What seems to work for me is getting the write keywords in my meta description lel
LOL
Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
111–120 of 139 posts
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#112>After returning from a year long maternity leave I found it difficult to juggle my new life as a mom working in the confines of a 9-5, I also came to the realization that the corporate life just wasn’t for me and became very unhappy. I was tired of faking it and really just wanted to follow my forever dream of doing my own thing and being my own boss. So, I did what anyone would do in that situation and got pregnant…
It’s not against the rules. I don’t see the problem. But even better, she’s growing the economy and everyone wins. You gotta like people with grit and tenacity to strive all while playing by the rules.
Thank you!
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#113Earlier quoted context omitted.
I got down to where he said he paid $10 for shipping and instantly clicked that it was a watch from Aliexpress and it was a classic dropshipping gig. There were some people a few years ago that managed to sell off a few hundred Hawaiian shirts that were most likely drop shipped from China by using some well targeted FB (and probably Instagram) advertising, and giving the shirts funny names (named after local alcoholi…
> Morally it's murky, but it's clever. No offense, but this is the kind of thinking that holds back people from succeeding in business. I see it a lot from non-biz engineering types. There is nothing, nothing “morally wrong” with dropshipping. The main value you provide is discoverability; if the customer finds a product through you that they would not have found otherwise, then you added value. Also, you provide cus…
I didn't mean the dropshipping is inherently morally murky (which I'll get to in a moment), but that Theive.co harvesting all their user data, then selling that to other companies to use for marketing and whatever else you can do with the data is morally murky.
I used to work for a company that was intending on selling all their user data to third parties (anonymised, of course) as an extra revenue stream. It definitely made me uncomfortable, my boss fully intended to sell as much of the data as legally possible. It was one of the reasons I left the company, especially considering the nature of the data we held.
Now, back to dropshipping. Falsely representing your product as "normally $80, now free if you just pay $10 for shipping" like in the linked podcast is false advertising. It's also probably illegal, you can't put product costs into shipping costs. It's a pump and dump scam. It's like the classic fake watch scam run on street corners all over the world, except you're now wheeling and dealing on the internet instead.
Selling a bunch of drop shipped Hawaiian shirts by using clever marketing, that's fine. The shop I mentioned made no misrepresentations, they didn't claim they were bespoke shirts made in some little village on a Pacific Island. They didn't claim that they were offering a massive discount.
But if you claimed that you were some bespoke Hawaiian shirt manufacturer who's just started up, and you're giving away shirts if you just pay shipping and tag your mates in the post. That's sort of sketchy isn't it? You can see the moral difference here? Maybe you buy some likes and followers on Facebook or Instagram to make you look more legitimate. Put a couple of stock photos of your "employees" in some remote village in the Solomon Islands. Maybe claim that your shirts are ethically sourced. Are we getting into morally wrong territory here?
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#114Pat, you should be marking your topics as Show HN: Promotion of your blog should be clear to readers.
Blog posts, sign-up pages, and fundraisers can't be tried out, so they can't be Show HNs.
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#115Very cool story. One of my favorite stores is Britax in San Francisco, where you can see fabrics going north of $1,000/yard. She doesn't seem to use Pinterest, which seems like a natural fit.
I was about to tell you that Britex had gone out of business, but I fortunately for you they've simply moved from Geary to Post :)
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#116Earlier quoted context omitted.
Nice, thanks for the numbers! At a certain point you start competing with Home Depot, Michaels, Walmart, Amazon, whoever. You are in the product retail business, rather than the manufacturing or services business. I think if you get really good at streamlining your marketing (Instagram photos and landing pages) as well as your pick/pack/ship operations (i.e running a warehouse), then you can expand into multiple nich…
You're welcome. Ya you can't be scared off by the big guys like Michaels, Walmart, Amazon. The fabric I sell isn't really mainstream and it's more boutique quality designer prints. My market isn't really people who would shop at the big box stores anyway. I tap into the niche markets, etsy shop owners, small biz crafters. There is a real community and it's one that likes to shop local and Canadian.
How do you source your fabrics? Do designers or agents approach you with existing inventory? Or do you seek new art online or at trade shows? My wife worked in fabric design and it's hard for new designers to break into the industry.
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#117Hi! It's Alanna Banks, found of Fridays Off. Thank you for reading my story and all the comments below. I haven't had a chance to read them yet, but I'm going to run through them now. Please feel free to reach out to me with questions. :)
Thanks for sharing your story!
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
Depends on scale and runway. If you have 200k/month in revenue you can easily make (or lose) a boat load of money with a few small adjustments to your margins.
Every month I buy a Ferrari for 250,000 en sell it for 200,000. I can now make a blogpost and say I have a revenue of 200,000/month. Revenue alone is not a valid metric.
Genius, time to profit. /s
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#119Earlier quoted context omitted.
Thanks for your insight. You're not too far off, but my margins are much higher - thank goodness. I've been at this for 5 years and also have an employee who helps with all the cutting, packaging and shipping. I offer a flat rate shipping fee for small price orders anything under $45. Sales above $45 ship with a Canada Post calculated shipping rate. Good luck with your business :)
Thanks - how are your margins higher even with an employee? I'm guessing your markup is way higher? I'm in the UK - I don't think our market can support higher margins (cost to import fabrics is relatively high), so just curious.
I'd be very interested to know how customer sales typically break down between design categories: solid colours, geometrics, florals etc. Do you have any insight you can share there?
Context: trying to understand the design market.
Re: Bootstrapping an Online Fabric Shop and Growing to $20k per month
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just out of curiosity, have you tried building the price of shipping into the product, and marketing with free shipping? From my own experience in eCommerce, it really boosts conversions.
I have a similar-ish product. For non-discrete items sold at a single price per unit, and where people buy a wide range of volumes, baking the shipping costs into the product leads to strange prices outside whatever sweet spot you choose, because shipping prices don't scale linearly with your product. The flat rate shipping under $45 in this example is probably because it costs nearly the same to ship half a yard or…
Can't you just give a lower price at 10 yards and again at 50 yards for example? Then you solve your baked in price issue and get to offer discounts on high amounts, incentivizing buying more.