Boutique Chat #035 | Meet a New Wholesale Marketplace, Fashion Domino

All right, it's time for episode number 35 with a brand new wholesale shopping marketplace. Get ready to meet Fashion Domino. Let's talk about your business strategy and the juicy details of what actually works, from mainstream fashion to fashion on Main street and the entire ecosystem behind it. How do we scale your company and do it with the balance and the happiness that we all seek? Let's hear from those insiders, experts and strategists that actually make it happen. I'm your host, Ashley Alderson from the Boutique Hub, and I can't wait to chat. So one of your most critical jobs on a daily basis as a boutique owner is understanding where your newest, freshest and trendiest pieces are going to be coming from.

Now, I know that so many of.

You are going to markets on a regular basis and you're working with your trusted reps on an ongoing basis sourcing new products for your store. But there's still a lot of times where you're looking for those ready to ship pieces that you can bring in immediately and turn for a good margin. So today I'm really excited, you guys to sit down with a brand new wholesale marketplace called Fashion Domino. Now, we just met Fashion Domino not all that long ago when we began to collaborate with them for a trip that we're taking to LA to the fashion district for a group of just about 100 members of the Boutique Hub who are a part of our retail boot camp program. Fashion Domino stepped up and wanted to offer busing to help get our buyers around the city of la and we wanted to sit down with them and learn more about their business, about the marketplace, and about the number of discounts and free shipping offers that they're able to pull from brands that they work with and provide to their retail members and buyers who are using the service. So this week I'm really excited to talk to the team at Fashion Domino to learn more about the service and share with you guys so that you can take advantage of these opportunities that are presented to you. You to find those great pricing, free shipping, and to find new brands that you may not have carried in your store before. So get ready to meet this brand new wholesale fashion marketplace and enjoy.

All right, guys, welcome back to the podcast. This week, I'm so excited to have not just one, but four guests with me today as we have a very special episode of Boutique Chat. Today we're talking with a brand new wholesale fashion marketplace called Fashion Domino and their leadership team. And rather than me go through and give you the introductions, I want you to put voices to names. So guys, I would love it if each of you could take a second to introduce yourself and then we'll get into talking more about the company and what we're here for today.

Hi, my name is Ho. So I'm the CEO of Fashion Domino. I'm very happy to announce our accompanied to the podcast and we start from last April and we are growing around 15 and 20% every month and not every year. So it is very wonderful. And then we start from the small fashion district area but we are growing to more and more and from even the other every day are trying to join our fashion dominant wholesale marketplace. So we are very happy and we are very proud of them.

Wonderful, thanks. So this is Mr. Kim, the CEO. Thank you for joining us today. We appreciate it.

Thank you.

Hi, my name is Sean and I'm in charge of our business operations. I oversee our entire operations ranging from business aspect, HR, digital product sourcing, vendors and etc.

Wonderful, thanks Sean.

Hello, my name is Jay. I'm the sales director here at Fashion Domino's and my job here is currently getting new vendors, connecting vendors to buyers like you guys. And currently we're in the works of getting a lot of new vendors here locally and domestically as well. So hopefully you'll be one of our bigger buyers, you could say and we could go and get you connected to all the new vendors here in Los Angeles and beyond.

Wonderful, thanks Jay.

Thank you.

Hi, my name is Victoria Kanievski and I'm in charge of traditional and digital marketing for Fashion Domino. Fashion Domino is my preferred client because I am an independent consultant. The reason they hired me because I'm the only one person in fashion industry who has super heavy business to consumer background and experience working in online fashion marketplaces. So I combined my experience brought it to Fashion Domino and I hope that we are going to become first. Not first, but one of top fashion online marketplaces.

Perfect. Thank you Victoria. Then thank you all of you for being here today and I'll let you guys each, you know, jump in and answer questions at your will. Really for everybody who's listening today. I think the purpose of this conversation and the podcast is really to share the fact that there, you know, is something new available to learn more about it and to talk about what the benefits are going to be for those boutique owners in the industry. So are you taking a unique approach to bringing on vendors in terms of, we'll say pre qualifying them based on their styles and their collections to ensure that pieces are unique on the platform yes.

So what we do is we not only consider their sales or their. When we look at their products, we make sure that they're unique and that they are communicating with their buyers. And they're also meeting their needs and understanding the demographics and the needs of the buyers.

