The tailoring business is attractive for several reasons. Beautiful and comfortable uniforms are in great demand among Russian customers, and in the future the volume of orders will increase. Entering this market does not require industry experience and is possible with symbolic investments. In addition, there is practically no competition in certain niches.

According to the All-Russian Center for Occupational Safety, about 30 million of our fellow citizens use professional clothing, that is, about half of the country's able-bodied population. These statistics testify to the impressive potential of the uniform business, says Ilya Khandrikov, chairman of the Guild of Professional Clothing, Safety Shoes and Protective Equipment Enterprises and founder of Formika, one of the oldest companies in the Russian market. Meanwhile, in his opinion, the most capital-intensive layer of the market, where monthly production volumes amount to tens or even hundreds of thousands of products, is mainly divided between several leading players: Vostok-Service, Trakt, Technoavia and a number of other suppliers of professional clothing to the largest enterprises in the country. Therefore, for beginners today, the business of small orders, up to 10 thousand pieces of clothing per month, is much more interesting.

According to some information, in St. Petersburg the market share of high-quality corporate clothing is about 7 thousand sets per month (80.5 thousand per year), and its capacity increases by 15-20% annually. In the northern capital, however, no more than five companies operate in this segment. The same picture is in Moscow, says Dmitry Koshlakov-Krestovsky, director of development at Varion-Design. Last year, this company commissioned a study of the Moscow professional clothing market. "We came to the conclusion that the niche of stylish and high-quality uniforms is half empty today. In addition to us, it is occupied by four companies, and this is from more than a hundred manufacturers of professional clothing. All the rest, to one degree or another, offer consumer goods, often reminiscent of an ordinary robe. About judge for yourself how profitable it is to sew elite products: for every $1 we spend, we get 30, and sometimes 40 cents of profit,” say Varion-Design, which employs about 20 employees. The monthly turnover of a company with less than 100 employees can reach $100,000.

In Soviet times, all clothes made for professional needs were accompanied by the prefix "special". Now, special clothing is mainly understood as products made in strict accordance with GOST. It is intended for people working in dangerous or specific conditions (say, oil workers or doctors). When designating the entire range of proposals on the clothing market for corporate clients, the concept of "professional clothing" is used. There are the following varieties:

• the special one mentioned above;
• working - an aesthetically and technologically primitive option, for the tailoring of which cheap materials are mainly used (quilted jacket, coarse calico dressing gown, etc.);
• uniform - satisfies the demand of security structures, paramilitary units;
• corporate - should create relatively comfortable working conditions and emphasize the corporate style; as a subspecies, clothing for participants in promotions can also be attributed here.

Fish "Hekla"

A year ago, Valeriy Pyzhov's firm mastered a new direction - leasing professional clothing (before that, only Finns offered such a service in St. Petersburg). Together with the clothes, the client is provided with cleaning and repair services. There are three sets (or items) in circulation: one is worn by an employee of the client enterprise, the second is in his warehouse, and the third is being washed and repaired by the lessor.

According to the entrepreneur, his company is now repositioning. Valery Pyzhov: "Traditionally, our slogan was:" "Hekla" is part of your corporate culture. "Now we want the clothes with our label to be also fashionable, so that it would be prestigious to wear them at work. I think it will take at least three to five years.

piece goods

The light industry has never been very profitable, and the profitability of an average-sized enterprise in this industry still hovered around 10%. Under such conditions, it is profitable to sew simple and cheap uniforms only in large volumes, which, by definition, small and medium-sized workshops do not have. However, you can produce a small-circulation exclusive and sell it at a price that will be an order of magnitude higher than the average market price. In this case, attention to each customer and a creative approach to creating models should be considered a competitive advantage. For example, a large manufacturer will not manually embroider buttons for Chinese suits: the effort spent on training staff in this difficult technology will not pay off. Meanwhile, they turned out to be very important for the Peking Duck restaurant, which did not spare $2 per piece of handmade accessories.

"If the price of a product for a client is significantly higher than the average for the clothing industry, then both he and we must be sure that this is a reasonable deal," entrepreneurs say. For example, Ives Rocher paid $120 for a set of clothes for the staff of its Moscow stores. The executor of the order had to quickly negotiate with the Turkish supplier about painting the material exactly in the color that the French needed. The implementation of this operation led to an increase in the cost of the order.

However, the quoted price is by no means the limit. The cost of other sets of corporate clothing can reach up to $150-200 (for comparison: a work suit from one of the serial manufacturers of professional clothing worth 1000 rubles is considered expensive).

