Don’t give up on what you’ve been doing until now. Analyze more, talk more. Let your collection include 80 percent of “certainties” – products that will be sold through your channels for sure, and 20 percent of “novelties” – take the risk, wait for feedback. Diane Von Furstenberg is still selling her wrap dresses, Calvin Klein is still famous for his jeans.

So now you have more resources, you probably use more marketplaces, there’s more movement on your website. Analyze more. Try to inspect the behavior of customers in the shop, observe if your clothes are displayed in a good spot. Where do the customers spend their time? This is where you should try to position your clothes. Maybe you’ll manage to convince the store to use beacons that can help you measure your customers’ behavior (if the boutique is big). Do the same with your website – measure and analyze.

Don’t waste even the smallest snippet. Try to estimate the way of designing and cutting that will limit the quantity of waste to a minimum. Contract out the work, but don’t hire permanently until you have to. Do it only when you feel that you can’t sew by yourself anymore.

When you already own a big brand