Posts Tagged ‘exclusive clothing retail’
Small Business Interview with SJ Trotter from Exclusive Clothing Retail (www.exclusiveclothingretail.com)
Tuesday, February 2nd, 2010
What best defines ecommerce? The lack of boundaries in searching for the best goods/services at the best price. We here at KikScore came across www.exclusiveclothingretail.com and its owner, S.J. Trotter on Twitter and have been following ECR for a while (despite the fact we’re on the opposite side of the Atlantic). We’re a fan of ECR and asked Mr. Trotter to give us a few minutes to talk about the economy, lessons on business, and who is his favorite Beatle. He obliged. Here’s our interview:
1. How did you get started with your store and selling online?
As soon as we started our company, Exclusive Ent, we knew we wanted to start by selling online, with the amount of free advertising you can gain from social networks an online store is a must.
2. How would you summarize your survival strategy for the past two years?
Not throwing money into the company! One thing we agreed from the start was to slowly build up our company and not take out a massive loan to try and kick start it. Word of mouth and social network promotion was our route rather than spending thousands on advertising. Resulting in us being in 0 debt at this current time which I believe is an achievement.
3. Have you seen any recent uptick in business activity
Because we are a fairly new company we have had a steady increase in sales since we began 2 years ago.
4. What will be your focus for 2010?
Artist’s endorsements & finalizing plans to open our own flagship shop.
5. What are 2 things that you would pass along as guidance for a business just starting out today?
Just do not allow yourself to built up a large amount of debt. As good as your idea is to you, your never ever know if it will be a reality and sell well so test the waters for a while before you start piling money into your business. Also take full advantage of all social network and free Internet advertising.
6. Have you seen any sales deriving from social media?
50% of our sales come from social networking sites, the chain reaction you can achieve from them is priceless.
7. If you could have dinner with any person, present or past, who would it be and why?
Richard Branson, I think I could write a list of 100 questions to ask him in seconds!
8. Better Artist: John Lennon or Paul McCartney?
John Lennon for simply ‘Imagine’, But really I’m not sure you can pick between them they are both world class
9. One informal economic indicator that you watch more closely than anything else?
Although it may not be an economic indicator what I watch closer than anything is my competitions prices, not necessarily so we are always cheaper but more that we show our customers that we have more value for money.
10. Any favorite piece of advice you’ve received?
Built your company with what you earn, not what you can borrow
