What Inventory to Buy For Your Boutique This Fall | Summer To Fall Profit Plan Part 2 - Boost Your Boutique with Emily Benson

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
So we've just gotten you prepped a little bit for market or for your buying However, youcan do it if you're going to go to a market center or go to a show like magic or Dallas or
Atlanta Awesome.
Awesome.
Awesome all of this data that you've collected and kind of like consolidated in one placeI want you to think about what vendors are you gonna prioritize when you go to market?

(00:23):
Do you need to find new vendors?
What do they need to sell?
Where do you want to like avoid the vendors because you don't wanna buy their stuff?
That is okay to do.
I want you to prep a simple buying budget with the understanding of what you need to lookfor for that next season.
So right now we're talking about looking at spring and summer sales to inform our fallsales.
Now fall is most of my boutique owners like absolute favorite season because we get intosweaters and layering and like all this really cool chunky.

(00:52):
I don't know, there's something about fall where it is such a big transition weather-wisethat I find that boutique owners really love it, because it's like this big switch up.
The thing about either going to market or jumping online to start to buy your inventory isthat it can feel very overwhelming.
There's so many choices.
We don't know what's actually gonna ship or not.
And so we're kind of, again, still making these guesstimates, but.

(01:13):
My hope is now that you've done some of this legwork on what has sold, you could even lookat what sold last year at this time if you were open and use that as a comparison as well.
Sometimes we don't take last year's numbers as seriously because of certain things thatare happening in a store.
again, like all of this should be custom to your store, whether you're a bookstore, an artsupply store, a women's boutique, a kid's store.

(01:36):
Like I don't care what kind of store you have.
Every corporate retailer that is in your category is doing this all the time.
Okay, so that means you need to too now a couple of things that you always want to thinkabout is like buying to some kind of budget so you Want to take a guesstimate of how much
money you're gonna make each month for that season that you're going to buy So for again,it's July we're talking about fall

(02:01):
we're gonna be going in buying like September, October, November, December.
So that's fall and holiday.
You wanna look at a mix of like what is trending, what you've sold and what is excitingand new.
Now, as I say that, we can buy what's cute and like again, use our intuition, but we'realways gonna double check our gut with not only our buying plan.
So like how much did we devote in terms of dollars?

(02:24):
to that department.
So if tops are our biggest department, we know that we're gonna do $10,000 of sales inOctober.
We know that 50 % of that is gonna be tops.
So $5,000 of sales in tops.
What does that equal for your buying budget?
Most people that's like around $2,000, $1,700 at wholesale cost, okay?
I'm just doing like some really rough math.

(02:46):
So out of that $1,700 to $2,000, like what is the mix of that if we're going into fall?
It's probably not tank tops like it was for spring.
This is now where we're looking for blouses and long sleeves and maybe sweaters areincluded in there.
Depends on who you are.
You want to have a sales projection that breaks down by category that then you canunderstand what your buying budget is.

(03:10):
Because what happens when you go to market or when you go online to start shopping andharding and putting things in your cart is you just get overwhelmed.
It can be distracting.
And oftentimes I find that a lot of people
Double-buy things like they'll buy a similar style from two different vendors The biggestpart of going to market is taking pictures if you're buying from Fashion Go Week or a fair

(03:33):
market week online That's where you actually want to like take some screenshots downloadthe pictures start keeping a file whether that's just like a simple Spreadsheet or a
folder where you can just open everything up and see it so much of our job is visual andit's translating
the data and the numbers into a visual.
And I think that's where a lot of people get confused.
And honestly, that's where I shine.

(03:55):
This is my favorite part of the process because I want to have the most beautifulassortment and I wanted to make you so much money, like so much profit.
Okay, let's be clear.
So much profit, not just money, profit, money in your bank account.
So taking pictures, keeping track of what's going on.
I know it's so annoying, but you need to try to do it.
Now here's the thing.

(04:16):
As you're buying for your next season, right now we're talking about fall again, you don'thave to buy everything all at once.
I never want you to spend like your entire budget for a season that's six months awayunless you really have to and unless you're established.
Listen, I have boutiques I work with.
that have been open 10 years, 15 years, 20 years.
And we really like know what's gonna sell and what's not.

(04:38):
And we can pretty much confidently place orders for the entire season and leave some moneyopen, obviously, for chase items, trends, reorders.
We always do that.
But I think the newer you are, the less money you wanna place for each month becauseyou're still testing.
You're still understanding what's gonna work and what's not.
And so the balance of what is my budget?
What do I need to spend versus how much could I hold off and sort of buy in the moment?

(05:02):
as I see how things are selling or see what trends come up.
I think it's important to hold some of that money back so that you can react in themoment.
Okay, if you're like, Emily, this video was really good and I'm a little confused still.
I get it, like a lot of this is new.
That's why I have a 90 minute training where I walk you through step by step.

(05:23):
Like basically you're watching over my shoulder as I do this for someone else so you cando it for yourself, right?
I'm teaching you.
I'm giving you the spreadsheets, I'm showing you exactly where to find the data and how toanalyze it.
And I'd love for you to grab it because I think if this is something that you need helpwith, that is the digital product that will go even deeper than this video.
If you want to check out what that training involves and you wanna grab it, type below inthe comments, fall.

(05:50):
We'll reply back with the link so you can grab it.
On the next video, I'm gonna walk you through what does it look like to transition to fallin your store, how to deal with tax-free weekend, how to deal with Labor Day, like all of
that stuff we're gonna talk about in the next video.
So hopefully you will click like and subscribe.
If you click that bell notification too, you'll get an email when that next video comesout.

(06:10):
I think that's really important so you can stay caught up.
But always, if you need more help, reach out, send me an email, send us a message.
Don't want you to stay here struggling and trying to just make it work off my YouTubevideos if you're really serious I have amazing trainings that will super clarify things
for you and give you that next level of education that you're looking for for yourboutique or retail store So thanks again for joining me.

(06:36):
Here's to making lots of friends and lots of money.
I'll see you on the next one

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What Inventory to Buy For Your Boutique This Fall | Summer To Fall Profit Plan Part 2

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