Expenditure item

The successful business of many current players in the professional clothing market began with an antediluvian sewing machine, which the founders of the company often had to master. The founders of the Splav company, which produces uniforms, at one time sewed tourist equipment for their needs - and so they ended up in a market where durable and comfortable products in the field quickly found demand, in particular among emerging private security companies. And Ilya Khandrikov recalls with nostalgia how, with an entrepreneurial gleam in his eyes, he unwound rolls of fabric on the parquet of his apartment. His company Formica started in the mid-1980s using homeworkers. One of the advantages of this category of workers was that they were not in a hurry to pay. The first money from customers then appeared six months later, and before that no one had received a salary.

It is theoretically possible today to launch a business without investing in production. In this case, you will have to work at home or in a rented apartment, attracting relatives, acquaintances or just sitting without work seamstresses as tailors.

To create the most modest sewing production, according to the owner of Fox Model (clothing for promoters) Augustina Kulebyakina, it is enough to have an initial capital of $5,000: there are several Soviet-style cars.” However, Mrs. Kulebyakina herself, opening the workshop, spent $30,000, which she returned two years later.

About $10,000, which was used to set up sewing production, was saved up by the family firm Varion-Design by reselling ordinary cheap clothes. However, the available capacities soon ceased to cope with growing orders. To upgrade sewing equipment, they took a foreign currency loan from a bank, which had to be repaid after the 1998 crisis. Since then, the company has decided never to take on debt again and develop only with its own funds.

Valery Pyzhov, owner of the St. Petersburg company Heklya: “Of course, you can rush into battle with $10,000. But in this case, the risk of not paying back the investment is too great: with the current market concentration, the minimum level of competitiveness is more expensive. So it is desirable to have at least $25 thousand, and even better - $80-100 thousand. With this money you can create a decent production that will help you reach $10 thousand monthly turnover in four to five months. If you do not sleep and act without gross mistakes, then you will be able to recoup the costs in a year and a half or two.

time and place

The tailoring business of any clothing, including professional clothing, is subject to seasonal fluctuations, which must be taken into account when planning to open a workshop. Demand usually peaks in early autumn, when most executives remember that staff need warm overalls or long-sleeve shirts for the winter. The market also revives in late winter, when the consumer begins to buy summer sets of clothes ahead of time.

On average, an energetic businessman needs six to eight months to launch production for 10-15 jobs. Most of this time is spent searching for premises and negotiating with suppliers of equipment and consumables. Based on this, Svetlana Skvortsova, general director of the Kontakt-SDS company, advises to start moving after the New Year in order to fully meet the seasonal demand. In this regard, summer is a less successful option: in the midst of holidays, it is more difficult to find personnel.

But before forming a team, it is necessary to find a room for production. The main requirements monitored by the SES are good lighting (preferably natural, which requires large windows) and relatively free space with high ceilings.

Small and medium-sized sewing companies tend to rent their production areas: investments in real estate in this business rarely pay off. Sometimes a basement or semi-basement is chosen. So, the company of Mr. Koshlakov-Krestovsky very successfully rented a basement for a sewing workshop in a house located a stone's throw from the Arbat.

However, for reasons of economy, in Moscow, St. Petersburg and other cities with high rental rates, in addition to the office, it is better to place only experimental production. Its main purpose is to release a trial copy of the model before manufacturing the whole batch. It will be difficult to do without a sewing "laboratory": the client will not be able to verify the correctness of his choice, and you will not be able to assess the complexity of the process in order to correctly set the price. Fox Model, for example, carefully calculates the time spent by an experienced seamstress on the manufacture of a new product, and only then informs the customer of its cost. True, in this case, the experimental and full batches of goods are produced in one place.
The monthly production volume of Mrs. Kulebyakina's company is 400-500 items, for which 100 sq. m in the building of the former research institute. However, when you need to sew a thousand or more units of products in a month, you inevitably have to think about expanding.

Buying your own factory is extremely troublesome and accessible to few, especially at the initial stage. The Splav company, according to its co-owner and head of the sales department, Dmitry Parshin, decided to open its own plant only three years ago, in its seventh year of operation. About $1 million was spent on the purchase, reconstruction and technical equipment of the building for the garment production in Tver. This is a profitable option in terms of prices for industrial real estate and the level of staff salaries, and our company employs no less than 300 people.At the same time, our factory is located near Moscow, which gives us the opportunity to effectively manage production and meet the schedule for the supply of materials and finished products,” says Mr. Parshin.

