How to get an Inventory for an Online Boutique (Source your Clothing)

Whether you are an online retailer or own a boutique in the local market, every boutique owner gets this question once in a while - how to get inventory for online boutique. Hence, you must always have a solid strategy planned to earn maximum profits with minimum investments. This is the only way to make your business sustainable for years in spite of dealing with challenges every now and them.

A wise sustainable retail strategy is to lower the cost per unit. This will ensure that your products are sold faster and have a good number of satisfied customer bases and the best way to do that is to start sourcing your products from wholesale clothing vendors for boutiques. 

Step-1 Choose the supplier type 

The first step in our guide in our “how to get inventory for online boutique” is to select the type of supplier that you would want to work with. This majorly depends on the warehousing space available, inventory budget, and clothing designs. 

• Wholesale clothing suppliers - One of the most popular ways to source your clothing inventory is by working with a wholesale supplier. The wholesale-supplier-model doesn’t require you to store big inventory and saves you from losing money in continuously changing fashion trends in the industry. Additionally, you will also get bulk discounts and a higher profit rate. 
• Clothing manufacturers - If you are someone who is willing to invest big and risk your online boutique then you can work with direct manufacturers. However, working with manufacturers would require you to have higher MOQ (minimum order quantity). 
• Dropshipping suppliers - Many clothing boutiques prefer to test multiple designs or not want to manage an inventory or handle shipping. In that case you can have your inventory stored with the dropshipping suppliers. You only have to make payment on a per order basis, no investment risk.  

If possible, choose popular brands for your supplier industry. Reputable wholesale clothing suppliers will always offer you established products that are well observed by the customer worldwide. Since they already have a great brand value in the market; you don’t have to spend your extra time or money on marketing these products. You will automatically receive good footfall in your boutique in the initial stages of your business. But, market enough for your customers to know about your boutique. Also, you need to ensure that your wholesaler is not charging you a higher price than others in the market. Hence, it’s important to know about the wholesaler first before you decide to work with them.

Step-2 Vet your suppliers 

Unless you are working with a popular wholesale supplier, you need to vet it properly to know whether the clothing items are coming directly from them or a partnered wholesaler. Look for online reviews or ratings to know about trustworthiness of your clothing supplier. 

You can use sites like Trustpilot or perform simple Google search to know about reviews or feedback. Alternatively you can use a test order to know about the details. Make sure that you read the refund policy and shipping term. 

Step-3 Ensure fast shipping for organized inventory 

When you are dealing with wholesale clothing vendors for boutiques, you usually don’t have to spend much time in between procurement of inventory and display of materials. Wholesale vendors deal with boutique owners’ day in and day out. Hence, they understand the importance of time in this business. As a boutique owner, you just order products from a wholesale vendor, pay them upfront because if you are dealing with the first time, they would want you to buy a large number of products in your first order with 100% cash in advance to minimize financial risks and receive the product in a couple of days. But, sometimes fast turnaround time may lead to some quality issues. Therefore, you should research your wholesale supplier by small orders initially and spot checking of quality before you put it on your shelf for sale.

Conclusion

So that was our take on how to get inventory for an online boutique. Don’t forget to synch your inventory and update the SKUs. If you are using omnichannel eCommerce or selling on multiple platforms, then you can use inventory management softwares. 

Lastly if you don’t find the clothing product of your choice, you can also consider using a free product sourcing apps for finding best-sellers.