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Starting an apparel line will be a challenging endeavor, but it can also be very rewarding if done right. Here are the first 5 things someone starting an apparel line should think about and start executing on:
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Develop A Strong Brand Identity: Before launching your apparel line, one of the most important steps is to develop a clear and distinct brand identity that sets you apart from the rest of the field. To do this, it's key to define your target audience, and create a unique brand name and logo that represent your brand ideals and style. This is often easier said than done though, sometimes great ideas strike you like lightning, sometimes they take months to evolve through a lot of hard though and rough drafts. Just follow your vision and try to stay true to your passion that started you on this journey in the first place. You'll eventually get it solidified enough to at least take the first steps.
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Conduct Market Research: Before launching your apparel line, it's important to get to know your audience, the closer and more clearly you can identify your target market and understand their preferences and desires, the more they'll resonate with your brand. This understanding will help you in many ways and will evolve as you build the brand over time, so don't worry if you don't know exactly who your avatar is to start with. Oftentimes they look a lot like YOU, so choose what you want first, and through that process you'll create a brand identity and product line that will bring you and your customers into alignment.
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Create High-Quality Designs: Your designs are a major component of your apparel line, it's how you visually represent what the brand stands for. It's essential to create designs that are unique, visually appealing, and match the brand vision. This includes more than just the design itself though, the blanks you choose should match the style, cut, and material preferred by your target market, and paying attention to finishing details like custom printed neck labels, and individual folding & bagging are also a key part of crafting the customer relationship with the product.
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Establish A Reliable Supply Chain: This is an essential component to ensure that you have access to a supplier and resources that can bring your brand to life. This includes finding reliable screen printing and fulfillment companies for the shirts and other products your brand will create. Make sure you work with a manufacturer or production team that can handle production at scale, meet deadlines, and has solid communication and repeatable quality (this is exactly what we focus on at www.IndustryThreadworks.com, click here if you'd like to work with us).
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Develop A Marketing And Sales Strategy: Launching your apparel line is just the beginning, and it's important to have a marketing and sales strategy in place to promote and sell your products. This includes identifying and choosing sales channels that you want to focus on (such as social media platforms, an ecomm store, pop-up shops, or wholesale), developing a pricing strategy, and creating a marketing plan to reach your target audience. Marketing is a whole other animal that we'll cover in another blog post though, it's far too complex to do it justice with just a paragraph.
In the meantime, if you enjoyed reading about this and want to go deeper into what it takes to build a successful apparel brand from the ground up, we have our Brand Building Guide available here, or we'd love to connect with you on our Instagram page!