But even if you decide to start a business on a grand scale and manage to find money to buy production, it will not be easy to find the right option. Today, there are almost no inexpensive industrial facilities, and even suitable ones in terms of area and layout, in the vicinity of Moscow. “Three years ago it was possible to buy a factory in the Moscow region. And now the buyer of an enterprise located 200-250 km from the capital can consider himself very lucky,” states Ilya Khandrikov.

It is easier and cheaper to entrust part of your production to an external contractor. This is what the vast majority of market participants do. The fact is that traditional garment factories mainly use the in-line production system, when the technological process is divided into many small operations. The scheme, in which each seamstress performs a simple operation, ensures high productivity: sometimes it is three times higher than in individual tailoring, when the tailor makes the entire product. For reasons of efficiency, you can give the most simple models to conveyor manufacturers, leaving only clothes that you would not want to entrust to a third-party manufacturer.

And with contractors working on small but complex jobs, you can focus entirely on design, sourcing and customer service, and outsource the rest. But the time has not yet come for a complete transformation into a shell company: the process is not always hindered by the high qualification of the contractor's personnel, the poor quality of equipment and the imperfect organization of production at most industry enterprises.

staffing

In Russia, the clothing business for corporate clients appeared largely due to the enthusiasm of amateurs in the clothing business, in particular, graduate economists and marketers. There are also engineers and scientists. As a rule, they are engaged in general management, marketing and finance, and the production technology is entrusted to a specialist. According to Dmitry Koshlakov-Krestovsky, if there is a coherent concept of promotion on the market, good material support and a talented designer, the success of your enterprise depends on the work of a technologist by two-thirds. In small firms, he often performs the functions of a production manager.
True, according to Valery Pyzhov, a separate position of shop manager should be introduced only after the number of employees exceeds 10 people. It is possible that before that, the head of the company will have to select seamstresses and monitor the quality of their work. At the same time, it is naive to expect that as soon as you advertise in the newspapers for a job, a queue of highly qualified craftswomen will line up for you. “Despite the abundance of secondary and higher educational institutions in this area, the personnel problem has been and remains one of the most acute for us,” Svetlana Skvortsova complains. And other entrepreneurs agree with her.

As a rule, seamstresses work on the principle of piecework wages. In addition, the amount of their earnings can be affected by the complexity and speed of creating products. In Moscow, an experienced seamstress earns an average of $200 to $400 (at least twice as much as in Tver or the Ivanovo region).

At the same time, problems are not limited to a set of seamstresses. You will not find instructions in any management book on how to manage a team of women with secondary technical education, sometimes behaving like spiders in a bank. The first year, the turnover can reach gigantic proportions, and you should be mentally prepared for this.

In addition, a relatively complete staffing of a small sewing company will require a cutter, designer, purchasing and sales managers. Total 15-20 employees.

Partner games

Ruin in the professional clothing market is a rarity. And if they do happen, then, as a rule, for one simple reason: work for one customer.

For example, Akademstil, a clothing company for hotel and restaurant personnel, suffered from this. For some time she worked closely with the Trekhgornaya Manufactory factory. The company did not pay for the premises and fabrics, and even received profitable orders from a friendly structure. And "Academstyle" did not burden itself with the search for additional customers, for which it paid the price. When there were changes in the composition of the owners of the garment factory, the company lost its patron and, in fact, remained out of work.

A similar story happened with the already defunct Skitto-Master company, later renamed the Pobeda Trade House (by the way, the Skitto-Master office was located on the territory of the garment factory of the same name). This trade and sewing enterprise paid too much attention to one client - Yukos Oil Company. But when the oil company suddenly left for a competitor, Skitto-Master did not have enough orders to fully load its capacity.

A similar outcome awaits any enterprise that expects to survive in the market at the expense of one or two large customers. Moreover, according to Svetlana Skvortsova, it will become more and more difficult to count on them every year, since Russian sewing enterprises risk not being able to withstand price competition with foreign suppliers: “I was in Belarus at an exhibition and I can say that local clothing manufacturers are simply eager to market. At the same time, their selling prices are at best equal to our cost price.

According to Valery Pyzhov, in the near future only small production facilities will remain in Russia, serving the individual needs of specific customers. Only the strategy of filling small and medium-sized niches will be effective, bringing a decent profit. Which, alas, cannot be said about large clothing factories. If the economic situation develops as it has for the past two years, then, according to the entrepreneur’s forecasts, mass production will begin to close one after another due to rising costs and, accordingly, loss of competitiveness - primarily in relation to Chinese manufacturers ready to produce anything , including professional clothing, at extremely low prices. At the same time, it is better to get rid of the illusion of conquering the market by dumping from the very beginning. Valery Pyzhov: “We have cheap” is the weakest of all possible positions. There will always be a competitor whose price will be more attractive. Then the course towards cheapness, especially in a young company, will not give it the opportunity to produce an interesting, beautiful and high-quality product. It will simply get lost among the workshops and factories for tailoring unremarkable utilitarian products, the difference from which from the assortment of Soviet times is only in a branded blotch. In our business, you need to have your own face, and it’s good if it is expressive.”

