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Note: Make sure you read all the mistakes in by commentators! Thanks

I was looking through some of my notes for articles and just wanted to come up with something new that I haven’t seen on any other blog…at least in the manner that I am going to provide the information. What better way to learn than by knowing and listening to mistakes that other clothing companies in your field make. This list is going to go on indefinitely and I will re-post it to the top of the blog either weekly or daily depending on how popular it becomes. I know most of our readers either have or are in the process of starting a clothing line have made a mistake, wit their own stories to tell of were they ordered too many products or set prices too high while trying to start their clothing line or in their day to day business activities. So I am going to begin the post by listing as many mistakes that I have made and know other companies have made that can limit your chance of success as a clothing company.

I decided to bring Pick of the Day back! If you’ve been a long time reader then your familiar with the concept. Basically we write about any interesting company or new concept in the apparel industry from new to old. This time there is a little twist to keep the flow of the process down to a minimum and make the process of choosing what fashion industry company to write about.

For instance if you represent a clothing company then we would prefer you send a sample my size is 2x shirt and 36 jeans, but if you don’t have it just send whatever, because it is more about us seeing and feeling the quality of your garment and we will donate the clothing to a local charity. If this is not possible still send us an email to review@dobizo.com and we will review your clothing company if we like it…that simple. If we don’t review it don’t take it personal most likely we will send feedback as to why we didn’t. This is our way to give back even more and in know way are we obligated to write about your company.

I was going to compile a list of different promotional tactics I’ve seen used and I still might depending on the response I get from our loyal readers, but I thought this exercise would be more beneficial from many people perspectives instead of just one.

So with the trade show season kicking off with Magic this past week I know many of you promoted before, during, and after the show and I personally want to hear your experiences from the show and what you did while there, before and after to promote your clothing line or to better your position within the apparel industry.

Please go into detail as much as possible and don’t be afraid to list your mistakes and ideas that didn’t work out as good as you thought. This will kind of be reminiscent of the Top 100 Mistakes Clothing lines Make article, but a positive spin. No matter how simple you think your tactics were PLEASE list them here because what is basic/minuscule in results to you could benefit another clothing company on the come up. (I will list them in the main article with a link back to your site)

Boosting sales- there is no better time to do it then holidays by creating promotional incentives to drive new customers and get the usual shoppers to spend even more. Even the big guys like Nike are in on the gamble releasing exclusive Valentines day sneakers as they do every year for women and sometimes men.

Brands like Johnny Cupcake have made it big off of taking popular themes, monuments, or holidays and flipping it to their advantage. In October many clothing companies had special sales one reader of Dobizo blog actually sent me an email about how all t-shirts were only $10.31 until Halloween a simple strategic move like I mentioned will entice customers to spend more and they appreciate when you help them save. That’s where word of mouth and self promotion lives.

What I’m talking about is nothing new just not taken advantage of by the smaller guys that don’t have the big budgets or cash flow to give away thousands in promotional products, but that doesn’t mean you can’t join in on the fun.

What role do social networks like Facebook, Myspace, Bebo, and Blackplanet play as far as in online marketing for companies in the fashion industry or any business? If I forgot any social networks sorry your important also!

I remember writing an article about marketing on Myspace and how to get thousands of visitors back to your site or landing page it had a more then moderate response from online blogs and networks compared to most articles on Dobizo that just receive comments, but not many linkbacks due to the nature of the blog. You can see that previous article by clicking here.

I was reading through the Dobizo Answers page looking for some interesting ideas for topics or questions to answer when I ran across:

Jezzy Asks:

“How can I find out if someone has the same name as my clothing label?

If someone already has the same name I intended to use for my clothing label/company but not legally registered as a business will it affect me if I register my label, get a tax ID and license under the label name someone else has?

Sounds too good to be true right? Well it’s not Dobizo is going to be featured in a print and online magazine as a monthly contributor for the success in the fashion industry columns section.

What does this have to do with your free magazine publicity? Well I couldn’t have made this blog a success without your thousands of questions right? Exactly so I’m asking you guys once again for your help on making this venture for Dobizo another success in the making.

All you have to do is comment on this article with your ideas for monthly topics for the magazine column and whomever questions are chosen will be mentioned in the article for your support and a possible text link to your website in the print edition. Also the readers question chosen will be highlighted on Dobizo with a link back to their website monthly.

Questions that are submitted should be descriptive enough for a 400 word article on the topic you choose. Please no questions that are already answered on Dobizo.

