I'm Starting An Online Clothing Company...

[lildragon]

Hello all

I've recentley started up a clothing website selling clothes from Thailand to Europe (primarily to the UK) and just need some tips from anyone doing something simmilar.

This is a complete stab in the dark for me. I am getting my product from Pra Tu Nam at the moment but I would like to know where the actual factories are so I can negotiate a better wholesale price.

Also I would like to know contacts or websites I can sell too. (I don't expect that information to come easily for that one!)

this is my site www.lalafashionbiz.com - I know it's ameatur (it was cheap!) and I will be upgrading it soon.

Thanks

Dragon

[richardt1808]

I'd be amazed if you got any business from a site like this. As you said, it is truly a stab in the dark....

1. I believe that the kind of fashion you are trying to sell is a highly 'tactile' purchase. ie The customer needs to touch the real thing to judge the quality.

2. Any professional company would have a proper e-commerce site with prices, descriptions and online ordering.

Personally, I'd never take the time to write you an email just to ask you the price because I wouldn't want to wait 2-3 days for a reply !

[jay1980]

As was mentioned, would have prices and an online checkout using paypal. Also I would not post a thai number on the site, maybe can set up some sort of call forwarding from a UK number as customers maybe put off by this.

good luck

[Bangkokiwi]

Hi 'Lil Dragon,

I am currently in New Zealand but while in Bangkok I went to The THAILAND EXPORT PROMOTION CENTRE. Have forgotten name of street that its in now but am sure that someone else will follow up on that for you. They are a great help.

Bangkokiwi

[dave111223]

A) Get a new website

- List prices on the website, and allow customers to purchase through the website

- Hire a decent website company (with eCommerce experience) to build the site

- Hire an SEO company to get your website up the search rankings.

- Take out some pay per click ads on google (SEO company may be able to assist you with this)

If you don't want to put the above money into it yet, then i would suggest just starting using Ebay.

B ) If you have a person in the UK you may want to ship some of your products in bulk to that person first, and have then ship the items to customers as they order. Shipping from Thailand direct to customer can be expensive and takes a long time (but still possible if you don't have anyone you can use in the UK)

C) Don't bother trying to sell to other websites, they already have their own suppliers. I get about 3 or 4 emails a week from companies in Pakistan trying to become my new suppliers, these emails all go straight in the trash.

If they want a new supplier they will come looking for you (which is when the SEO work comes in)

D) Don't sell the cheapest possible clothing items available (not that you are, i'm just saying). In Thailand you can buy a dress for 100Baht, but by UK standards it's an absolute piece of crap, will shrink about half size in the wash and fall a part after a few weeks. You will have a lot of unhappy customers.

Pay a bit extra to sell quality products which may cost you 200 or 300 each. (Note that just because something costs more doesn't mean it's better, really examine the fabric and stitching and make sure you're buying good quality) Because at least these will be on par with international standard clothing, and will still be cheaper than in the UK.

These are just a few suggestions to get started.

Edited March 16, 2010 by dave111223

[lildragon]

Wow! Thank for such a great response guys.

I will take aboard this advice. In the meantime I think I might start small on ebay.

Anymore help welcome!

[Xonax]

May I suggest that you as a start have an OsCommerce webshop created. It is cheap and easy to maintain. You should be able to find someone to help you set it up here: http://forums.oscommerce.com/

Alternatively there are a lot of professional OsCommerce experts available, like this one in UK (found via Google Adwords): http://www.holbi.co.uk/

Please remember that you will have no customers without having a budget for advertising. A CPC (cost per click) solution may be the best idea. If you use AdWords you will find a lot of competition when using the best keywords, but you dont have to pay anything, unless someone is actually being directed to your shop. You will also need to find a good solution to handle credit card payments.

eBay and PayPal may be a better and much easier way to start. When you are successful on eBay, you can move on to having your own webshop. Personally I have unfortunately not been able to get access to my eBay account, when residing in Thailand.

You will find a lot of wholesale suppliers on www.alibaba.com but please be careful, if you make any prepayments. Start using the suppliers from Thailand (a lot around BKK) and simply go there to pick up (and see) the products and pay in cash.