A new service on this market that can save SIGNIFICANT funds for the customer company, which is very important in a crisis. This is a RENTAL service for industrial clothing. This service includes:

• work clothes
• Delivery
• Regular washing
• Clothing repair
• Arrangement of cabinets
• Replacing worn out clothes
• Clothing branding

It is not easy to produce and sell ordinary casual clothes today, because the competition is too great and it will be difficult to find your niche. Special clothing is an alternative option for a businessman, products are used in a wide range of activities. We offer for consideration a business plan for a clothing store. To open your own store, you must first draw up a business plan for a workwear store with calculations, and then develop the business in the direction of increasing investment in tailoring.

Project Summary

Within the framework of this enterprise, it is planned to sell the following types of overalls:

• Security of all kinds.
• Fire Department.
• Repair services.
• Maintenance of petrol stations.
• Hunting, fishing, gardening.
• confectionery industry.
• Medicine and pharmacy network.
• Corporate uniform.

In a detailed business development plan, parameters such as the cost of starting from scratch, investments by expense items, possible costs and profitability expressed in specific figures will be displayed. These calculations will allow you to evaluate the real profitability of your production. An example of a business plan will visually present the situation in the declared area and reveal the net profit.

The first priority will be finding channels for uninterrupted sales. To do this, the entrepreneur will have to conclude contracts with enterprises that need to purchase special uniforms and work clothes for their employees. This form should look branded, with an exclusive design, a special cut with badges and stripes.

The seasonality factor plays a role in the formation of this type of business. By winter, demand rises for warm jackets and pants, hats and mittens. The summer assortment consists of light work suits and overalls. A decline in sales is predicted in the middle of winter and in the hottest months - in July-August.

Financial plan

The main purpose of drawing up this plan is to review and plan long-term business activities, taking into account market needs and competition. The financial position of the individual entrepreneur must correspond to the tasks set, and the necessary resources must be sought for the turnover of funds. This will increase the potential market share to 2-2.5% and expand the geography of product sales.

The volume of expected investments in the project is 1 million 750 thousand rubles. The payback period of the project is at least 18 months. In this case, the amount of initial investments will be 130,000 thousand rubles. Repayment of credit funds, if they are involved in the implementation of the project, is carried out at the expense of the proceeds received from the sale of goods.

The profitability of the business will be 6.6%.

Registration of entrepreneurship

Starting a business with the opening of a small store, it is enough to draw up documents and register as an individual entrepreneur. The procedure takes an average of 5-6 days, and the costs will amount to a small amount this year:

1. State duty - 800 rubles (mandatory).
2. Printing - 500 rubles (desirable).
3. Settlement account - 1,000 rubles. A legal entity will need to have at least ten thousand rubles on the account and pay for notary services - up to 4,000 - 5,000 rubles.

The total amount for legal services will be at least 4,000 if an individual entrepreneur is created. Setting up an LLC will cost around $20,000.

Room selection

You have to trade in working uniforms and uniforms. In order for potential buyers to quickly find your store, the outlet is equipped with a bright sign or shield that is visible from afar. It is best to look for a room near the market, in a place of maximum traffic of people. If such a place is expensive, you can place the trading floor a little further away by hanging billboards on the approaches to the store.

In a small town, rent can be up to 15,000 rubles a month, and subsequently a rented and renovated trading floor that justifies the investment can be redeemed. For comfortable work with customers in your store, you need to purchase equipment.

Store equipment

In total, the organization of the trading floor will have to spend at least 57 thousand rubles.

Description of the product range

A wide range of clothing, shoes and hats on offer will ensure a constant influx of customers to your store. To get started, you can opt for several items that are in high demand.

Items for the clothing store:

P/n	Name of product	Cost (including markup), rub.
1	Series "Worker" (men's and women's summer suits)	1 900
2	Series "Specialist" (women's suit)	3 000
3	Overalls and semi-overalls	2 200
4	Summer trousers	1 500
5	Summer jackets	2 500
6	Bathrobes (men's and women's)	900
7	Special vests	860
8	Suits warmed working series (men's and women's)	9 000 – 2 000
9	Bib overalls and warm trousers, including for seasonal hunting and fishing	3 000 – 4 700
10	Specialized gloves and mittens	600-700

The margin on all goods is from 80 to 96 percent.

