From private label to your own design

Private label is not a final stop. Many start with it and then develop their products step by step until they become their own designs.

The path of development

1. A ready product with simple changes.
2. A product with bigger changes: a fabric and a cut of your own.
3. A custom design built on what you learned from your customers.

What selling teaches you

• Which sizes and colours sell?
• What do customers complain about?
• What do they ask for and cannot find?

Move carefully

A custom design needs patterns, samples and larger quantities. Move when you have steady sales and know your customer, and draw on the first collection, fabrics and sourcing courses.

Exercise

Write three things you learned, or expect to learn, from your customers, and how you will change your product with them in the third batch.