Perfect. So like other fashion marketplaces, the vendors congregate on your site. A retailer can come and I'm just kind of walking through how this works. A retailer can come, discover the vendors, discover the styles. The checkout process takes place on your site, and then those vendors are individually fulfilling those orders, correct?

Yes.

Yes.

Perfect. Can you tell me about other services and the other perks that Fashion Domino.

Provides for our vendors? We also provide photo studio service, meaning that we have our own photo studio and we have about 60 top models. And these models are fashion models, not just print models. And we provide the service to our vendors so that they could showcase their products better. And also for buyers, we provide free shipping.

Perfect. Tell me more about that. I know shipping is such a pain point for so many boutique owners today and a lot of the surprises that they get in shipping and handling charges. So can you talk more about that? You know the number of vendors that are offering those free shipping or other discounts on the platform. I know that's something unique to you guys, right?

So about 80% of our vendors are participating in our free shipping promotion. So any order, there is no minimum requirement. Any order, no, doesn't matter how much. We're providing free shipping for those buyers. Also about 50% of our vendors, they also participate in discount programs. So not only they're giving free shipping with us, but they're also providing discount.

We understand that majority of our buyers are boutiques and smaller retailers. So that's why we understand how tight on budgets they are. And free shipping will give them opportunity to expand their inventory so they can buy more, they can add more, more of new arrivals. And this is part of our strategy from the beginning. So that's why we concentrate on free shipping. And as for photography, I wanted to add that our models are girls who work on LA Fashion Week, New York Fashion Week magic show. They work with major clients all over United States. We have very, very high selection. I believe that we provide service not only for vendors, but for boutiques as well. For example, if somebody, if a boutique wants to photograph and we can provide lifestyle images, e commerce images, we use the best e commerce photography practices to showcase product. So customers would like it. Because at this time, when customers can touch and feel the product, photography is a main Selling tool, certainly important.

So many boutique owners rely on those stock images on a regular basis. So that's definitely.

Yeah. But we can provide customized photography for boutiques.

Okay. On top of the images that you're already taking with the brands?

Yes, yes. If somebody wants, if for example, boutique wants a customized collection, they can pick from our portfolio and we would make photoshoot before we ship the order.

Oh, wow, that's a nice perk. Can you talk about, you know, are there other consolidated shipping opportunities or, you know, connecting with other people who may be private label in la? Are there some of those connections as well? Once an order is placed for a.

Retailer, yes, we do offer that service, but private labeling, it's basically between the buyer and our vendor. So the buyer would have to contact the vendor and see if they're okay with it. But we have some vendors that are.

Providing that service and also we do have great companies to refer for private label. So we always believe in providing resources. If somebody needs private label and at particular moment we cannot offer it. So we will refer them to somebody who would do the best.

Wonderful. You mentioned to me earlier about some boutiques who are new have a difficulty joining because of your catch 22 with receipts or that approval process. Can you talk about, you know, whether you're a new boutique owner or an established boutique owner coming onto the platform, how that onboarding process takes place?

We try to make the process very simple by so especially for our new boutique owners, we understand that they don't have any sales history. So what we offer is as long as they could provide us with seller's permit, then we could go ahead and activate their account.

Perfect. Overall, you know, we talked about your mission to basically shake up the wholesale industry and provide something new with a great focus on opportunity for the boutique owner. Can you tell me more just about your overall mission and what you're trying to achieve in this first year of business and in the next five years of business moving forward for the industry.

First year, we would like to let people know that we exist, let them try what we do, be happy with our services. Right now we are, are trying to expand and in next five years we would like to see ourselves very established company with tons and tons of new merchandise, different merchandise or I would say if it's the same, but super high quality merchandise. And we would like to provide our buyers and our vendors with also educational materials because we believe if people know what they are doing, they expand their businesses. So we would like to help our vendors grow, our buyers grow, and then we'll grow then.

That's going to make us grow too.

Yeah. And so we would like to be, we would like to concentrate on providing great quality, affordable prices, educational materials, free shipping. We would like to be above and beyond than our competition.

So talk about the types of boutiques that are most commonly shopping there now and really the types of boutiques you feel like the vendors that you have fit. Is there a certain demographic of boutiques and buyers that you see commonly on the platform or you know, price points that your vendors typically fall in range of?

