Tailor Archive

This is exactly the kind of thing I've been trying to do with my "complete collections" vendor; I've found a great many people are happy with a basic description as to what's in the pack and the knowledge it's going to co-ordinte. As yet, I've only had one request to tweak an order.

Each pack has the description and between 10-12 items in it. I also tend to lable the clothes by colour scheme names as opposed to by color. For example, WickedWays is black with bright pink details. there's decorative vests on the walls in each colour, and a second vendor with odds and ends.

And like RangerGirl, I can't keep my vendor stocked either. Good thing I like making clothes so much.

Yes, custom work makes up a fair proportion of my business too. And I'm just breaking into BE clothing now, but keeping hold of atame BE is proving to be tricky.

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Doing Bad Things Well Since 1976
L'Animal animé d'âme de luminosité

I used to have my shop in a large Tatooine house. I had displays all over. Up on the balcony, around the walls in the main room, up the sides of the staircases... and I was in the shop most of the time. Sometimes I'd be upstairs in that room with the smoked window where I could see down into the main room where all 4 of my vendors and all those outift displays were. And I had my vendors spread out around the main room. One on each wall. I'd watch the customers. Not once -- not one time did I ever see a customer go around the room and look at the outfits displayed. Not to the walls, up the stairs, the balcony -- not once. They always went straight to the vendors and bought "off the rack."

Only regular customers and guild mates ever requested a custom appointment. I found the average shopper just wanted to be able to browse a wide selection without having to take the time to make an appointment or to interact with the tailor. They wanted off the rack, and back out the door in as little time as possible.

I have since moved my vendors into a merchant tent and sales have been much, much better. I have only 3 outfits on display (not much room in there with 5 vendors, lights, a little furniture and the outfits). The "average" shopper just isn't interested in the Wow factor of your shop decor, nor in the enticements of your fashion displays. That I do any decor at all is because I enjoy doing it. It really never did impact my sales one way or the other.

Packaged sets would be good, if the customer would take a moment to actually look at the displays that matched the numbers or descriptions on the packages. But too often, even a customer who says "whatever is fine" will balk at the color or style of one or two items and defeats the purpose of offering packaged sets.

However - I seem to recall reading a couple months ago that one of the features that will be in the merchant revamp in publish 11 (?) is that backpacks on vendors will be transparent! Now THAT would be fantastic and I would most certainly offer packaged outfits then.

AFK is not OK
Clicky - AFKers are disruptive to my Gameplay - Clicky
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Qitu &Tabu
Tailor &Entertainer
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*May your future endeavors prove to be
interesting and rewarding experiences that
fulfill your dreams and enrich your life.*

Julia Eve
Master Tailor & Master Merchant
Owner of Wayfar Wearables located at (-5760, -6723)
Just a few steps away from Jabba's Palace

I also have a large Tat House with numerous displays (geez, this is starting to sound like an AA meeting....Hello, My Name is A'Srai, and I have a large Tat House ). I get lots of complements on it, and I just can't see myself setting up a Merchant tent. I have noticed that the guys just run in browse my vendors for 2 secs, then "Hey, can you make me look cool". All the gals come in, browse the vendors, look at all the displays, then email me (like the a couple of my vendors bark out all the time) what they would like to have if they can't find it on my vendors. I change my displays every couple of weeks on some items, others are just there for the look and colors. I also have one of the back rooms setup as a Design Salon with a dressing room screen and other little touches to give the customer a real boutique feel.

I once tried the combo outfits in the bag idea. They sold really well, but I had lots of emails asking for their money back due to not the right shade of something or wasn't what they wanted. Plus, I'm a Tailor. I like to help people find and design that "Perfect Look". I stock my vendors just to have a wide selection of popular items and colors for the impulse buyers or those that can't catch me online at the same time.

As the other tailors have mentioned, it's hard to try and sell packaged sets if the customer can't examine the items within the packs. There are also many customers who just want to browse through a vendor quietly and select what they like without having to deal with the tailor directly. A problem I find with packaged sets is that not everyone wants to look exactly like everyone else. Hard to be unique when you're buying from a pre-packaged outfits vendor, and hard to determine if it's really the style, colors and clothing combination you wanted. I stock around 34 different colors, continuously add more new colors as I can, and stock *every* article of clothing. I'm not happy as long as there is even 1 item with a poor selection of colors. With that type of selection, if I'm not around (and they aren't able/willing to wait for me to log in), customers can *easily* find something they will like in stock, and with color labels they canmix and match to their heart's content. When I am around, I custom match any outfits from other tailors or loot, or custom colors I don't stock. And sometimes they do ask me to dress them But not very often. That works very well for the customer, and myself. I don't make a fortune in credits, but I domake a fortune in friendships. And I enjoy sewing so much that no one has to buy a stitch of clothing for me to continue sewing and stocking. lol. *is a clothing fiend*