Started with the box now we’re here 🙂
What’s up everybody! There have been some pretty cool accomplishments for the little engine that could. We sponsored our first athlete. Sidney Boyd IV out of Atlanta. Sidney is a former collegiate basketball player and runs in the 40+ category. He recently ran the Cruisin for Christmas in July 10K and finished with an overall ranking of 8 in a field of over 300 runners. The best thing was that he wasn’t really in the best shape he could have been in. I’m excited for Sidney and his addition has been a great inspiration for me at a time where I’ve been contemplating selling the company or simply letting the shoes hang out to dry. The other very cool information is that I’ve been running a Facebook Ad campaign and the likes have been pouring in.
Okay you never lead off a sales meeting with bad news. That was the good news. The reports will show the bad, and boy it’s pretty rough (I know that’s an oxymoron, just shush and keep reading, lol). As I wrote a few months back I went into production on the Spring Summer line from ARCH. I started production in February when the company was rolling along and sales were very good. Here is that report. This is when things got really rough. I hit Chinese New Year and the manufacturer shut down for one month. This pushed production back to March which aligned me with the larger shoe companies and pushed my production back. I didn’t get my footwear until June basically. Now what does this do to a small shoe company, or any company? People forget about you. I had to develop a new marketing campaign, get the shoes QA’d and then get them up for sale as quick as possible to catch the time before people basically quit buying shoes at the beginning of summer. I didn’t make it. This report is about how critical it is to catch the wave and ride it to better performance. Let’s get started.
Facebook Ads
I started advertising on Facebook once the shoes were ready to be posted for sale. There is never a good time to begin promotion and there is no such thing as the perfect time. So here are the stats:
6/3/2013 – 6/30/2013
Man from what I can see for a new company, with the production hassles described — this actually does not look too bad. Also don;t overlook the other benefit of advertising–branding–getting others to learn about your business.
It doesn’t look real bad until you realize I lost 6K last year, lol. Even that isn’t really very bad at all considering how much I accomplished alone. It typically takes six figures to launch a shoe company, but I’ve been able to utilize my writing skills to open the door to opportunities.
This is powerful info and I appreciate the time you took to share. Analytics take time and not always fun but really important and insightful, good and bad. Hang in there!
Thanks!!!! I pride myself on transparency and showing the reality of the business. I’m currently running a Kickstarter to prepare for the Fall 2015 release and to make a new mold, but I am definitely going to keep posting stats and updates.