Mary Portas take on dying High St's

lostinrates

What a super thread.

I'm even going to own up to owning more than one over £300/500 item of clothing: I was lucky enough to have been given more than I bought though. (And they are not the kind of clothes with the label on the outside, although its hard to get away from logos now.) Sadly, none of it fits me nowadays. I won't sell it because to me its both art (which I could never have afforded to buy what I like of) and memories: the clothes remind me of time in my life, apart of who I was (am?) and I love them: the things I bought are well made, of beautiful materials. Ideally I'd make more of my own clothes, but I'm distinctly lacking in skill (the horrors of the wedding I wore a dress I'd made myself the day before and it started to disintergrate on the train joiurney on the way ''up north'' from London and I had to buy corsages to pin the wretch together with)and lots of the fabrics I'd go for are also expensive, often.

My family, the female side, have been professionally connected to fashion, not in the same was as FC though, and its not surprising I'd be a little interested (though much less than the others). Some one I know has made profit from filtering through and selling of pieces of her collection over the years. I think its unlikely mny of mine would profit: most would not, but I'd hope a few had held some value.

I love to shop holding things in my hand. What suits the foot/thigh of a model on a screen might not suit mine at all, regardless of general principles of shape. The fabric, the feel, might be not right at all, and colours, well, thats difficult to discern on a screen. The fit might just not be right....long in the wrong places: women are hard shapes to fit into bog standard sizing (sizes can be right but the shape within the size wrong). And then of course is the difficulty of sizing. What is a size anymore? different in different shops.

I don't like wering what other people wear: I do not see ''designer'' as 'good' but I do appreciate well made, beautiful pieces of wearable art. I also a\ppreciate a good shop/boutique who will mention they have something next week/month coming in tht might suit me. I'm lucky to live in a place wear our highstreets are still vibrant, with lots of independants. I like to support them as much as I can, but for bog standard items it gets harder.

I often use both internet nd face to face.

For exmple, I recently was told my DH I was due a piece of jewellry (corporate wife bonus time) and I had remembered reding a feature on jewellry dsigners I liked. I nrrowed them down to the ones who had websites, then those whose sites were reasonabl up to date so I could see what was currently available from stock: then we went to visit the chosen designer's shop and I chose my piece from within stock. (and I have a few loose stones the designer might be asked to make in to things for me if gold price drops). The jewellers work is what attracted me to them, that wr clicked, that I feel they ''got'' me and my likes/dislikes in person, is what has had us emailing each other since, and what that is what will more than likely see them mak further sales to me.

Mr_Mumble

lemonjelly wrote: »

I agree wholeheartedly in respect of Longbridge - a situation I can only see getting worse! Who in the current climate is going to attempt to build a whole new town/shopping centre?

You'd have the problem of trade being sucked from Rubery and Northfield... I don't see the need for a big shopping centre in Longbridge. Too close to central Birmingham to compete on range and quality product while too far away from local population centres for convenience.

In example I have a friend in Bham who loves the shopping centre in Redditch. Different Strokes I assume.

I was impressed seeing the newish shopping centre in Redditch, pity its still in the middle of a poorly designed new town and it takes business away from Bromsgrove.

Stourbridge, Dudley (& I'd include Halesowen & B Hill) are dying towns.

Were they ever particularly vibrant? Why not have small retail centres in these towns and better transport links to Merry Hill?! Wolverhampton does have a football stadium and educational establishments near the centre, there's a rather large demand for alcohol!

Apologies for pruning your talking points, I wanted to be brief since I'm not sure how relevant this regional picture is to the wider discussion.

lemonjelly

No apology necessary Mr Mumble, I'm intruiged as much at the points we agree on, as well as the ones we disagree on.

Interestingly, Bournville college has just been given the go ahead to build at longbridge - allegedly to kickstart the regeneration of the area. Personally I agree, I can't see any form of shopping centre in Longbridge being a success - more of a sprawl going as far as great park. That said, it is relatively close to the motorway for travellers.

Can't dispute any of this: Were they ever particularly vibrant? Why not have small retail centres in these towns and better transport links to Merry Hill?! Wolverhampton does have a football stadium and educational establishments near the centre, there's a rather large demand for alcohol!