The first purchase of a large consignment of goods will require expenses of 1 million 200 thousand rubles.

Staff

To serve customers in the store, it is supposed to work in one shift, from 8 to 18 hours. Further expansion of trade will require the hiring of more workers. To begin with, you can personally, together with hired workers, sell workwear and keep accounting in the store on your own, taking one or two qualified employees as an assistant.

For a specialist seller, conscientiousness, good knowledge of the goods being sold, and the ability to offer it to customers are important. A wide range of products will attract a large number of people of all ages to the store.

It is desirable to accept a man under 50 years of age, with work experience and good knowledge of the cash register, as a seller.

The salary for an employee in a workwear store can be 8,000 - 12,000 rubles per month. Sellers will replace each other after a full week of work. This schedule is convenient because customers who come to the store can find the same person who offered them the product on the weekend. Then he hands over the shift to the second salesperson, compiling a sales report for the period.

Salary expenses for store employees:

At least once a month, you will need to allocate funds for support services and cleaning of the surrounding area - up to 4 thousand rubles. The total amount of monthly investments will be from 40 thousand rubles. A registered individual entrepreneur can perform the duties of an accountant independently and, thus, save money.

The expansion of the business is associated with the subsequent replenishment of the staff, including the hiring of such specialists as a director, a purchasing manager and a chief accountant. If it is necessary to organize shift work, the number of sellers can be increased to 4 people with a salary fund of 60 thousand rubles per month, including cleaning services.

Advertising and marketing

It is carried out mainly by placing posters outside the store and distributing flyers to visitors. For convenience, you can organize a website on the Internet, for the maintenance of which funds in the amount of 80 thousand rubles are allocated.

To attract potential buyers to the store, commercials are launched on the radio and advertisements in local newspapers. The entire campaign should cost no more than 120 thousand rubles. For the design of posters, additional designers are involved, for which at least 10 thousand rubles are allocated to pay for their services.

Income and expenses

Starting costs

To open a specialty shop for work and branded clothing from scratch, it will be necessary to bring all the costs together to determine the exact amount of payments and the total amount invested in the business. This table looks like this:

It is supposed to take the main amount from the bank - 1 million 360 thousand rubles at 18% per annum for 48 months. In this case, the monthly payment will be 38,460 thousand rubles. The rest of the money is supposed to be available as own funds - 65 thousand rubles.

Monthly expenses

Total: 146,000 rubles.

Revenue part

The markup on goods is up to 97%. This indicator is important to take into account when selling a large batch of in-demand workwear worth more than one million rubles. Income in this case will be distributed according to the following system:

The maximum revenue will be 500,000. At first, goods from stock will be sold, then the share of suppliers will be 40%. Thus, the income of the enterprise will be 300 thousand rubles. Subtracting monthly expenses, we get 154 thousand rubles of profit, which can be considered an excellent indicator.

Profitability will be about 100%, which is an excellent result for this line of work. However, we note that the calculation was made according to a positive strategy. The average profitability is expected at the level of 60-70%, and revenues - within 100 thousand rubles.

Eventually

Special clothing is in demand on the market all year round, and the reduced seasonal factor makes the business profitable all year round for individual entrepreneurs. By placing a store near highways in a place with the largest influx of visitors, you are guaranteed to start receiving the planned profit.

The risk factors include, first of all, competition among companies selling this type of product to attract wholesale buyers and large enterprises that give the best result. Probable income is provided by many parameters, starting with successful advertising and ending with the optimal ratio of price and quality, overcoming competition.

In the modern world, it is difficult to imagine the activity of any manufacturing company or corporation without overalls - they are used everywhere. Workwear is not a whim of the employer, it is designed to help maintain safety and hygiene at work. Its special role is in protection from exposure to harmful substances, although sometimes overalls also perform a decorative function. Everyone knows that overalls are mandatory in such areas as medicine, food handling (restaurants, shops), construction, security structures and even the hotel business. It is the high demand for this type of clothing that justifies the high profitability and relevance of the tailoring business.

The tailoring business differs from other businesses in many ways, and this article will help you understand its features.

How much money should be invested in the creation of production

To start a business, you will need at least $15 000 .

A significant part of the amount will be spent on the purchase of sewing equipment, which will require space to install. Experts recommend renting a room, it can be both industrial and warehouse - this is not important. However, the size of the room is important - it should not be less than 70 square meters. The premises, to the great joy of a novice businessman, will not require huge costs - the fact is that renting production and storage space is much cheaper than renting offices.

