A popular trend in the entrepreneurial world is to start a clothing line. Now, not everyone is fashion-savvy, but almost everyone has a message to spread. And a clothing line may just be the perfect way to do it. My friend started his own small line, called Vegan Cartel. He and a couple others use it to spread awareness about the vegan lifestyle and animal cruelty. Here are some tips he gave me for firing up your own clothing line:
1. Have a message. Have a reason for doing it in the first place. Maybe you love design, fashion, clothing, whatever. But what are you doing it for? Like any business, have a mission statement. Have a reason or a cause for people to want to get behind and support your brand.
2. Get a solid infrastructure in place. You're going to need a team of people to get things off the ground. Designers, suppliers, printers, embroidery...the list goes on. Sure, you can do all this yourself. But in reality, you can't. And that's just the production side of things. Take into account you will need a website, marketing of some sort, accounting.... It adds up quick. Get things in place and start to build hype before you even roll out any products.
3. Use the outlets you have available to get the word out about your brand. Maybe give some shirts away for free for people to wear. Sponsor an event. Do you have friends who are in the entertainment industry? See if they can get somebody to wear a shirt in a music video, or place a sticker on a prop that will be in view of the camera. Get creative, and use what you have available!
Source: http://www.vegancartel.com