Good luck with your project.

Edited March 16, 2010 by Xonax

[filingaccount]

To drum up demand and excitement about your product lines you have to be exceptionally good with online social networking. If you just build a site and hope you will get clients you are sorely mistaken. Start by having a small ebay (or equivalent for the UK) site, take payments via paypal AND use Facebook to market yourself without marketing yourself. It will take time, and you initial purchases will be very small (eg. 1 item for a pound). You will quite likely give up after 6 months of failing. Why? Because you are selling what everyone already has easy access to everywhere in the world. How do you succeed? By inventing a fun, easy, consumer product that doesn't exist yet or exists in a non-desirable form. If you sell womens trinkets (eg. ear rings, rings, necklaces etc) be sure to have an online "customize here" option where clients can build their own trinket and you make it as ordered.

If you want to discuss more, feel free to PM me at any time.

[roamer]

Selling clothes on Ebay hard work, customers look for brands anything else goes for peanuts and you'll find it hard to cover Ebay & PayPal charges. Btw, think you need to get your website sorted out as pop-ups like this one don't help if your trying to sell stuff.

Actually I checked this out and the answer is as follows:

Hello,

In this case and ANY website that's reported like this our software is working as designed and there is NOTHING that can be done to change it.

Its the fact the website if 3 month or newer.

Its the unfortunate fact that hackers put up thousands of sites a day for malicious reasons so we rate any new website like this.

We don't have the staff to evaluate every new website in the world daily.

So we go with just telling you the website is 3 months old or newer and let the person surfing make a decision to go to that website or not.

We never say there is a definite threat on the website.

Forum Moderator

__________________

That was from the Zone Alarm forum, might be of interest to anyone else putting up a new site, make sure its registered for 3 months or more before you open for business!!!

Edited March 16, 2010 by roamer

[LaoPo]

OP: ".........I would like to know where the actual factories are so I can negotiate a better wholesale price."

Wholesale people/factories demand quantities, most of the time.

But you can start finding manufacturers here on Alibaba; it's the largest B2B portal in Asia and used by many smaller and larger businesses, all over the world who want to buy and sell in/from Asia:

alibaba.com

LaoPo

[lildragon]

Thanks again for the replies.

The other obstacle seems to be shipping. I have been told cargo is the way but I'm not sure what import tax is to the UK for clothing.

Hoping to start an ebay auction up within the next few weeks but want all the facts straight first.

[cmsally]

As far as I know import duty depending on tariff code and then also VAT.

Unless you are sending very small amounts.

[ttechguy]

As far as I know import duty depending on tariff code and then also VAT.

Unless you are sending very small amounts.

www.agirlshop.com

let me know if anyone is interested, I am 50% partner in that. I can help you out if any one want products.. questions about importing.. fashion...online buisness

[101734]

- Hire an SEO company to get your website up the search rankings.

10K sterling + no joke.

The site would have to be scrapped and start again, complete and utter waste of time. Sorry to be blunt but that's how it is.

[lildragon]

- Hire an SEO company to get your website up the search rankings.

10K sterling + no joke.

The site would have to be scrapped and start again, complete and utter waste of time. Sorry to be blunt but that's how it is.

Yep I quite agree. Will look into re-designing it next month.

[tonglen]

Thanks again for the replies.

The other obstacle seems to be shipping. I have been told cargo is the way but I'm not sure what import tax is to the UK for clothing.

Hoping to start an ebay auction up within the next few weeks but want all the facts straight first.

I was just on your website perusing at your profferings. May I make a suggestion or two?

1.) Invest some time in your site and make your pictures expandable or better yet, a 360 view if possible.

2.) As was mentioned above, clothing biz is a very tactile experience, so be prepared to mail samples to larger clients for closer inspection.

3.) Chaing Mai is a better alternative to Bangkok for most textiles, both in terms of quality and price.

To better answer your question for taxation of certain clothes. There is no general taxation of clothes. Each garment will be taxed specifically and accordingly to the amount of what material is in them.....Hemp, Cotton, Poly, Wool.

