As a clothing startup, you are probably wondering the best way to sell the products of your clothing business. Deciding whether to have your storefront online or offline can be difficult. However, it is one of the more important decisions you will have to make for your business, as it will affect many other decisions you make along the way.
Today, as e-commerce stores continue to rise in popularity, brick-and-mortar stores remain a favorable choice among labels and their consumers.
In this article, we explore the pros and cons of both options below to give you a better idea of what might suit your business best. Once you’ve got your products sorted, you’re going to need to sell them. Which is the better option? Or is there even a need to decide between the two?
Pros of an online store for a clothing startup
1. Lower upfront costs
Setting up an e-commerce store is essentially setting up a website. Therefore, the costs involved would fundamentally be your website domain, e-commerce shop plan, and web developer.
Setting up an e-commerce store helps clothing startups keep things financially manageable by avoiding the high upfront costs of selling from a physical store. It also allows them to get started quickly and sell their products right away to a larger audience.
2. Convenience
Being able to shop in the comfort of your own home or anywhere you are is an advantage. Customers can browse at their own pace, offering them the luxury of convenience.
With today’s fast-paced lifestyle and long working hours, this convenience can make the process more enticing for some. On top of that, having delivery to your doorstep at preferred times has made the shopping experience much more tailored to and streamlined for the customer.
3. Data collection
As a clothing startup, data collection is very important. You can monitor customer interactivity on your site and analyze their shopping patterns. This allows them to effectively tailor the experience to their target market. Access to this data also allows labels to adapt and modify their inventory planning and marketing methods beyond what a traditional store can manage.
Cons of an online store for a clothing startup
1. Larger marketing budget
Because online stores don’t have a physical location, it can be difficult for people to find out about your store. As a clothing startup, you have to focus on marketing your brand. You will probably need to spend more on marketing to increase brand awareness and drive traffic to your online store.
2. The loss of personal interaction
It might be more challenging for online stores to build meaningful relationships with their customers as there is a lack of face-to-face interaction. With no sales staff to show standards of service, more effort has to be put in to make the store more inviting for customers to want to make a purchase.
3. Cost of returns
Shopping in a virtual store also means you don’t get to see and feel the physical product. This increases the rate of customers returning items because they don’t fit or have discrepancies with the way they actually look and are displayed online.
Pros of an offline store for a clothing startup
1. Physical Location
A physical storefront doubles as advertising for your brand. With traffic passing by every day, customer visits to your store are likely to happen. Since your store is permanently there, it constantly serves as a reminder for customers to drop in whenever they pass by the store. This allows you to spend less on your marketing budget as your store already promotes brand visibility every day.
2. Brand representation and shopping experience
Working within the confines of a digital screen can be limiting for some brands. With a physical space, you can decorate and furnish it extensively to better articulate the vision for your brand.
From the racks to the flooring to the scent of the store to how the products are displayed, there are many ways for you to anchor your brand identity in a physical space.
You can also control how your customers navigate around the store—what they see first when they enter and what they see right before they leave. Additionally, with sales staff on the ground, even as a clothing startup, it injects a human touch and exemplifies the brand’s standards of service.
All of these components make up an immersive shopping experience, which can make a real impression on your customers and keep them coming back for more.
3. What you see is what you get
Most shoppers will not reject the process of seeing and touching before making a purchase. It is a surefire and straightforward way of guaranteeing that a product is satisfactory. For this reason alone, brick-and-mortar stores hold a trump card and are still favored by many.
Cons of an offline store for a clothing startup
1. High maintenance
As mentioned above, the upfront costs of setting up a brick-and-mortar store are high. On top of this, the running costs are high too. Having to upkeep rent and utilities on a monthly basis can dry up your funds quickly if you’re not careful with your business decisions.
2. Permanent location
Location can be a double-edged sword. Competing brands might set up shop in the vicinity and make it tougher for a clothing startup to thrive. Other unforeseen circumstances, such as the development of your area, could also cause potential customers to move and affect traffic to your store.
Ultimately, what clothing startup should ask themselves is how to meet the changing expectations of their consumers and how to utilize a location that can best serve them. Hence, they must ensure that their business continues to grow.
3. Longer working hours
Having a physical store will mean that you have to keep your doors open for at least 8–10 hours a day. You will need to cater for customers who are shopping after work and on weekends, so the flexibility of your working hours will be catered to during these peak periods.
Factoring in commute time, this often leaves you with limited personal time.
Conclusion
The decision to set up an online or offline store, even after evaluating the pros and cons of both, isn’t straightforward.
There isn’t a one-size-fits-all solution in this case. In a constantly changing landscape, many brands are opting for an omnichannel approach to maximize their reach.
Since you are a clothing startup, focus on improving your brand’s visibility and authority online and offline. To learn more about it, you can always reach out to Bryden Apparel to help you start your own clothing brand!
