type of your collection, marketing & sales strategy etc. So what we’ll do here is to look at the different areas where you need
New season, new inspiration, and new possibilities. Once you’ve launched your first collection, it is time to start thinking of the upcoming one. With the feedback you have received and with the stats you have collected from the previous collection, you’ve got a good restarting point.
We accept Bitcoin because we embrace forward-thinking approaches. We like the power of new technology and the questioning of authority. We also like people and businesses that challenge the importance of middlemen, and strive for self-sufficiency.
While the first collection is out you pretty quickly have to start thinking and sketching on the new one. Before starting all over again it’s vital to pause and reflect. Ask yourself all these questions, and give yourself time to answer them as honestly as you can.
A Jack Of All Trades is someone who is decent at everything, but not especially adapt at any one thing. However, there are advantages of being in charge of many areas of your business. Here we list 7 positive reasons to be a jack of all trades for your brand.
A croquis template can be used both in the early design idea stage for quick hand sketches, and when constructing a tech pack.
We are proud to announce a new partnership with the functional fabric fair PERFORMANCE DAYS. The fair is the world’s first address for innovations, trends, and sourcing of fabrics and accessories in functional sportswear, athleisure, corporatewear, and workwear.
At the end of your product development cycle it is finally time to sew and make all the garments in larger quantities. Hopefully you had a great sell in and have written orders and actual production quantities for each and every single style in your collection. Now there are quite a few things to coordinate and you need to start
As with marketing, customer care should be present at all times. You are making a great product to meet a specific customer need. This is why you are in business, if you’re in it for the right reasons. So you better pay attention to your customers before, during, and after they purchase from you.