Also the import to export (country to country) will be different for each clothing item.

It is best to invest in the advice of a customs broker and an Attorney. The former will be able to expound on taxation of items and the latter will tell you how to pay fewer of them.

Take advantage of your local FTZ's or foreign trade zones.

Cheers

[tonglen]

- Hire an SEO company to get your website up the search rankings.

10K sterling + no joke.

The site would have to be scrapped and start again, complete and utter waste of time. Sorry to be blunt but that's how it is.

You must be joking. 10K sterling? Ive had websites custom made for a fraction of that. He doesnt need BBC.COM.....

But agreed the site does need some work!

[Jamesday]

Take a look at smartchinasourcing -- online. It's got practical articles for sourcing from China, but might have some releveance for Thiland also. At least in terms of articles trelating to doinjg business in Asian cultures. Good luck!

[sharerfeebee]

hi im currently setting up my online store based in Singapore,

I would appreciate if any of you can send me an email to help out in sourcing quality and cheap bangkok wholesale apparels and ship over to me

let me know! thank you very much.

[TheKingfisher]

Dude,

learn how to make a word press e-commerce site, get a beautiful template, tweak it a little bit = site finished in a month and you know how to change it re-design add content change logos, add remove products your self and you never pay for more than the training.

Some of the templates you can get for your sites now are really fantastic, they all work like a charm, have full featured galleries, shopping cart and pay pal integration, you can install all sorts of funneling features and on site SEO widgets (Connicial urls - if your dealing with duplicate content issues from supplier product listings).

As far as SEO and Marketing goes you DONT need to pay 10K for it, if you do your being totally ripped off. It seems that because its a relatively confusing subject a lot of people here and abroad will tell you that it costs the earth because its really complex etc... and because most people don't know any better what else are you going to believe?

its not expensive BUT it is time consuming, you can of course budget 10K sterling into your PPC ad spend, but if your smart you don't have to spend that money on content creation and rank naturally.

Also don't let a forum tell you if you should or shouldn't make a e-commerce site and give it a go mate, if you think its a good idea, go for it, why not.... worst that can happen you lose a little bit of cash but gain a heap of experience.

Anyway, I hope that it works out for you mate.

Good luck!

[MANICMINER]

the pratunam market is a wholesale market. many of the big sellers have multiple shops with different names, so it appears the shops are not linked, but these large sellers have their own factories, so you do not need to go to the factories to negotiate a price - you just need to find the boss who is usually working in one of the shops. if you are quite computer savvy, you can set-up a good looking website yourself very cheaply. if not, you need to hire a professional and they charge you an arm and a leg. unless you are really serious and have serious cash, i would not go down this route. the real cost is really in the advertising: you can have the best website in the world, with the best products, but if nobody sees your site, you will sell nothing. why don't you try a free site like ecrater.com first, and start from there.

[northernlights]

Hi ! I hope that you havent forget your business idea because you havent got customer via your internet page. I think your internet page is quite primitive and it not bring so much advantage for you or your potential customer. I have made some business 1,5 year now and even I created nice web store with online ordering I couldnt got customer via internet page. I have got only big amount visitor. Is not easy to start business via internet. This time I dont even wait customer anymore but still I have web online store because it help me to control stock. It is cheap to mainain because I software is free ( ZenCart ). I can give some advice what I have learnt.

1. Try to find many different products and quite small amounts what you sell. In the beginning you dont know what you can sell. In bad luck you have big stock products what you cant sell. Time will tell you can you sell or not .... try many products.

2. Sell such product what you know and you should be exprerience about quolity of products.

3. Sell products to your home country. It is your area ... you know it !

4. The best idea is marketing your products in online auctions, online marketplaces. There are already potential customer !

5. Research what other shops and people sell !

6. Calculate that could you sell cheaper than them ( dont forget that shipping is quite pricy and sometimes small and quite cheap products could bring good profit )

7. Cheap products is easy to sell.... people dont scared to order .... later you can sell expensiver products for them.

8. Dont try to become rich with one customer ! Online business needs huge amount orders if want to earn living .... but some extra money you will got anyway !