ABOUT OUR GUEST
Margo Morrison is the owner and creator of Margo Morrison New York, which offers a collection of necklaces, earrings & bracelets that even some of Hollywood’s finest can be seen wearing. Morrison has been in the retail business for over ten years now and during that decade, she’s learned a thing or two about wholesale- and the benefits it offers.
According to Morrison, her business is expanding by 10 to 15 percent a year. As a designer, being able to adjust to retail shifts and learning to take advantage of wholesale can lead you to that level of success that Margo Morrison of New York has experienced.
Key Takeaways
Wholesale can be a great way to advance your business.
“The whole point of doing wholesale is that the stores do the work for you. You deal with 20 stores and that becomes exponential because they’re dealing with hundreds and hundreds of customers. So, if you’re just doing a website to one customer it would take you the same amount of time actually to work with their customers as it might take for you to get a whole order from a wholesale customer or wholesale buyer at a trade show,” Morrison said.
“I just immediately saw the money, I saw the benefit of letting the other stores work for you. Plus it’s not easy working with retail customers with returns. I didn’t want to do returns- let the store deal with all that stuff. And, if we need to take items back, we have a ratio of what we’re willing to step back in order to take a new order. It just seemed like a better business decision for me,” she said.
In order to reap the full benefits that come with selling wholesale, brands have to be well prepared.
“We need to make things really easy for them (wholesale customers) because they can just go on and take another brand.
"You can have a really great product and not good marketing or not know how to present it to the world and you won’t do well. You could actually have a mediocre product and a phenomenal high tech, amazing way of reaching your consumer or customer and you can be really successful. So we always have to find a way to make it easier for our our wholesale customers to buy our jewelry because they’ll find someone else,” Morrison said.
Don’t be stubborn, paying attention to the trends consumers like at the time and changing your product to meet those desires will lead to a better business.
“What’s really important when you’re running a company and you’re running a business and you’re in the marketplace is to not fall in love with your designs to the point where you’re unwilling to be flexible with what the market is asking for,” Morrison said.
“That’s an integral part of having a successful business- is not getting stuck in your own perception of what you think is going on. That being said, I have to love everything I put out. I love some things more than others, but I feel very good about the stuff that we make and the stuff that we put out in the marketplace,” Morrison said.
“But, like I said, you have to be in touch with what’s trending and what’s going on. You have to be able to contribute to that creative part of that process.”
Designers must be able to adjust to is the changing world of trade shows.
“Trade shows are changing dramatically… buyers are not coming to all the trade shows any longer. They’re going to a trade show that maybe isn’t just accessories. For example, New York Now, which is a big show that’s done at the Javits Center twice a year is getting a lot more attention from buyers who didn’t use to go. We didn’t use to see these buyers at New York Now, we saw them at a specific accessories show,” she said.
With this shift it’s important that businesses find ways of connecting with their buyers outside of trade shows.
“We are having more appointments at our showroom. We are doing more marketing where my V.P. of sales will take photos of collections that she thinks stores need to buy and she’ll help them place their orders. We are working twice as hard now…not seeing twice as much income, but we’re seeing a steady growth of our income in our retail and wholesale sales,” Morrison said.
Margo Morrison NY Website: https://www.margomorrison.com/
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