5 000 ₽
Starting investments (an island in the shopping center):60 000 - 70 000 ₽
Net profit:40 000 - 50 000 ₽
Payback period:3 months
Stickershops are stores of vinyl stickers, stickers, and other accessories that are popular with young people and teenagers. These products are sold with a high margin, and you can open a business even without experience.
Stickershop is a youthful, fashionable business that even a novice can handle. With a budget of 60-70 thousand rubles, you can open a outlet to the delight of lovers of stickers, posters, vinyl stickers and other cute accessories. And in online trading, you can start with 5 thousand rubles in your pocket. The concept of sticker shop involves the creation of an original business that will bring not only profit, but also pleasure from the process.
Today, stickers (or stickers) are a popular product among young people. Stickers can be found on phones, laptops, cars, in interiors, on clothes and, of course, in notebooks. The product is inexpensive, but beautiful - so resisting it is so difficult.
Before the start
Before you take specific actions to start a business, you should study the demand for goods. What do I need to do? Find the account of an existing sticker shop on the Internet, analyze the number of subscribers, comments - so you can understand how people are generally interested in this topic. Examine the offer in your city - are there any who are ahead of you? For a metropolis, the presence of several competitors is permissible, but for a small city, it’s already too much. Stickers are too specific to offer on every corner.
Keep in mind that you will work with young people, so think in advance which trade format to choose. We will consider two options: an outlet in the form of an island in a shopping center and an online sticker store. Both formats can shoot. The main thing is to know which targets to hit.
Target number 1. Format
Imagine that you analyzed the demand in the local market and made sure that many people dream of buying cool stickers. So, it's time to think about in what form the sticker shop will be: as an island in a shopping center or as an online store. Let's compare which is better. The advantages of the islet - spontaneity of purchase. This is when a person simply passes by, comes to your counter to look for curiosity, and makes a purchase. Most customers will come to the online store purposefully. But an island in the shopping center will eat a significant amount of your budget - even supported equipment will cost you an average of 30 thousand rubles, and rent is 5 square meters. in the shopping center - about 10 thousand rubles, and this is even in the best case. So the first advantage of the online store is savings.
For online trading of stickers, you don’t need to make a complicated website, because you can simply create an account on Instagram, invest several thousand in its promotion - and gain a target audience that will not only become your customers, but also a regular reader - and this increases the possibility of multiple purchases . Another advantage of the online store is the reach of customers from different cities. You can send orders by mail and explore new territories. Thus, the circle of potential buyers expands, which promises profit growth. Stickers - a product that easily fits in a regular mail envelope, so shipping costs will be scanty.
There is a third option: combine two business formats and work simultaneously on an island in a shopping center and online.
Target number 2. Location
If you still decide to open a retail outlet, you should choose places with high traffic: shopping centers, park areas, embankments, parks, cinemas, etc. Open where there will be a lot of your target audience.
To open a sticker shop, a large area is not required - 5 square meters will be enough. m, which will house the "island". This format allows you to attract more visitors. The rental price of the retail space will be about 10, 000 rubles / month. In order to save money, you can buy a used kiosk worth about 30, 000 rubles.
Target number 3. Assortment and suppliers
Immediately you need to solve the question of where you will take the goods? Some sticker stores form their assortment from what they produce themselves. The technology for making stickers is simple, but there is one caveat. On the Internet you can often find inspirational stories about how a person downloaded funny pictures and made stickers using a plotter, which he then sold with a huge margin. And here, for some reason, everyone forgets that you can download the “wrong picture” and incur the wrath of an illustrator (or photographer) who will be absolutely right when he claims copyright infringement.
The moral is this: if you decide to make stickers yourself, read Art. 1259 of the Civil Code of the Russian Federation. It clearly states that the use of images for commercial purposes without the consent of the author is a violation of copyright. How can these legal delays be avoided? There are several options: firstly, you can find an illustrator who will draw custom stickers for you. Today you can easily find many talented artists. And the payment for their work will be moderate. Or maybe you yourself are an artist? Or does your friend draw beautifully? There is no need to develop this idea: in this case, you yourself know what to do.
Secondly, you can use various photo stocks, where illustrators and photographers from around the world "pour" a huge amount of their work. You buy an image - and make as many stickers with it as you wish. Moreover, today a huge amount of free stocks has divorced: you just have to search well.
Those who decide to make stickers themselves will have to get a plotter - this is a professional printer, with which images are printed and cut. The cost of such equipment is 20-40 thousand rubles - for mini-production you will be enough. You will also need a minimum set of tools (scissors, a stationery knife, a ruler, a roller, etc.), as well as a self-adhesive film as a consumable. If you do not want to spend money, you can use the services of a printing house.
But you can go the simpler way: just find suppliers of stickers, collect an attractive assortment and then sell it. Where to look for suppliers? At the good old Aliexpress, where a wide selection of stickers for every taste is presented. Many suppliers sell them in bulk - and the purchase price is scanty. But everyone knows about Aliexpress. But not everyone knows about the Etsy.com foreign portal in Russia. But there you can also find interesting stickers - they will only cost more. Another way is to try to find artists who already sell their stickers and offer them cooperation.
When choosing an assortment, try to take into account different tastes and cover the maximum number of interesting topics so that each buyer can find stickers to their liking. Sell stickers on laptop and phone, stickers for clothes and paper, interior and vinyl stickers. Sort the stickers by topics, the most popular: animals, plants, characters from films and cartoons. For certain holidays, order thematic stickers.
What else can you sell in a sticker shop besides stickers? Posters, patches on clothes (patches), key rings, collectible figures, badges, socks, thermoses and other accessories.