Great thread this by the way fc123!

fc123

lemonjelly wrote: »

Great thread this by the way fc123!

Why thank you *said in a Scarlett O Hara breathless tone*.


Drop Shipping. Pobby's info.
Problem is everyone is trying to follow the Tesco/Walmart (and the rest) 'just in time' business model.
Only snag is the stock has to be made, then held by some poor s0d somewhere......to then be pulled instore ''just in time''.

I can only write about clothing but I do know of a factory that went down some years back by 'holding' stock ordered, that it had made to order, but the The Big Bad Chain (a household name still trading very nicely thankyou) decided that sales of the line were slower than anticipated.

Rather than take the hit on the risk themselves (which, considering it was to their design and spec so made to order, they should have) they just got the factory to 'sit' on the stock until they decided to 'call it instore'.

They then decided not to call it in and so hit the supplier. He was not permitted to offload the stock anywhere, couldn't recoup his costs (let alone any profit) and went down after 32 years trading.
Many jobs lost too.

As far as the beancounters at HO of Mr Corp High St store were concerned..fan-diddly-tastic for them. They were managing their stock levels superbly, their inventory was 'clean' so what a lot of clever bunnies they were.

Manufacturers are taking back control in a tiny way and OH was involved in a shop fit last year involving a Chinese manufacturer (shoes) who was supplying 3 chains on the UK High St. via a middleman (UK).

Unfortunately,Mr Middleman didn't quite have the correct skills to see through the chain concept that he was intending to set up on Mr China's behalf, but this guy (Mr China) will try it again at some point. He was no fool and was extremely wealthy ands manufactured millions of pairs of shoes per year. All he needed was a design team so he wasn't so reliant on copies and he's got everything he needs to trade directly in The West.

Someone, somewhere has to put their money where their mouth/instinct is and make and hold some stock.....you can't make one at a time to order.

I hate making stock on spec..but it's part of the deal. It's what retailing is about.

fc123

Hey Lics...nice mini break? ;-)

lostinrates

fc123 wrote: »

Hey Lics...nice mini break? ;-)

mixed: some was not pleasure but ''business'' but even that was interesting, if frustrating.

Had a particularly fabulous wednesday evening Including a cocktail that tasted almost medecinal in its herby content and left us with no hangovers! Very busy, very social too much food and wine and far too much coffee, which is saying something as my blood must have at least 70% caffiene content these days.

bluey890

fc123 wrote: »

They then decided not to call it in and so hit the supplier. He was not permitted to offload the stock anywhere, couldn't recoup his costs (let alone any profit) and went down after 32 years trading.

Why was he not permitted to offload the stock elsewhere? It seems like the supplier may have been subject to unfair contract terms...

fc123

bluey890 wrote: »

Why was he not permitted to offload the stock elsewhere? It seems like the supplier may have been subject to unfair contract terms...

Because it had their brand label in it, was made to their spec/design.

Your average UK Garment manufacturer couldn't afford the legal bills to take this comapany to court for breach of contract.

This was a few years back when they were all straining under
the price pressures of the imports. There was no surplus in the business at all.

Snooze

Pobby wrote: »

Tell me a bit more Please Snooze. I am interested. Sounds like you have experience in this field.

E-commerce is my main line of business and I charge people money for my expertise on what works and what doesn't! As I've already said, with some research you can find out what you need to know and you will soon see that it is far from the 'easy cash' you make it out to be. It's about one step away from the endless 'earn $200 per hour part-time doing data entry' ads that litter the web.

Rob

Pobby

To be honest i do have experience in drop shipping. I also know that it can work. I`m not making out it`s easy cash, indeed a few years ago, some of my customers learned the hard way that just having a website showing products and prices wasn`t all it was cracked up to be.

However I do have a customer who turns over millions on line. His shop is responsible for just 3% of his turnover. It also costs him a great deal of money to run, pay for clicks, on line real time chat and so on.

I am sure that he uses drop shipping but he also maintains pretty high stock levels.

I was chatting to a customer yesterday who, although has a shop, he has a very whacky website that links into an e-bay shop. His e-commerce alone produces a decent income.

Of course it needs researching and a great deal of time and money invested so I am not trying to over simplyfy things.