Yes, I can answer this question. So pretty much right now we took off super fast. So among our buyers, we do have large chain retailers, we have top online retailers, lots of small, smaller businesses, lots of boutiques. But I would say 50 to 60% are boutiques and smaller retailers. And this demographic between I would say 27 and 45 years for owners who sell pretty much contemporary, some me jewelry, handbags, our typical price point, I would say between $10 and I would say $30. Because we have several vendors with higher price point and their items very popular.

Do you see many, you know, the vendors. If we, we talk about the life cycle of fashion, right? From being, you know, the manufacturing process, the sample process. The vendors who go to trade shows do have your vendors. Can you talk about the, the new samples that are developed and say taken to a trade show and shopped, you know, by a boutique owner there and then they come back to la? What is the time difference between when something is new and kind of being marketed as a sample, between when it's being placed on your site and that ordering process takes place? Can you talk about kind of that process and how it works.

The real process in ideal world, samples are developed, taken to the show, people order. In the real world, it doesn't work way. Manufacturers develop samples daily. They put them on website, on pre sale, people shop. This is the truth. That's how it works. And of course there are collections that are taken to the show. But I would say 80% of vendors work of samples. They don't exist.

Right. And I ask you that because I think that there are so many new retailers in the industry that it's important for them to understand, you know, the lifecycle of their products and where they come from and really what happens before it reaches that box in their store for them to put out.

Life cycle can be as small as, I would say two weeks up to a few months.

It could be even shorter than that.

Yeah, And I do believe it's, it has to do A seasonal in the aspect of shows. Yeah. If they have a seasonal item, they'll wait until the following shows that come up in Vegas or the east coast or the West Coast. You know, it depends on, I guess, the show in the area where you want to showcase your items.

Yeah, but I've seen the pattern before. I've seen pattern pretty much, much smaller. Again, some people work of shows, some people work off. It depends on the collection, on kind of items that boutique want. It's all very individual. If you can ask me if you would like to ask me more specific questions, maybe I come up with more specific answers.

All right, so let's ask the question in this way. Victoria. You know, I think there's confusion sometimes when boutique owners go to any online marketplace and some items are ready to ship and some are two weeks out, some are months out and some never ship. Right. Because there's not the popularity and demand for that sample. So therefore it never gets manufactured. Can you talk specifically about that process and maybe what retailers should be looking for?

Also another reason why the item is not shipped is because manufacturer run out of fabric and they cannot produce anymore. So that's why it's not shipped.

Is there a good way for them on your site to know, you know, estimated shipping times and to follow up directly with that vendor if they want recuts and restocks, if that's even possible?

Yes, that's what we are shooting for because we don't want to have people to have false expectations. We understand people's time, a value of people's time and we want them to be sure if they ordered something, they.

Would receive it absolutely perfect. Okay, so we talked about this a little bit at the beginning. But I do want to come back around to this because I think it's, you know, it's something that you guys are making sure that you highlight about your business and that's the importance of boutiques. You know, not only shopping from big, well known brands in la, but also some of the up and coming and new vendors. And that seems to be something that you specialize in. Correct?

Our sales director, he also does vendor recruitment and he is very good at picking out the unique vendors of our market.

In regards to the vendors themselves, I do believe there's thousands here locally in Los Angeles. I know there are, you know, hundreds and thousands of all across the United States. You know, where the fashion is booming in New York or Atlanta or in Dallas. But you know, we do our best to, you know, hand pick or you could say if they specialize in something or even the buyers if they are looking for someone in particular. You know, we do our best to cater to the buyer's needs as well. Try to get those vendors to sign up with us. So we do our due diligence in the aspect of picking the right vendors. So the vendors themselves would do well. But you know, the buyers are getting what is hot currently out in the, you know, the fashion world.

Fashion market.

Perfect. And a discount on top of it, which is unique.

Correct.

And free shipping.

Yeah, free shipping. You can't go wrong with that.

Perfect. So before we switch gears and talk more about wholesale industry as a whole because I would love your guys on this industry that we're in. Is there anything else specifically on the site and the platform and fashion domino that you would like to share that we haven't already covered?

