Children’s clothing sales are influenced by some of the same consumer shopping cycles that affect the overall retail clothing industry. Market research firm High beam Business notes that children’s clothing revenues historically increased when youngsters returned to school in late August. Sales were generally consistent through the holiday gift-buying season. In fact, 30 percent to 40 percent of annual clothing sales were recorded during this four-month period. In 2010, children’s clothing stores have seen more evenly spaced sales as toddlers and preschoolers head to class all year.
Step 1
Document your children’s clothing store business. Create a business structure with a certified public accountant familiar with retail businesses. Common structures include sole proprietorships, limited liability companies and Sub chapter S corporations. Meet with a commercial insurance agent regarding liability insurance. Obtain a business license at your city or county clerk’s office. Contact your state department of revenue for a sales tax license (See Resources).
Step 2
Lease a visible and accessible store location. Find a building easily reached via main roads, with sufficient customer parking, and with a spacious display window. Look for a site near family-oriented businesses, such as day care centers, child-friendly restaurants and pediatricians’ offices. Attract walking traffic by locating your shop near other retail businesses. Obtain written zoning approval before signing a lease. Work with a sign maker to create eye-catching building signage featuring colorful child-themed graphics.
Step 3
List your regional clothing store competition. Visit cities and towns throughout your region, and list retailers that sell children’s clothing. Include big box and discount stores, as well as family clothing stores with a children’s department. Visit upscale children’s clothing retailers as well. Observe each store’s product lines, general cleanliness and staff interactions with customers. Identify nationally popular children’s clothing that’s not sold in local stores, and thus represents a potentially profitable opportunity.
Step 4
Buy display fixtures and mannequins. Purchase clothing racks, hangers and other clothing display equipment. Add several child mannequins on which you can display your children’s fashions. Purchase mannequins with flexible limbs and bendable bodies to convey the figures’ sense of movement (See Resources).
Step 5
Purchase your wholesale children’s clothing. Order name-brand tops and bottoms, dresses and suits. Add shoes and seasonal wear. Consider fun gifts such as stuffed animals and child-sized totes. Purchase your merchandise from online suppliers or warehouses (See Resources). Examine children’s clothing at a regional merchandise mart, a trade-only shopping extravaganza set in an exhibition hall. Some marketplaces feature one theme, such as jewelry. Other merchandise marts display varied apparel, including children’s wear (See Resources).
Step 6
Hire outgoing and child-friendly staff. Network with play groups, stay-at-home parents and children’s activity volunteers. Place fliers at community pools with toddler programs, as well as active senior retirement communities. Publish carefully constructed newspaper help wanted ads as well. Outfit your staff in brightly-colored matching attire, and conduct role-playing exercises to train employees in customer service and sales techniques. Include trivia contests on manufacturers’ clothing product lines, and provide gift card prizes to the winners.
Step 7
Host a child-oriented grand opening. Create a grand opening that children and parents won’t want to miss. Offer introductory discounts, and provide a gift with all grand opening day purchases. Conduct a drawing for a kids' restaurant birthday party, and utilize entry forms for a mailing list. Invite popular animated characters to meet children throughout the day. Advertise the event in newspapers’ children’s pages. Place fliers at pediatricians’ offices, day care centers and child-friendly restaurants.
Things Needed
- Help wanted fliers
- Help wanted newspaper ad copy
- Matching staff attire
- Gift card prizes for staff trivia contests
- Grand opening gifts
- Entry forms for grand opening drawing
- Ad copy for grand opening newspaper ads
- Grand opening fliers
References (2)
Resources (5)
About the Author
- Based in North Carolina, Felicia Greene has written professionally since 1986. Greene edited sailing-related newsletters and designed marketing programs for the New Bern, N.C. "Sun Journal" and New Bern Habitat ReStore. She earned a Bachelor of Science in business administration from the University of Baltimore.
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