Is your closets full of clothes that don’t fit you? Do you have a large family with old clothes stacking up everywhere? Then why not use those clothes to start a great Thrift Shop.
A Thrift Shop will thrive right now, because the economy is so bad. Everyone needs clothes, but the high prices at the major retail stores are limiting consumers to what they can afford, and kids grow out of clothes so fast, that for the first 3-5 years of their life, it isn’t even worth buying new clothes. So why not offer them another option.
How to get started: Before you start planning on where you are going to set up shop, you need to build a inventory. You can’t really open up a store, if you don’t have any product to put on the shelves. You could easily build your inventory up in one summer, and be ready to open your doors by the winter.
Here is a few ideas on finding your inventory:
- Get out your newspaper, and find and attend every garage/yard sale you can. Make offers, don’t assume that just because the price tag says one dollar, that one dollar is as low as they will go. Make them a bulk offer, and make it ridiculously low. Offer to take all of the clothing for one low price. What is the worst thing they can say….NO. You need to start thinking profits. Don’t worry about offending the seller, you will be offending many more people with your offers in the future, this is something you will have to get used to. Most people who have a yard sale, just want to get rid of things, and usually will be glad to sell it all at once.
- Start checking ebay every day. Ebay sometimes has huge lots of clothing for incredible prices, you just have to shop around.
- Ask family and friends. Tell them about your business plans, and I am sure most of them will have a few bags full of clothes to donate you.
- Place an ad in the newspaper. Keep it simple, tell people exactly what you want to buy, and leave your phone number. ”Buying gently used children’s clothing and wedding dresses. Contact Kelly at (555)765-4321″.
- If you still don’t have enough inventory to fill your store, then think about having a consignment corner. Leave a corner of your store open for people to sell their things on consignment. They put their items in your shop, and you charge them a percentage of the final sale for allowing them to use your space.
Well, now that your house is literally covered from wall to wall with used clothes, it’s time to go find a store to put them in. You are going to want a good spot in the middle of the town you want to do business in. Going 25 miles out in the country, isn’t going to help business much. You will probably need at least 1500 square feet, and more as you grow. There are vacant buildings everywhere right now, and you should be able to negotiate a decent price. The ultimate idea would be to buy a building that you could separate into two or three units, and rent the other ones out, that way you didn’t have a mortgage or rent payment to worry about in slow times. I understand that purchasing is not a possibility for everyone, and renting will be fine, but why throw money away if you don’t have to.
Organize your store as a retail outlet would be. You will spend weeks pricing and tagging everything. Take the extra time to make sure everything is as neat and organized as possible. The easier things are to find, the easier they are to buy. Kids items are always the most popular, so make sure they are what people see when they first walk in!
Marketing: You need to get the word out to get the business in. Don’t cheap on the marketing, it will repay you, I promise. Here are a few marketing tips for your thrift shop.
- Take out a newspaper ad, and build the excitement. Announce the grand opening date, and have a huge grand opening party. Plan what is going to be your first official day of business, then invite the local radio station to broadcast from your store. Have food and drinks and possibly some entertainment for the kids. Make your grand opening seem larger than life. The excitement will bring many people through your doors, that hopefully will continue to return for many years to come. Make sure you have a banner in front of your building a few weeks before you open announcing your grand opening date.
- Your target market is definitely going to be moms, so think of any where you know that mothers congregate, and have signs up there i.e. grocery stores, coffee shops, telephone polls in front of schools.
- Start a website. Not many thrift stores have a website offering their products online, and I have always been kind of curious why. Spend the time to build a great website, and offer all of your products for sale online. Try putting outfits together, and selling them as a whole outfit instead if an individual piece. You might be surprised that you sell just as much product if not more online.
- Signs. Never underestimate the power of a good sign. Put a sign as close to the road as your allowed, and make sure it is lit up.
- Ebay. When your sitting at your store with nothing but time on your hands, why not add a couple lots of clothes on ebay. You can charge for shipping, and surprisingly enough, people seem to be willing to pay more on Ebay than they would of they actually went out and bought it. Think about selling things that have been on your shelves for a long period of time, mixed with a few good name brand items. The name brand shirt will catch the buyers eye, and the quantity of clothes will make them feel like they are getting a better deal, and you will be getting rid of product that wasn’t selling! Win-win!
- Word of mouth. People talk, make sure you nonchalantly talk about your store in all of your conversations. Ask customers to tell their friends, and hopefully their friends will tell their friends, and so on and so on.
Summary: A thrift shop is a business that some people will have the personality for, and some people won’t. If you feel guilty telling someone their dirty old shirts aren’t worth a dime, then maybe this isn’t for you. To be profitable, you have to think profitable. You will start seeing the profit in every shirt, or pair of pants you see, but if you are buying the shirt for $3.00 and selling it for $3.25, it’s going to be a cold day in hell before you see a profit.
Resources:
Kate Holmes: Kate has a incredible site set up with everything you ever wanted to know about this business. She is also the author of the book: Too Good to be Threw, The Complete Operations Manual for Retail and Consignment Shops. Kate started her first shop; One More Time for under $1000, and was profitable within six weeks. If you are serious about starting a thrift store, you will find Kate to be your best resource.
