Opening shoes shop as a challenge…
Two days ago, a friend asked me, “Do you know someone I can hire to to do business plan for opening a shoes shop?”
The conversation was short. He told me he wanted to open shoe shop in a large trade center. But, he has no experience with that type of business.
Before he starts the job he needs to do some serious homework. Through his intuition, planning and skills, he must be able to complete brief market research in order to choose the right target market (potential buyers) for his shop then do a simple segmentation of the market.
After defining the right targets, he needs to gain some knowledge of basic elements of marketing 5p: product, pricing, placement, promotion and people.
1. Depending of the amount of money he can provide for his budget (alone or together with someone else) he first will make a decision about quantity of the products for the shop. Biggest challenge is to choose the right product mix – example is the optimal combination of sizes, colors, models (for men, women, kids). This needs to be done at least a few months before the season starts.
2. That is closely connected to the prices of the products in the shop. He must make a detailed pricing structure by calculating the expenses of the company and divide by all unit of products. Afterward, he can determine the margin to make satisfactory retail price.
3.The decision of the placement is also very important. He must chose the best location, for the lowest price. Depending from the concept of the shop, (to construct mono brand or multi brand shop) in consultation with the supplier of the product, the manager should decide where is the best place to locate the shop. A shop that is well illuminated with windows are big advantage for every serious retail store.
4. Promotion is also important. That is an investment into better selling.
He should decide how much of his overall budget will be spent on different elements of promotional activity for the store. The promotional mix consists of few a elements: advertising; personal selling; sales promotion and public relations. Usually bigger percent of the budget is advertisin – companies spent to make video and to broadcast their commercial on television, to create initial brand awareness to the potential customers and to keep to them recurring in the future. Sometimes, social media and flyers can also to contribute into better selling. Sales stuff – is very important part. If your people know how to maintain best fluid, chemistry to the buyers, your company shall easily gain and building a returning customer base. They must know easily to offer the right product, to the right buyer.
In my opinion, 12 months is the shortest period of time to see if the location is well chosen for a business. The manager must see how the people will purchase all 4 seasons. According to that numbers, the manager will get data on the specific information about the sold products, and easily construct his next series of product orders. The unsold stock, between 2 he should sell through discount promotions. Also the manager should be ready, if the stock for some model is sold before the season ends, order again the same model for same or better price.
If he wants to be successful, he must have clear vision of how his business will progress in the future ~ leading from self-motivated stuff, willing to work for the company, feeling it as their own.
So, good luck to my friend, I wish him big success!
