Texas always has clothing stores for sale and each has its own unique approach to the market. The demand for specialty clothing is constantly being driven by changes in fashion trends and changing lifestyles. However, many clothing sales are discretionary and very much subject to available consumer income.
While there are many possible business opportunities with in the clothing sales industry, certain types have proven themselves to be good ideas. These include big size stores, custom-made shops, children, bridal, sporting, and resort wear. An apparel store like these can easily expand its offering to include additional high-margin activity-related merchandise.
Listings of Clothing Stores For Sale in Texas
Complete Bridal Shop TO GO
Large North Texas Formal wear and Bridal clothing store
Harris County Lingerie store for less than asset value
Industry Overview
While half of apparel industry sales are from family clothing stores, women's fashion stores dominate with about 35% of the total number of locations. Women's clothing stores represent about a quarter of total industry sales with men's stores being around 6%. Children's clothing stores will generally carry infant ware, and accessories are carried by all types and often sold in their own specialty outlets.
Sizes of clothing stores for sale in Texas varies widely. A small boutique store can start in under 2,000 square feet, with the average mall store running around 7,000 square feet. From here sizes can range up to 30,000 square feet of large scale off-price outlets. As is the case in all forms of retailing, an important measure of business effectiveness is sales per square foot (and its cousin, cost per square foot).
The sale of clothes is quite seasonal, with major spring and fall seasons and in some cases summer and winter as well. As more and more inventory is imported, managing inventory and a more complex international supply chain has made handling these seasonal demands more challenging.
Improving store layouts are frequently opportunities to increase clothing sales. A flexible floor plan that allows for seasonal repositioning is a distinct asset. Since the shopping experience is a major determinant in customer loyalty, unique decor, appealing displays, background music, are in common use throughout Texas clothing stores.
Marketing and promotional programs can include TV, print, and advertising, direct mail and telephone campaigns, catalogs, and internet sites. Price mark-downs are frequently used both as a means to increase store traffic and to move excess inventory. As the merchandise becomes more expensive, customer service becomes more significant with a recent trend among the high end apparel stores to encourage the development of personal shopping relationships for each customer.
Industry Benchmarks
Cash flow in a Texas clothing store is generally as seasonal as the sales, with peaks in the fourth quarter. This includes both a back-to-school and holiday shopping benefit to sales. The clothing store owner needs to carefully monitor the seasonal inventory cash demands against cash available to keep inventory and sales at effective levels.
Another trend effecting sales and cash flow is the apparent general decline at many mall locations with a corresponding growth from catalog and internet sales,
Reasonable expense profiles as a percentage of sales for a clothing store business opportunity are:
Cost of Goods Sold: 46% to 52%
Labor Costs: 14% to 18%
Occupancy Costs: 6% to 10%
Pretax Profit: 12% to 15%
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