Thread: How to Start an Online Clothing Business

If having an eye for fashionable clothing, you might be able to produce an income by selling clothing on internet. Consumers sometimes unwilling to purchase clothes online, but if can find a niche and items that people really want to achieve some level of success in this venture It is very easy to start an online clothing business by setting up a merchant or PayPal account, website and supplier relationship.

• Search clothing providers that carry the kind of clothes willing to sell on the site. Can ask to purchase the items on credit, upfront, or establish a drop-shipping arrangement with the provider. With a drop-shipping arrangement, the buyer will buy the items on behalf on order. If drop-ship, will possibly get a lower profit because of the convenience of not buying products or saving items in a warehouse. You may want an authorized business license from the state before providers can work with you.

• Step 2

Sign up for a website hosting plan and select a domain name that represents the kind of clothing planning to sell. For example, if selling sporty clothes for men "sportyclothesforgents .com". Make it as mush descriptive as possible without making it too long.

• Step 3

Make 5 main pages for the website. There should be a home page where posting some featured clothes, a contact page, shipping and order data, privacy policy page and terms and conditions page.

• Step 4

Apply for a credit card merchant account. To be able to accept credit card payments for clothing order online. Pay a charge, a monthly maintenance charge and a percentage of every deal to the merchant services supplier. Keep the data about the merchant account useful.

• Step 5

Take images of the clothing that planning to sell or ask to the provider.

• Step 6

Enable website's secure shopping cart program. Follow instructions, which differ according to the software and type merchant account information when requested. See "Resources" for more information about how a shopping cart works.

• Step 7

Upload all parts of clothing including the images, description, and cost and product number to shopping cart program. This will make a new page for all part of clothing on the site. Publish the products to the website so that people can go through the clothing collection and create a purchase when ready.

Hello
"ForTheFit.com is a specialty menswear e-tailer that offers current, premium quality apparel for men of hard-to-find sizes. Currently, our focus is on shorter men's clothing (defined as men 5'9" & under). We scour the apparel markets for manufacturers that cut smaller than average and have many items customer manufactured for our store. This way, we can offer shorter men under 5'9" a better fit right off the rack."
Is it Important to Find a Business Niche?

"Jeff (my husband and business partner) and I had dreams of working for ourselves in some capacity and maybe starting a small business together. What we lacked was an idea. It came to me one day as I was doing some shopping for him. There are 28 million, professional men in the U.S. under 5'9". Shopping for my 5'7" husband, I quickly learned that options at department and mall stores were extremely limited for men under 5'9". The other options, such as constant alterations or custom clothing, proved expensive and time consuming. So, we started ForTheFit.com in 2005 as a store to address the needs of stylish professionals under 5'9" who needed high quality, modern, and most importantly, well-fitting clothing for work and weekend."
Were You Ready to Start a Clothing Business?

"As much as you can be. Intellectually, we were prepared. Together we had backgrounds and professional experience in marketing, finance, the law, project management, accounting- all the areas we felt we needed to make any business a success. Then again, we were also pretty naive about what it would take to get this new business off the ground- such as the incredibly varied "hats" we'd have to wear. But in the end, this probably served us well because it removed "fear" from the equation!"