Basically about our platform, it's developed by high end professionals. It's easy to shop, easy to navigate. We have application process, registration process for boutique, for buyers and for vendors are simplified again to save time. If we are talking about vendors, we have super easy admin for them to navigate and upload merchandise. We are trying to save everybody's time.

Also we are open to vendors as well as buyers feedback. So if they want us to make revision here or adjustment, we welcome and make accommodation as much as we can.

Perfect.

We'll keep that in mind. And if anyone in our boutique hub community has feedback, we'll be sure to send that along to you as well. I think that's a great industry collaboration to help build the platform for both sides.

Yes. Right. Yeah. Also we always try to build a new business model to help our vendors as well as our buyers. So beside this B2B marketplace model, we are developing a new business model for the boutique shop and other buyers. So probably you will see those business models in three months later. So probably it will help a lot for the current vendors and then new buyers.

Perfect. Can you talk about as a whole, do you feel like there are in the industry today because it's changing so fast? Do you think that there are common wholesale buying misconceptions out there that you would like to help retailers better understand when it comes to, you know, the sourcing of their products and where they come from in the wholesale cycle?

Well, I can answer it from marketing point of view and my personal experience. So I believe that lots of retailers, they are not buying exactly inventory that will sell for their demographics. They are not sure who their buying Persona is. They don't. Some of them, let's put it this way not everybody knows what they are doing. It's about buying wholesale patterns that I saw from inside being in other very established marketplace. That's what I know.

I think you bring up a great point Victoria, because I think we see that as well a lot in the hub through conversations that we have with retailers on a daily basis. And so that point of education and helping retailers understand rather than buying on just trend and what seems to be popular, buying for your exact customer Persona, your exact demographic and not losing sight of who that is. Correct?

Yes. Because I know that lots of buyers, they go on the side, that they browse around and like. Oh, I like that personally. And they shop for themselves. Buyers can shop for their own taste if they have huge following, if they are top influencers. But if they are trying to cater to, to their customers, they have to shop for their customers. And also another pattern. Sometimes they buy a lot because they are scared to run out of inventory. I believe that it's better to be understocked and show your customers that your product is in great demand than to overstock and then don't know what to do with inventory. This is another whole. I mean I would like to sell, I would suggest to buy as much as possible because it would be good for our marketplace. But.

Right, but going deep on one product isn't recommended.

Yeah, it's better to shop small to run test and then take sale for. Take sell for a cell and buy more. This way company would stick in business. At the end of the day, they would buy more.

Absolutely. Can you speak to, I mean I know between all of your experience you've dealt with a number of successful retailers over the years. So can you speak to any commonalities that you see between you know, those buyers and retailers that are successful? What do they have in common?

They cater to buyers.

They're buyers, they cater to buyers, they have budgets, they invest in marketing, they know what they are doing, they are constantly learning and they invest in good employees. Basically this is from marketing point of view.

I mean the way I see it is these boutique owners, the good ones, the way they run their successful business is by catering to their buyers, understanding their buyers needs and demographics. And like Victoria said, shopping for the buyers, not for themselves. That's a key.

Absolutely. And also all retailers, I would say one of keys for success, increasing retention rate, meaning treat their buyers, existing customers as a gold.

I think that's a great point. You know, stats in retail show that 80% of your revenue often comes from 20% of your list. So There's a lot to exactly about treating those existing buyers well. How about on the flip side? You've also seen a number of successful wholesalers and manufacturers along the way. So can you speak to what those successful companies have in common?

I can answer this question. They try the most successful manufacturers. Again, they also try to know their customers, their wholesale customers. They deliver, cater to their needs and also they constantly work on new arrivals because new arrivals in wholesale industry is a key. This is simple. The more new arrivals you have daily, weekly, monthly, the more sales you will get. And again, quality of product. Because buyers are very smart. Even if they don't have experience, they don't want to shop for collection that was made three years ago and pocket from left side was moved to right side and present it as new. They want great quality, matching price, good price. And even if it's the same trend, they want great quality new product.

So it's basically going back to the same concept. Even as a vendor, you have to understand the needs of your buyers and cater to what they want, what their customers need instead of making products that as a vendor that you think is going to sell. Because that's not going to work.

I believe in each industry, wholesale or retail, it's all about customers making them happy.