The Christmas holiday season is the best time to gain new customers by introducing season critical products and promoting old stock with sales and discounts…hopefully some of the new comers will stay around for more than when your product is heavily discounted.

How has the rush of tourist and shoppers on and offline looking for bargains and holiday sales affected your bottom line? Or did it affect it at all? If not your most likely not properly promoting your product or offering customers discounts or your target market is not heavily influenced to buy on discount or marked down prices if so your clothing products are probably in a higher price range.

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Popularity: 3% [?]

If you remember the post a few weeks back on the Pop Up Retail Store Concept New High Mart one of the founders must have caught wind and decided to join the discussion and added some pictures of the retail store and some of the garments that adorn it. You can see the original article Pop Up Retail Store Concept.

I will post some photos here but you can look at the full collection of them by clicking here. Only thing missing is an outside shot of the pop up store from a consumers point of view. Most of these pictures show off the inside and some designers work. Still the inside is very similar to an everyday retail store setup.

Popularity: 3% [?]

This is a guest review for Alpha Mart Trade Show which is a bi-annual trade event in Atlanta, Georgia at the Americas Mart.

Never one to shy away from an opportunity we attended this year?s Alpha Mart trade show occurring in Atlanta between October 14-17 2007. We?ve only attended one other trade show prior to that, so we were looking forward to the experience as well as the southern change of scenery.

It was located in the heart of downtown Atlanta at Peachtree Street, specific to Peachtree Center. Our focus was the urban menswear portion of the show which ran from Sunday, October 14 to Wednesday, October 17th. We registered and picked up our ID?s the day before, on that Saturday, and attended with the intentions of taking it one day at a time, so we did not rent a booth. The selected site of Alpha Mart, is a privatized building, sort of like a large mall, open to buyers and retailers throughout the year. The location was a nice size and urban menswear took up the entire first floor of the selected building. Many of the up and coming labels along with the established ones could be found there on the first floor. Located higher up on the twelfth floor, some of the more established urban labels maintained office suites for conducting business. They included Akademiks, Baby Phat, Ecko, Parish, Rocawear, Sean John, Tommy Hilfiger, etc. Many other independent fashion labels maintain location there in the building and cater to multiple markets which include women, children, etc, all for the purposes of fashion.

I just wanted to bring light to a great company that is part of the Global Fashion Network: Where The Apparel Industry Connects. Polina Fashion is a full-service fashion production company offering event production, fashion show production, photo-shoot production,
talent casting and placement services and fashion consulting. The owner Polina Raygorodskaya was featured in Business Week Magazine’s Best Entrepreneus under 25 with sales over $1 million.

I will add their company to our industry page that will be getting a remake to better suit our readers. Make sure and pay Polina Fashion a visit and maybe they can be of some service to your business.

Popularity: 5% [?]

If you remember the article earlier this month about Jay Z’s Rocawear brand losing out on naming the New Jersey Nets Airline Arena after his clothing brand, than you will know the reason for the article title.

PVH (Parent Company of Izod) sees this as a chance for a multi-faceted marketing effort across its whole brand channel, not just Izod. Brands under PVH include Calvin Klein, Izod, Van Heusen, and Arrow. The renaming of the arena and the debut of the change will be this Wednesday Halloween also to kick off the season for the New Jersey Nets basketball team.

This is definitely a major branding effort that Rocawear missed out on. According to PVH they have many things in store for the branding efforts of the Izod brand for the new Izod arena that include logo staff member attire, branded cups, seats, scoreboards, pillars, elevators, way-finding signs, and much more.

Popularity: 3% [?]

A fashion line representative emailed me and asked what were they doing wrong and why their clothing wasn’t selling as they expected, because after marketing, promoting, sales incentives and building an online shop products were still moving at a slow pace and it seemed as if they’re headed for a dead end. After looking at their website I came to the conclusion below.

The key to marketing and promotions is not having a million dollar budget, the best fashion public relations company behind your collection or even having a big name in the fashion industry back your clothing line even though all of the above helps, but most importantly you have to actually have a good quality product targeted to the right market, if you don’t start there.

It seems so many people spend so much time worrying about how they’re going to get in stores or how to get a celebrity to wear your clothing that you forget about the basics of the fashion industry and that is the overall design and function of the product you’re selling. Otherwise all the promotions, marketing and incentives in the world won’t save your brand or move a piece of merchandise