# How much inventory do i need for a 1200 Sf store??



## EddieM (Jun 29, 2009)

Anyone running a TShirt store?
Retail walk in T Shirt store..

I am thinking about opening one.

Looking at a 1200 SF store front in a high traffic area with a lot of walk by and drive by traffic.

If i am offering both M/F and Kids shirts and had say 100 or so designs ( I would be buying a lot of pre-made designs from Proworld plus some custom designs of my own.

What would i need to get this started?
How do you figure it out?

What amount of Ts in each size would i need to full the store and have extra stock in the back ready to go as we sell items.
Plus what colors sell the best?

Could i do this for 10K or less not including fixtures and setting up the inside of the store.

We can buy a store all set up right now for $49K with all the stock not including the building we would still need to pay the monthly rent. They sell a little of everything not many Ts but i do not want to sell a lot of what they are selling right now.

Looking at starting from scratch with a new store in a just opened new shopping center location.
We would need to do everything. The store is bare right now cement floors and drywall ready to be make into something.

Not going to offer to make custom shirts just going to sell what we have in the store and on-line.


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## Catbox (Oct 3, 2007)

you need about 1100 square ft of merchandise... 
so people will have a little room to walk around the store...lol
I have no clue... you could ask the people you are buying from what they recommend...


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## Liberty (Jul 18, 2006)

Take a different approach to your inventory levels. start with what your anticipated sales will be. Let's say you need to sell $20K per month and you hold a 50% gross margin. That tells you that you will have to turn $10K in inventory every month. The typical apparel retailer is doing pretty good with four inventory turns per year so you can extrapolate that into a $30K inventory at cost to support a $20K sales at retail. And that assumes you know what you're doing with regards to stocking goods that actually sell.

There is a lot of play in these numbers and you'll have to eventually work out your own. And none of this applies to just in time delivery in support of a custom operation. This only applies to a retailer with standing inventory. You can do a little digging to come up with inventory turns for a lot of publicly traded companies.

My personal opinion is that for a pure retail play, $10K in inventory is nowhere near enough and will only support retail sales in the area of $100K per year.


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## EddieM (Jun 29, 2009)

Thanks.

If we could do the - only support retail sales in the area of $100K a year that would be ok maybe.

We will be selling another item that should support over 100k in profit on it's own plus we hope to do well with internet sales as well.

The store we are looking into next week is.

$1500 for 1000 SF or
$2000 for 1200 SF

The area gets over 14 million tourists a year and this store location should see around 7 to 8 million people walk by it a year looking in our front window.


If we could sell shirts and cover the cost of the store rent, elc insurance, water and to pay one worker 20k a year i would be ok with that. We have a worker ready to go if we can get all this set up and worked out right.

So we would need to make around $55k to 60K a year to break even in profit from the shirts sales.
We would then make our profit from other things to do with photography.

The store front with the T Shirts would be a good draw to get people in the store so they can then see what all we have to offer.
We would then also offer custom photography related items on shirts and just about everything after a photo session out on location.

We would be moving away from our current town location and move away from out current business that all ready makes over 100K a year profit. To move to a new town and start all this up in a new location with a store and add on the shirts the new thing we are getting into.
We would be selling our house here as well and will be renting a place to live at the new location another cost to us.


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## Liberty (Jul 18, 2006)

Wow, 7 million foot traffic for that price is a bargain. But that number sounds wildly high. Is this year round traffic or seasonal? When you figure the gate count at the Magic Kingdon is about 16 million a year, you are projecting half that traffic in walk-bys? Thats a person every 2 seconds, 12 hours a day, 365 days a year.

If you get a fraction of those numbers and you offer anything of interest to those walking by, your problem is going to be how to restock in the middle of the day and how to avoid exhaustion. I'd have to say go for it and find something to sell... but be careful relying on those foot traffic numbers.


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## needsomeshirts (Oct 24, 2009)

i would say 10k should do it. that could get you around 1000+ good quality shirts to start with.


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## TshirtGuru (Jul 9, 2008)

EddieM said:


> Thanks.
> 
> If we could do the - only support retail sales in the area of $100K a year that would be ok maybe.
> 
> ...


Curious, why are you moving away from your business that makes $100k profit already? Are you guys looking to become bigger?


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## EddieM (Jun 29, 2009)

Hi A few reasons.
Our current business is Photography and we work on the beach all summer and i am getting tired of going out on the beach everyday in the heat, wind, fog and sometimes lite rain.
I get down in the sand shooting and my knees are bothering me a lot now days and after years of carrying around cameras on my neck and back and carrying around lighting equipment i have many neck and back problems.
Many young photographers do not see what being a photographer can be to your health over time.. Not a good thing.
I know may photographers that have to take many pain pills just to make it for a wedding day.
I am at that point now myself.
Put a 10 pound weight hanging around your neck and walk around for 5 to 8 hours a few times a week and you will see what it is like. Plus a never ending amount of hours editing photos and filling orders.
My life as a photographer is wake up go to PC start editing till its time to go shoot the next job, Drive to job shoot session drive home go to my PC up load photos make back up DVDs and go back to editing till i go to bed then do it all over the next day.
We shot almost 130 jobs in 7 months this year plus filled hundreds of orders.

It is a fun job most times but it is work and it takes its toll on you after many years.

Right now we are just getting into T Shirts and designs and hope to over the next year or more have the T Shirt business (websites) making more then our photography business and we will still do some photography to stay in it to just not shoot everyday.

Looking at a store front to sell shirts and other junk and show photos to sell family photo sessions.
We would quit shooting weddings unless they are very small 1 or 2 hour weddings.
Shooting portrait sessions takes less time and editing then weddings but we would need to make up the difference in money we would miss out on from the weddings with TShirt sales.

Hope to some day be all TShurts sales on the internet and hit 200K a year and then not have a store or shot phots for a living just for fun.

I guess you could say i am getting older and want to work on another business that i can do forever and enjoy photography for fun.


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## TshirtGuru (Jul 9, 2008)

Oh ok that makes sense.

But just remember, the grass is not always greener on the other side.


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## sjidohair (Apr 9, 2008)

Eddie,, 
I have a store front, and i say go for it,, 
what you might think will sell, might change in a Month once you see the traffic that walks in, they will tell you what they want,, and listen,
What you start with might be on sale when you know for sure what your market it,, 
Beach tees and store tees, will keep somewhat the same, style, but go with the flow,
If i can help, let me know,
MMM
Great luck to you


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## Teamwear (Mar 12, 2007)

I did not see anyone ask-but are you heat applying these as transfers?

If so-inventory would not cost nearly as much. 

Buy a dozen of each of the designs you want and create some specific or custom to you and print a few as you go.

Of course have plenty ready to go-but you could print to replenish a couple of times a week and not have the big outlay. 

I would put some of every size out there and replenish.

I just do not see it costing $10K to stock this store in t-shirts. Even 1000 shirts (just the shirts) would only cost $2500 at the most-transfers no more than that-you are looking at $5K on the shelves ready to sell. 

Add back stock of 300 shirts and spare prints for another $1000 and you should have enough to get started. ( I am assuming you would not have much of a back room for production)

I would use the extra money on a few other things to stock the store. 


If this is still a beach location-it would make sense to add a few more items. I seem to always buy a hugger and a straw hat at the beach too. Maybe even some sublimated car tags and mugs.

I am sure you know all this. It just got me thinking what I would do.

Sounds fun.


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