Typically, the cost of renting a production space is about 30% of the cost of renting an office.

How about competition

Let's not hide - there is insane competition in this business. Yes, if you were counting on easy prey, then you were mistaken - at first you will have to break through here. You can easily assess the volume of competition by simply entering the query "workwear in Moscow" into the search engine. You will be offered more than a hundred companies, each of which offers its product in this area. But don't get scared right away. Firstly, competition pushes for development, and secondly, in this industry it can be overcome by choosing a specialization, as well as making clothes of very high quality and functional.

Ease of production

Overalls, in comparison with ordinary clothes, have a simple cut and almost all are standardized - this suggests that they can be made quickly enough and in large quantities. For the most part, materials for workwear are also used special, but you can find them in almost any fabric store (in bulk, of course). Tailoring of overalls is made according to patterns - you can freely buy them all in the same Tkani stores or make them yourself according to the purchased overalls. However, do not forget about competition - your clothes should stand out from the line of their own kind, so you will need to improve existing patterns, supplement them with something new and certainly functional. The quality of the final product has three components: quality material, quality equipment and quality work.

How to sell workwear

Your potential customers are companies, legal entities and individual entrepreneurs, you should pay attention to this when choosing a marketing strategy. In this case, the b2b – business to business strategy will suit you. The best way to sell products is direct marketing. So, at first, a novice workwear manufacturer can visit companies using it himself with a proposal to conclude a supply contract. In this case, the main thing is to interest the client, to make it clear that your workwear is better than the one that is currently used at the enterprise.

The sequential chain of sales of products will look like this:

• Production of several copies of overalls.
• Creation of a commercial offer.
• Search for firms that use overalls.
• Receiving an order.
• Order fulfillment.
• Delivery of products to the customer.

Making to order is another way to cut costs, as you don't have to raise large amounts of working capital.

The profitability of the tailoring business is approximately 30%, which is a very good indicator. If three seamstresses produce 300 sets of overalls per month, costing about $25 - $30 each, then, after deducting the necessary expenses, the profit will be $1700 per month.

In pre-perestroika times, there was a huge network of stores in our country under the general name "Working Clothes". They were filled with dull overalls, tarpaulin and rubber boots, felt boots, padded jackets, canvas mittens and other unsightly goods. But the shops were popular because the things they sold helped people in their work. They made their work more comfortable and safer. Today, modern enterprises have come to replace them with beautiful, practical and comfortable, but still the same “work clothes”.

Zoya Alexandrovna, you have a diversified business. Who are the main clients, for whom do you work in the first place?

Our main customers were initially and remain to this day enterprises where the production process requires workers to have special clothing and footwear. These are, for example, the staff of medical institutions, catering workers, road workers, firefighters.

Among our regular customers are well-known enterprises in Pyatigorsk. These are OJSC Kholod, OJSC Pyatigorsk Khlebokombinat, LLC Hines and others.

We value our regular customers very much and we are happy to cooperate with them.

Which product segment is in the highest demand?

The largest purchase is directly from workwear. For example, shoes for road workers involved in asphalt laying, clothes for kitchen workers are in great demand.

Fire fighting equipment is being sold very actively. From time to time on TV we see and hear terrible information about fires that occurred due to the lack of proper equipment of buildings with fire extinguishing means. Many tragedies could have been avoided if an ordinary fire extinguisher had been at hand.

Personal protective equipment is very popular: respirators, goggles, gloves.

The seasonal factor also plays a role. By winter, workers need to be insulated and warm clothes (jackets, overalls, warm shoes) are sold well. In summer, light clothing becomes popular.

Can you please tell me how you do business? How did you become a sole trader or set up an LLC?

We work under the LLC scheme. This form of doing business is more convenient for us.

How did your business start? Why did you like this particular type of activity, and what was the reason for the choice?

The history of the business began in 2008. I was invited to work for one of the enterprises in Pyatigorsk, which sells overalls. I liked this work. I love people, communication. If a person came to us with a desire to buy a warm jacket, we selected the most convenient and comfortable one for him. I wanted the buyer to remember our store with a kind word when putting it on and be sure to recommend it to friends.

It often happened that purchases were not limited to one jacket. She wore shoes, gloves, and more. It happened that, having entered the store for a hat, the client left fully “staffed” for the winter. He left satisfied, because he acquired high-quality things at a very modest price. And completely free of charge he got friendly communication, practical advice and a good mood.