Target number 4. Target Audience and Advertising
The main target audience of the sticker shop is young people, in particular students and schoolchildren who want to decorate their laptop or phone with an interesting vinyl sticker.
To advertise your business, you will need to focus on advertising on the Internet: in this case, promoting your account on Instagram. This can be sweepstakes, promotions, advertising with bloggers, paid advertising through the Instagram service, and more.
5 effective ways to increase online sales of your products:
Increase the potential customer’s confidence in you. At the first stage, this is the main tool for managing online sales. Customer loyalty, which is based on the first impression of your account, directly affects the number of successful orders. Start with the right “packaging" for your product offering. Create an attractive page, colorful photos, so that your product would be wanted to buy.
Share information about your business with others. All social networks have a simple and free share tool. Ask your friends to distribute information about your product on their pages, as well as motivate your subscribers to do so. For example, play a set of stickers among those who tell about you in your account.
Targeted advertising (targeting) . You can use official advertising, with the involvement of targetologists - specialists in this field. They will be able to identify your target audience among the entire array of users of social networks and provide displays of advertising banners to your potential customers. Please note that the services of targetologists cost a lot. You can learn the basics of targeting yourself and configure the parameters in your account.
Contests, sweepstakes, promotions . This is one of the main activators of the audience. Come up with good prizes, various draws and promotions, mix them, try different ways. With their help, you can attract a large number of active audiences.
Opinion leaders (bloggers, famous people) are all those people whose opinions we trust and respect . If you enlist the support of such people (on a commercial basis or for ideological reasons), then you can promote your product and service among the audience of an opinion leader.
And if you have a point of sale? You can advertise it with a bright showcase. Although the best advertisement in this case is a favorable location.
Target number 5. Staff
Serving this business will require a minimum number of employees. You can deal with the online store yourself by accepting orders through Instagram and sending them via email services. For the outlet you need two sellers working in shifts. There are no special requirements for these employees, so finding a suitable candidate will not be difficult.
At the initial stage, an entrepreneur can deal alone with all the questions. To master the skills of working with the plotter (if you print the stickers yourself) is easy. The most important thing is creating layouts. To do this, you need to have at least minimal skills in graphic editors like CorelDraw.
Target number 6. Profitability
The task of any entrepreneur is to constantly increase sales and profitability of their business. You can calculate the income yourself by taking the initial sales amount. The margin for finished vinyl stickers is 100-200%. These numbers are very attractive. For a month you can safely earn 40-50 thousand rubles.
How fast can a business pay off? The owners of successful companies, who managed to quickly unwind and offer customers a wide range of stickers, argue that the payback period is no more than three months.
Target number 7. Business Registration
To trade under the law, you need to register an IP. To do this, you need to submit to the Federal Tax Service a statement, a copy of your passport and a receipt with payment of state duty. The documents should indicate the selected taxation system (it is better to choose the simplified tax system) and the activity code according to the OKVED-2 classifier. Fit:
47.6 Retail sale of cultural and entertainment goods in specialized stores
47.91 Retail trade by mail or the information and communications network Internet.
There are no special requirements for your business from regulatory authorities. Standard set of permissions from fire protection, SES.
Target number 8. The risks
In order for your business to be successful, you need to try to minimize the risks associated with it. Stickershop is a relatively new phenomenon on the market. Stickers do not belong to the category of essential goods, therefore, there may be problems with sales, and demand will not meet expectations. To avoid this, you will have to invest money and efforts not only in advertising your business, but also in popularizing the idea itself. It is especially difficult to succeed in small cities, where new trends arrive late. Therefore, at the initial stage, do not count on high profits. It is better to put the most pessimistic profit forecast in the business plan of the sticker shop. This will save you from frustration and ill-considered expenses.
Even if you ordered exclusive illustrations from the artist, you should not think that you will be the only seller of such stickers. Your idea can simply be copied and stolen. Confronting a violation of rights is very difficult, so you cannot assign all your competitive advantages to exclusivity. There should be other advantages: reasonable price, good service, a large selection.
At the end
If you think the sticker business can't shoot, then this inspiring story will prove the opposite. So, one entrepreneurial lady from the United States named Alexandra Pappas came up with a new way to use stickers. She suggested applying them to the soles of high-heeled women's shoes.
Indeed, shoe designers always ignore the sole, staining it in neutral and boring colors. Therefore, Alexandra has developed a series of stickers that can be glued to the sole and, if necessary, can easily be replaced by others. To sell his invention, Alexandra launched a site on a free hosting. Today, these stickers are sold in dozens of countries around the world and bring Alexandra a steady income. Thanks to the fact that she was the first to implement such an idea, she quickly spun up, increased sales and conquered vast markets for her unusual product.
In our country, such things are not yet sold, so there is a chance to occupy a free niche. To come up with such stickers on the sole is very simple. Alexandra herself depicted flags, recognizable ornaments, funny pictures on stickers and sold them at a price of $ 14 per pair. Probably, the author was inspired by the idea of a company that sold wedding accessories and released a collection of stickers for the sole of wedding shoes. These stickers were “I agree”, “Just Married” and other wedding phrases. It can also be a good business idea that can attract attention and win new customers.
Another motivating story happened with Anna Hindmarch, who founded her own brand. It all started with leather stickers. Fashionable stickers with smiles, various slogans and painted zippers went on sale in the spring / summer 2015 season and became a real hit. They brought their creator $ 18 million in just two seasons.
Anna Hindmarch says that she was inspired by her school memories when it was customary to paste on her notebooks, diary and briefcase with bright stickers to show her personality. Nevertheless, Anna began to take stickers seriously much later, when a technology appeared that allowed her to transfer complex and colorful sketches to her skin. So a simple sticker turned into a fashion accessory.
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