How about in terms of changes you guys have seen in the wholesale side of the business over the last couple of years? I know just as E commerce has grown so much and so much of business is done online today, can you talk about just these changes that you've seen over the years and then you know your predictions on where this industry is going and where a lot of the the traditional wholesale commerce will take place in the future.

So I mean in my experience a lot has shifted from traditional marketplace to online marketplace for past, I would say eight, nine years. But in order to have your successful business in fashion industry, I think you also have to emphasize on traditional market offline marketing also. And in order to in fashion industry as a whole, I think in order to survive and prosper, you have to understand the need of again going back to the same concept, the need of your understand your customers, understand your clientele, understand their needs and their demographics and accommodating their needs. I would say that's the key.

And I can add about online presence for many wholesale and retail companies. The problem I see in the industry is that people heard from friends and friends of friends that all money are online. And for some reason they think that they don't treat online business as serious as traditional business. For example, if you build a store, you know that break even point going to happen from three to five years. For some reason for online business, people believe that break even point going to happen either from immediately to three months and they are really disappointed. Yeah. Also I came up this term, I call it manufacturer mentality. When people have manufacturer mentality, they cannot proceed with online business. What I mean in manufacturing world people receive order and then they receive money and then they produce their goods. In online business, it's more like a gambler. You invest and then you see results. Unless people are ready to go. And for investing, they have to know what they're doing. Lots of people don't know what they're doing, don't want to learn what they're doing or invested in wrong people in wrong resources and then they're wondering why online business doesn't work.

I think that's great advice. I think that's, that's an important distinction to make. Certainly. Do you see, I think both of you mentioned, you touched on the points of successful companies in the fashion industry today have to have both an online and an offline presence. And so, you know, do a number of the vendors that you work with and, and your take as successful vendors in this industry, you know, both market themselves on your marketplace or on an online marketplace and attend certain apparel shows throughout the country?

Absolutely, absolutely.

Jay, you want to touch up on that topic?

Can I just add in fashion industry it's always going to be merging online and offline because by statistics, lots of people, I would say majority of people, they need to touch and feel the product to make their decision. So traditional presence always going to be there. Now Jay is going to talk more.

It works both ways, I think. But as the market is changing, a lot of them are opening online businesses just for one reason, connecting with buyers. You could say not. You go to shows, you're limited to a certain amount of people that you could connect. But if you're online, it's worldwide. So you have connection to people you know, not just locally here or in the states or whoever comes to the show. But you have presence all over the world so that you know that helps you in the aspect of sales. But even that, I think it's marketing and educating yourself. Even the buyer, even the vendors themselves have to educate themselves on what the buyers will want. And for the buyers, you know, perspective, it's good to shop on marketplaces like ours because they are not only catering to one store that we have multiple hundreds, you know, of stores that they could look at in One spot instead of going to. If you go to a mall, you have to go to many stores to get different stuff. But here in like a marketplace, you have all these stores at the power of your fingertips. You know, you could go wherever you want and purchase at the same time and consolidate them, you know, and be able to get those products to you to sell.

I think that that's such a great answer to the question, and I'm glad that you structured it that way. And really, one of the reasons I wanted to ask that is because dialogue among boutique owners today, you hear back and forth, you know, is it still worthwhile to attend apparel trade shows? Or I do the majority of my shopping online in a marketplace or I go direct to la. You know, there's so many different opinions and ideas out there. But I think the point that you hit on is that no matter what type of retailer you are, having a combination of those experiences is absolutely vital. Both having the flexibility and the freedom and the ease of shopping on a marketplace like yours on Fashion Domino, where you can immediately, you know, see what your needs are, place those orders and have them shipped conveniently to you, along with coming and having that personal experience with those vendors at a show or in LA directly. Would you guys agree to that combination being so experienced or so important for retailers today?

Absolutely.

Awesome. Well, I would love to, you know, kind of conclude our time together today talking about something that we're doing in conjunction with one another. The Boutique Hub and Fashion Domino, really providing a similar experience to that, you know, kind of an online omnichannel marketplace. For those of you who are listening, you may not know, but the Boutique Hub is hosting an LA experience in October. And we're bringing just about 100 boutique hub members who are a part of our elite retail bootcamp program. And we're spending three to four days collectively in la and we're pairing with Fashion Domino to really create that personal experience. So can you guys talk about the collection of vendors that you're bringing together and more about how we're collaborating while we're in la?