When communicating with wholesale buyers, representatives of organizations, we also tried and try to satisfy their requirements as much as possible. Sometimes there is even a “sporting interest” to find something, “I don’t know what” - similar wording of requests also occurs.

When I had accumulated sufficient work experience, I wanted to try my hand at running a business on my own. After consulting with her family, she decided to start her own business. At present, all family members work with me, we have a good family business.

In choosing my activity, I was not mistaken, I can say this absolutely for sure!

Tell us about your first year of work. What was the most difficult and most memorable for you?

The first year is difficult for any aspiring entrepreneur. What is the formation of relations with the tax office, the pension fund, the Social Insurance Fund worth. You have to delve into the wilds of accounting, select employees, form a team. At the same time, the assortment is being completed, the search for suppliers is underway.

A very important aspect was the process of attracting clients to the firm. The competition in our business sector is strong, and it is constantly growing due to the emergence of new companies and online stores. We had to look for an approach to each potential buyer, to convince that we are the best, the most versatile in terms of choice, flexible in prices, the most friendly in communication, the most convenient for business cooperation.
And we did it! We have excellent business partners and excellent clients. Work has become not only work, but also a holiday.

What do you remember from the first year? Fatigue, lack of sleep, lack of time to go home. But it can be overcome if there is a goal. And the goal was to take their place in the field of the chosen business, to earn authority and respect.
And one more word is suitable for characterizing the initial period: excitement. It is still present, but I still vividly remember those first sensations, when “as if in a whirlpool” you plunge into endless business and negotiations, you take on an almost impossible task.

Note from Moneymaker Factory: Read about all the organizational procedures that you need to go through before starting a business in our material. For the optimal form of tax accounting for small businesses, read the material online accounting.

You have already partially answered my next question about how to attract a client to your enterprise. Can you add something? And why would you advise young people to start a business?

Customers are now spoiled for choice with everything. This is not bad, because it makes us keep ourselves in good shape, look for new interesting suppliers, expand the number of products offered, and constantly be able to satisfy the customer's request in full.

But our efforts will be in vain if we cannot convey our advantages to the buyer. Advertising certainly moves commerce, but it is the personal touch that gives it momentum. The ability to feel the mood of a person, the desire to find a common language with him, I would advise beginners and future businessmen to acquire. Communication will not be taught anywhere, only personal qualities and the desire to communicate kindly with people will help to establish good business relations. Often a smile and a sympathetic word can decide the fate of a major purchase or a bargain.

Personal qualities are more important than professional ones. There are many professionals, but there are much fewer professionals who can establish reliable friendly relations with partners. They are highly valued and do not part with them.

Approximate initial capital to open a workwear store? Are any licenses or permits required?

The amount is influenced by many factors: the cost of renting a room with an area of ​​at least 100 m2. The sizes are large due to the mandatory presence of a warehouse of goods. If you have your own, great. But we will assume that the lease is still required.

How do you usually work with a client?

We have a retail department where customers are treated like in a regular store. If this is a wholesale buyer or organization, then the scheme is traditional: drawing up a supply contract, payment, delivery of goods. We often apply an individual approach to the client, we adapt to the scheme of work of partner enterprises. Payment for goods can be made upon shipment, can be paid in installments. Ultimately, a template emerges, according to which we work with each client.

Approximately what financial turnover per month have you had since the beginning of the activity, and what is it today?

In the first months of work, the sales turnover did not exceed 200 thousand per month. There were times of instability, especially in times of crisis. At present, our turnover significantly exceeds 1 million rubles. But I really hope that they will increase. With the expansion of production, the cost of its maintenance also increases.

The first word in the name of our business is the word “production”, and then “sales”. The prospect of development is directed precisely at production.

Currently, the business has grown by joining the garment business. Mainly with the help of my family members (husband, daughter, son-in-law) we were able to master the new direction. Now it is just beginning, but there are already quite a lot of buyers for our sewing products.

To date, we provide uniforms for workers of Roma-Pizza, Belorusskiye Kolbasy, JSC Kholod, popular enterprises in Pyatigorsk, and we sew chef's uniforms. There is a demand for products. So, there will be development of production.

We rented another office and are looking for new employees. Expanding!

There is an opinion that doing business in Russia (in our case, a small business) is very difficult. Do you agree with this definition? What is your view on this question?

Business in general is not easy. And in Russia too. To be a successful businessman, you need certain qualities of character, a willingness to work hard, put up with failures, and strive for a goal. It is important to be a decent person and be able to be responsible for your words and deeds. How many entrepreneurs are there? I am sure that among people who have their own business, there are much fewer of them than the total number of businessmen. Hence the problems.

