We have any boutique shop owners/managers?

[SCREAMINREELS]

Know it's an odd question for here.

My wife does marketing stuff full time and has always designed and made jewelry/clothing part time. she's in a few shops and does large shows a few times a year and does well for the amount of time she's able to invest.

Well she's ready to take a chance and walk away from her job (pretty good job) and focus 100% of her effort into her business. So figured I'd reach out on here to see if anyone or their spouse is in that field. Even if not interested in product would love to pick your brain for a minute through message here,email, or phone as I'm going to do everything I can to support her decision and help.

[SCREAMINREELS]

There's gotta be some

[CodyWitt]

Pm me, I know a few. To be honest, most of the time they are a pipe dream. Probably isn’t what you wanted to hear.

[curtintex]

In 2008 my wife started a women's clothing boutique called Dirt Road Divas. She started it from scratch. Found a retail space, hired an architect, got her husband to do the build out, decorated and planned it well, went to Market to find suppliers, did trunk shows, and opened for business.

She loved the business and her customers. She struggled to find good employees, so she spent two years working her *** off 6 days a week with two teenage daughters in sports, twin daughters in kindergarten and a husband who can't take care of himself or anyone else very well.

She decided in 2010 to sell the business and was very lucky to find a good buyer. They were a young couple and continued in business locally until about 2016 when they went online only. Jen looks fondly on her foray into the business world. She has no degree, but knew enough about business from helping me to grow our family construction company that she could handle the finances, employees, the government, customers, clients and vendors associated with the retail business. Her business was pretty successful and I have no doubts she'd have continued to grow it, but she sold it to go back to being a wife and momma. She says she has no regrets about it, but sometimes I do. She was good at it and she had fun doing it.

Dirt Road Divas is still around online. The people that bought it have done a great job of growing it and we're proud that they continue to succeed. They still have the same logo that Jennie designed sitting right here in our living room and the basis for what she started is the still the area that they target.

https://www.dirtroaddivasboutique.com

[be12hunt]

In 2008 my wife started a women's clothing boutique called Dirt Road Divas. She started it from scratch. Found a retail space, hired an architect, got her husband to do the build out, decorated and planned it well, went to Market to find suppliers, did trunk shows, and opened for business.

She loved the business and her customers. She struggled to find good employees, so she spent two years working her *** off 6 days a week with two teenage daughters in sports, twin daughters in kindergarten and a husband who can't take care of himself or anyone else very well.

She decided in 2010 to sell the business and was very lucky to find a good buyer. They were a young couple and continued in business locally until about 2016 when they went online only. Jen looks fondly on her foray into the business world. She has no degree, but knew enough about business from helping me to grow our family construction company that she could handle the finances, employees, the government, customers, clients and vendors associated with the retail business. Her business was pretty successful and I have no doubts she'd have continued to grow it, but she sold it to go back to being a wife and momma. She says she has no regrets about it, but sometimes I do. She was good at it and she had fun doing it.

Dirt Road Divas is still around online. The people that bought it have done a great job of growing it and we're proud that they continue to succeed. They still have the same logo that Jennie designed sitting right here in our living room and the basis for what she started is the still the area that they target.

https://www.dirtroaddivasboutique.com

A good friend of mine’s wife did almost the exact same thing. It was definitely a successful venture but they got burned out on the level of commitment it took.

[SCREAMINREELS]

Thank you her dream is definitely to own her own shop but right now she wants to focus on marketing just her own product and becoming a vendor for multiple boutiques and continuing to do the shows that she's done in the past and increase the number of those. she doesn't make the amount of profit being a vendor in the shop but it's much less work. The shows she actually done really well on so will try to get into better ones and we'll have more profit to pay for larger shows.
She started out doing small shows like craft fairs and stuff and then moved on to a little bit larger now she only does things like germanfest scarecrow Festival Etc she would like to get to the level of things like The Nutcracker Festival that Houston puts on but she honestly doesn't have enough product to enter that show. She would sell out in a few hours has she regularly sells out of certain items at the show she's already in

In 2008 my wife started a women's clothing boutique called Dirt Road Divas. She started it from scratch. Found a retail space, hired an architect, got her husband to do the build out, decorated and planned it well, went to Market to find suppliers, did trunk shows, and opened for business.

She loved the business and her customers. She struggled to find good employees, so she spent two years working her *** off 6 days a week with two teenage daughters in sports, twin daughters in kindergarten and a husband who can't take care of himself or anyone else very well.

She decided in 2010 to sell the business and was very lucky to find a good buyer. They were a young couple and continued in business locally until about 2016 when they went online only. Jen looks fondly on her foray into the business world. She has no degree, but knew enough about business from helping me to grow our family construction company that she could handle the finances, employees, the government, customers, clients and vendors associated with the retail business. Her business was pretty successful and I have no doubts she'd have continued to grow it, but she sold it to go back to being a wife and momma. She says she has no regrets about it, but sometimes I do. She was good at it and she had fun doing it.

Dirt Road Divas is still around online. The people that bought it have done a great job of growing it and we're proud that they continue to succeed. They still have the same logo that Jennie designed sitting right here in our living room and the basis for what she started is the still the area that they target.

https://www.dirtroaddivasboutique.com

[SCREAMINREELS]

Will do. Thank you.
She's been at it for about 3 years now.
With the limited time she has she's been successful. I truly believe if she can do 2 large shows a month she'd be able to make 30k off of just that but who wants to work weekends all the time.
She's going to do shows as it's pretty much a guarantee money maker. Since she switched from cheap craft fairs to things like German fest scarecrow etc. Her profit went up alot. She went from a few hundred to averaging 1500-2500 a weekend profit after paying her entry fees but she makes her products herself and that's alot of work after she gets off her normal job to trun out more jewelry.
She's been able to get her product in a few shops and that's where she wants to focus. Starting local and hitting towns going out. That's the game plan anyway.

