All The Mistakes I Made in Retail (So You Don’t Do the Same). And What They Taught Me About Retail Strategy
From Selfridges and Neiman Marcus to Cult Beauty and QVC, here’s what I learned from launching in 70 of the world’s best retailers.
I opened the chat recently and my first question came in (thank you, Gemma!): “Why, without adequate cash flow, can working with a larger retailer, be the death of your business?” I have a lot to say about working with retailers - mainly because I learnt the hard way - so this was a welcome first question to share my experiences on.
Faace launched in around 70 retailers over 5 years, including some of the most prestigious in the UK: Selfridges, Liberty and Harrods; mass-reaching sites like Lookfantastic, Cult Beauty and Beauty Bay; high street spots like Oliver Bonas and Anthropologie; and even in international spaces like Neiman Marcus and Douglas. Sounds impressive, right? And it is impressive, sure, I need to acknowledge that more. But what I didn’t realise was just how hard it is to make those partnerships work.
This Substack is all about me sharing my fails to help you succeed. So, here’s a summary of where I went wrong, to help you avoid doing the same.
Didn’t Stick It Out with Cult Beauty (Madness, I Know)
In the year we launched we landed in Cult Beauty (amazing!), this was honestly my dream retailer for Faace, and I couldn’t have been happier. Cult wanted us to stick with them on an exclusive basis - which we did, but only for a very short period before launching elsewhere.
Why Was This a Mistake?
We really needed the support of a retailer to grow our brand awareness and sales as a new-to-market brand. If we’d stuck with Cult Beauty on longer-term exclusive, we might have benefited from more internal marketing, more sales, and therefore more orders.
Plus, logistically, it’s easier and most cost-efficient to deal with one retailer.
Launched in Too Many Retailers at Once
Long story short (because this isn’t actually that fun for me reliving each moment), we then launched in multiple other (mainly online), spaces. I feel this meant we cannibalised our sales rather than growing the brand.
Launched in Too Many Markets Too Soon
When I was launching Faace, I remember meeting with Waldencast Ventures. This was me at peak naivety as the journey hadn’t even really begun at this point. Hind Sebti, who is now the founder of Whind skincare, and her partner gave me some good advice. It was to only launch into other markets once you’ve got the UK down. I didn’t listen.
Hired Too Many Consultants
I brought in consultants to support with Faace, which I didn’t really need to do. They were good at their job, bringing in opportunities for me to launch into different retailers and markets. But we simply didn’t have the budget to afford the level of marketing we’d need to do to make each one work. For example, we invested in PR in Germany and the USA (who both did a stellar job), but unfortunately in 2020-something, relying on just one marketing tactic isn’t enough.
Didn’t Address Having a Bad Relationship
I gel well with most people, that’s not me being arrogant, it’s just something I know, having worked with hundreds of different clients over my 19-year career. There were so many red flags with my manufacturer (again I am not going to go into these, as it hurts my soul), and I ignored them.
Why Did I Do This?
I was made to feel like it was me with unreasonable demands (on reflection, I didn’t).
I hadn’t built a brand before so trusted their point of view and doubted my own instincts.
I was so time poor that the thought of changing manufacturers just felt like too big a task to tackle.
Not gelling well with them and addressing this issue just made everything harder. Creating new products, meeting retailer demands, and planning overall was impossible. The lack of a good partnership slowed us down and therefore I struggled to keep retailers interested with fresh offerings.
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