And doing business in Russia is also complicated by the ever-changing legal framework. There are new forms of reporting, innovations in, the FSS, taxes are increasing. It is difficult to do business in Russia. Difficult, but possible!

And to everyone who dared to take this serious step, I wish to find their niche. To make it interesting, reliable and promising!

Investments: from 2 million rubles

Payback: from 1.5 years

When choosing to sell clothes as a business, most entrepreneurs often stop at ordinary everyday wardrobe items, despite the great competition in this segment. At the same time, there is a less obvious, but very promising direction - the sale of workwear. The demand for it is quite large, and it is not difficult to enter the market for this product.

business concept

Special clothing is designed to protect a person from exposure to harmful factors in the workplace. Such protective equipment is overalls, gowns, special suits, aprons, etc. They should be, first of all, practical, convenient and able to perform their direct functions.

Special clothing is used by workers in various industries. For example, such as medicine, fire service, security, production of various food products, hunting and fishing, as well as many others.

The customers of the workwear store can be both individuals who purchase clothes for their own needs, and companies that buy them in bulk for their employees.

What is required for implementation?

The first step towards starting your own business will be the official registration of the business. What organizational and legal form to choose, each owner decides independently. However, in the case of organizing a small enterprise, it is advisable to go through the registration procedure as an individual entrepreneur.

To implement the idea, you need a room for a store. You need to choose a passable place, because. For the store, a constant flow of visitors is extremely important. It is advisable to place a bright, eye-catching sign in front of the entrance, clearly making it clear which products are presented in the store.

After the repair work, the premises should be equipped with the necessary equipment, including racks and racks for products, fitting rooms (at least 2 pcs.), Cash register.

Simultaneously with the search and preparation of the premises, the assortment of the future store is determined. This is the most responsible task. The choice of goods should be wide enough so that the client can pick up everything he needs without turning to competitors. However, it is not necessary at the initial stage to take rare and complex items for sale. It is better to opt for high-quality and popular models that are in the greatest demand.

The store cannot do without qualified personnel. For shift work, you must hire at least two salespeople. Employees must have experience, be able to handle a cash register and find an approach to customers.

Step by step start instructions

A step-by-step plan for launching a workwear store will look like this:

1. Market analysis, identification of needs and study of competitors' offers.
2. Drawing up a business plan.
3. Search for funding.
4. Registration of a business (opening an individual entrepreneur).
5. Finding suitable premises for the store, concluding a lease agreement and carrying out repairs.
6. Selection, purchase, installation of equipment and furniture.
7. Search for suppliers of overalls, formation of an assortment, conclusion of contracts and purchase of the first batch of goods (this work is carried out simultaneously with the implementation of paragraphs 2 and 3).
8. Search and recruitment of personnel.
9. Launch of an advertising campaign.

Financial calculations

Having chosen a workwear store as a business, you should be prepared for the fact that it is guaranteed to require financial investments at each stage of launch. Let's take a look at what amounts we are talking about.

Start-up capital

The start-up capital will include the following expenses:

• IP registration;
• the cost of renting and repairing the premises;
• purchase of equipment;
• purchase of goods;
• advertising expenses.

On average, taking into account the above items of expenditure, it will take about 2 million rubles to open a store.

Monthly expenses

In addition to the start-up capital, the entrepreneur must take into account the presence of fixed monthly expenses, which include:

• monthly rental payment;
• communal payments;
• wage;
• monthly advertising budget.

In total, the average amount of monthly expenses will be 100 thousand rubles.

Payback periods

The payback period for each individual store will depend on many factors, as well as on the activity of the entrepreneur himself in the implementation of the project and his interest in business development. Nevertheless, according to various estimates, the payback period for such a business is on average 1.5 years.

Business Features

This type of business has a number of features, knowing and considering which, you can conduct business with greater efficiency.

First, it is necessary to remember about the presence of competitors and build work based on the analysis of similar proposals existing on the market.

For products such as clothing (even for special purposes), seasonality is a characteristic factor. With the onset of winter or summer, the assortment must be changed.

A positive feature is the weak dependence of sales volume on the location of the outlet. Purchase of overalls is made, as a rule, purposefully.

Conclusion

Summing up, it should be said that, despite the rather large amount of investments, the idea of ​​​​opening a workwear store can bring good income to the entrepreneur in the future. The start-up capital pays off relatively quickly, and doing business does not require special knowledge and skills. In addition, the business can be scaled by gradually turning one store into a network of outlets.