Pm me, I know a few. To be honest, most of the time they are a pipe dream. Probably isn’t what you wanted to hear.

[curtintex]

Thank you her dream is definitely to own her own shop but right now she wants to focus on marketing just her own product and becoming a vendor for multiple boutiques and continuing to do the shows that she's done in the past and increase the number of those. she doesn't make the amount of profit being a vendor in the shop but it's much less work. The shows she actually done really well on so will try to get into better ones and we'll have more profit to pay for larger shows.
She started out doing small shows like craft fairs and stuff and then moved on to a little bit larger now she only does things like germanfest scarecrow Festival Etc she would like to get to the level of things like The Nutcracker Festival that Houston puts on but she honestly doesn't have enough product to enter that show. She would sell out in a few hours has she regularly sells out of certain items at the show she's already in

So I showed Jennifer this thread and she offered up some advice that it sounds like is what your wife is doing.

Jen said if she had it to do all over, she'd avoid the Brick and Mortar model like the plague. The fixed expenses really hurts cash flow. Consider the lease payment, utilities, full time or part time employees, stocking inventory, fixtures, etc., really suck at the bottom line.

Jen recommended having a booth at Canton, the Nutcracker Festival, The Bluebonnet Festival in Brenham, Houston LS&R, the larger County Fairs have a big contingent of booths for things like that....along with an online presence with Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook and others all leading back to a great website where people could purchase her stuff. It'd be a much easier way to control cost with this model. Also, it'd be easier to plan and coordinate her inventory so she isn't carrying so much costs.

Jen is no expert, but she's done it before and knows a helluva lot more about it than most folks. If your wife would like to contact her, PM me and I'll get her contact info for you.

I love the entrepreneurial spirit and it sounds like your wife has that. 1000 people will tell her it won't work...meanwhile others are doing it everyday and making money at it. Good luck!!!

[SCREAMINREELS]

Thanks for the tips and thats pretty much her plan. She does sell online right now and it gets decently busy after her shows then dies off for a while. Sounds like your wife would be great to talk to.ill pass the info to my wife.

Scary part is walking away from a good job but I know she'll make money. We just don't know how much. She has enough inventory to get through a few shows that she always keeps in stock and there's enough in the company account for entry fees for a few months of medium size shows, and her look book is ready and made for marketing boutiques for her product so it really doesn't cost anything for her to jump into this except walking away from a paycheck.
In my limited experience she knows what's she's doing and is passionate about it. She's never lost money at a show and that's going to be what keeps her floating while she works on the goal of getting Into boutiques.
She's done her homework on basics like how much health nsurance will cost since she's the carrier for us and worked up a budget. It's going to be very tight for a while as I'm in school and work contract so I can work around school (our budget was already cut when I returned to school) but I'll be done in May and even if I had to switch gigs tomorrow for insurance I can get a gig working 3 12s just about anywhere as a nurse to get insurance pretty quick if I had to.

So I showed Jennifer this thread and she offered up some advice that it sounds like is what your wife is doing.

Jen said if she had it to do all over, she'd avoid the Brick and Mortar model like the plague. The fixed expenses really hurts cash flow. Consider the lease payment, utilities, full time or part time employees, stocking inventory, fixtures, etc., really suck at the bottom line.

Jen recommended having a booth at Canton, the Nutcracker Festival, The Bluebonnet Festival in Brenham, Houston LS&R, the larger County Fairs have a big contingent of booths for things like that....along with an online presence with Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, Facebook and others all leading back to a great website where people could purchase her stuff. It'd be a much easier way to control cost with this model. Also, it'd be easier to plan and coordinate her inventory so she isn't carrying so much costs.

Jen is no expert, but she's done it before and knows a helluva lot more about it than most folks. If your wife would like to contact her, PM me and I'll get her contact info for you.

I love the entrepreneurial spirit and it sounds like your wife has that. 1000 people will tell her it won't work...meanwhile others are doing it everyday and making money at it. Good luck!!!

[SCREAMINREELS]

Also her work for the past 6 or 7 years has been brand development, matketing, and helping with organizing events/festivals including everything from their website design, managing social media, to helping shoot commercials for radio and television. Marketing she can do in her sleep but the budget is no longer limitless if she does it on her own.
She started it out with HEB doing this and now works for a much smaller company but got to learn a little bit of everything working there.

[HDWRENCH]

Brick and mortar is a killer for sure . I build Harley for a living specialize in performance engines and dyno tuning machine work .

Now I started a long time ago and stay busy making a good wage . But Today its about social media I have not updated my web site in years . I post something on my Business FB page and ding 3000 + people see it .

Then they share it etc .. If she can do what she wants and ship from home use a part of the home as an office tax breaks are there for that .

The internet pricing though is the killer in my world we have MAP on at least 80% of the parts . Many do not follow it and cheat etc .

If she can work the social part that is half the battle .. HENCE there is a stay at home job right there . I currently pay a person to work on mine as I have no time I thought it was funny at first until the work really started to pour in . Something to think about .

I get bikes from all over the country and some times other parts of the world .

That came from the social side not my website .

Your own business but that makes money for others .

Or do it .. I do not regret starting my shop , sure tough some times but thats life

Good luck