Oh, sure. So we are trying to bring our vendors of the vendors that may interest on Boutique Hub members, and we are trying to have them meet our vendors on Tuesday between 10:30.

October 9th.

October 9th. Right. Between 10:30 to 1:30. The idea here is for our vendors to meet the buyers, the Boutique Hub members vice versa, and build a strong relationship. And once they have the trust, they could go ahead and build their business on it.

Yeah. And also, again, the way we are Doing it. We are bringing vendors who Boutique Hub members would like to see, not vice versa. We would like to deliver and cater to their needs.

Absolutely. And they're excited about that. I tell you, the conversations that I hear inside of Retail Bootcamp, they feel like it's a true VIP experience because it is going to be vendors that are catered to their needs. So we're really, we're thankful for that and we're looking forward to that. And I believe you guys are also providing transportation while we're there. So it's really going to be a great LA experience for the community.

Of course.

Yep.

Wonderful. Well, is there anything that we didn't cover today that you guys would like to add about our collaborations or anything about Fashion Domino that you would love for people to know about?

I think we've covered all the points going back to our event. Of course the lunch is provided so you guys can come and enjoy. Just great lunch.

Yeah.

And as for the whole community of Boutique members, we would like to add that Fashion Domino is here. We are waiting for them to shop. We'll go overboard. We'll take care of extra needs. We'll do the best just for to make them happy and come back again and again.

I mean, that's the whole point. That's why we exist. We're here to make our buyers happy.

Yes.

And likewise, we love that. That's our mission as well, right? Building businesses all over the world.

Absolutely.

Absolutely.

Perfect. Well, thank you guys so much for your time today. It was great to get to hear more from each of you and your unique perspectives on the industry and what's happening moving forward, both in wholesale and retail. So thanks again and I look forward to meeting each of you in person very soon.

Absolutely. Thank you. We are looking forward to meeting you too.

Wonderful. Thank you guys. Have a great day.

You too.

Bye. Bye.

Hey, guys. I hope you enjoyed and appreciated this episode of the podcast. If there's one thing that rings true with our mission at the Boutique Hub, it's to under understand the changing dynamics and changing conversation in our industry on a daily basis to help introduce you to new tools, new trends, new strategies and new opportunities for your business. So I hope that this opened your eyes and enlightened you and excited you about what's changing in the future of retail and wholesale. Now, if you're curious about what it's like to shop directly in LA and work with so many of these manufacturers who you know online or from trade shows that you attend, I want to invite you to be a part of our Retail Bootcamp community. Now, not only do we have a membership at the Boutique Hub that has so many tools and services to offer, but Retail Boot Camp is a part of our Boutique Boot Camp program which is our highest level training experience. We only open the doors for this program twice a year and it comes with almost four months of small group coaching. We can live videos, number of guest experts from experts like Shopify, Pinterest, Mindset coaches, you name it, and lifetime access to that information. But probably one of my favorite parts about the program and the reason I'm telling you about it right now, is that we take a trip direct to LA to help our students in the program get to experience firsthand what it's like to shop in the district, at cmc, at the Cooper Building and at some of the unique experience that are offered in la. So we're headed to LA during the month of October and we'll be going back again in the spring with all of our Retail Boot Camp students. So if you're interested in learning more, check out the Typeform link that is in the show notes of this podcast so you can be on our waiting list when more information drops about January's Class of Retail Bootcamp. And as always, if you've got questions between now and then, just DM me over on Instagram. Jalderson Guys, I appreciate hearing your feedback about the show and also hearing what else you'd like to learn and hear about.

So don't be a stranger.

Message me anytime and I'm right here to field your questions and plan what's going to happen week after week on the show. Again, thanks for listening you guys. I can't wait to see so many of you in person very soon and to hear from you what's important to help you grow your business. Hey guys, thank you so much for listening to this episode. We hope that you loved it. Don't forget to hit subscribe and leave a rating and review down below for a chance to be one of our featured listeners each and every week. For more information on our spirit of connection, Community over competition and how to access complete show notes and bonus downloads from our guests, head on over to the boutiquehub.com and join the community.

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