I want to start a professional clean looking online clothing store such as Macy's website, but I have little knowledge of web design. Besides that I really don't understand how I can get a dropshipper to create my custom designs and ship the item for me from my website.

I'm so confused and fustrated.

Hi allen,

I am sorry you're confused and frustrated. Take a deep breath and we'll figure everything out

Ok, so the two issues you brought up were:

1. the website
2. the supply chain

First of all, I wanted to ask you a conceptual question. When you're referring to Macy's, were you referring to it as in the layout and feel of the Macy's website or the general concept as the Macy's stores?

1. the website
Did you want to design the website yourself or do you have a budget for a programmer? I think you should be able to learn and create the website for yourself with the help of available tools. It depends on what you envision the size of your project, what you want your site to look like, and the capabilities of the site.

2. Your products supply chain
So you want to create custom designs... Have you thought about whether you will design the designs yourself? who will produce the clothes with the designs? where will you store the inventory? etc. I am sure you will find a dropshipper who would be willing to ship your products on your behalf, but I also wanted to let you know that Amazon offers a similar service, where they can store your inventory in their warehouses and will ship it for you. There are costs associated with all these steps. Have you looked into the numbers?

Let us know what stage you're in, other specific questions, and I think we will be able to help.

Don't be discouraged, you will figure out what you need to do!

Sherif

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I've had a close friend who tried to do something just like your project.

What he realised is that the market is a saturated one and there are major players out there in this industry. It's similar to making a website on making money online. The competition is too stiff. I don't mean to say this in a discouraging way but it might take time for you to break in and start getting returns. My friend failed to penetrate the market. This is a case study I thought I would point out to you.

As for getting a dropshipper.......you can try and google for dropshippers in your area and contact by telephone and see if you can come to an arrangement with them.
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So far I've only created a name for the clothing line and a bunch of T-shirt designs. I' m currently working on getting a trademark for the clothing line and copyright for the artwork designs I've created.

I have Macromedia Dreamweaver 8 and Photoshop 9 CS2 if that helps any.

So far I've only created a name for the clothing line and a bunch of T-shirt designs. I' m currently working on getting a trademark for the clothing line and copyright for the artwork designs I've created.

At the moment I don't have the money for a programmer...I want to create a design I can maintain by myself, nothing large or sophisticated being that I'm only selling t-shirts. I need the t-shirts to be created without physically having to see or ship them myself, so I don't want them stored in my home. I'm aware of custom t-shirt creation sites such as Cafepress.com but you can only create an online store in connection with their site so the domain name would be cafepress.com/yourstoresname which I don't want.

Questions:

What company will place my designs on t-shirts of my choice and also ship them out as well?

How will the dropshipper be notified when a customers completes a transaction through my website?

I have Macromedia Dreamweaver 8 and Photoshop 9 CS2 if that helps any.

An example of what I envisioned is a site called Threadless.com...check it out just to give you an idea of what I'm aiming towards.

THANX

I feel for you for the frustration.

I remember when I first tried to start a site , I wanted a big online company that will make me a millionaire.

But it's much harder than it seems, and same goes with a clothing line.

Not trying to hurt you or discourage you, but realistically, would one buy a shirt from your site, or from amazon and walmart?

And for a site that promotes products, it will be extremely difficult for it to take off.

Also, have you considered legal problems? Who will ship your products? Do you have a business agent? Who will supply the materials you need? Who's going to help you mass produce the shirts?

But if you truly want to stick to this idea, then I'd recommend maybe selling your products throughout your community, like maybe opening a tshirt business in the neighborhood, and if it's a success, it will grow larger and larger until maybe you could one day buy your own shop and even make it into a major company.


This is the case with most success stories.


Again, I'm not trying to discourage you from your cause, I'm just offering my advice.

But good luck and keep up the hard work!

Jim

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Why don't you start a -shirt blog. I don't think the niche is saturated. You blog about your t-shirt creation. then you can say if any one wants a t-shirt, he/she should contact you. It would be a gradual process.

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This is a great idea. You should look into it.

With CafePress Premium Shop ($5 to $7/month) you would be able to design your shop to match your website, so even if it's cafepress.com/yourshop, your site visitor may not even know he/she left your site, but I understand if that's not what you want.

I am not 100% about the dropshipping details, but from what I understand, you collect payment and orders, you transfer the order to the dropshipper, who then ships the product to your customer. What I am not sure about, though, is whether your dropshipper would charge you upfront or per order. I would think you would need to pay them upfront (and then you would get your money back + profit from your customers), but I could be wrong... but this is something to look into, as I am sure different dropshippers have different methods of doing this.

There are many t-shirt printing companies that would put your design on your shirts and ship them to your dropshipper. I would assume, then, that you would have to place a bulk order (and different t-shirt sizes, etc). So if you have multiple designs and you want different colors, it may add up.

You CAN do all this, but I just wanted to let you know about the upfront costs, so you're not surprised.

I am sorry if you already knew all this... I am just thinking out loud

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Very helpful information.

@allen9814

Hello... If you like to start online T-shirt selling you can choice Oscommerce or Joomla Virtumart. That will good i think.

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