I have to tell you about a post I saw and how annoying it was because I don't want you to fall into this trap. The post said, Target is reporting they're going to be flat till last year for Black Friday. So we should all understand how that affects the market and how that's a bad thing. It's not bad. This is not bad.

And I think we all have to start to get it into our heads that the market is cooling off. The market is in a good way. It's leveling out. We're actually seeing numbers that are sustainable across the board that are in a position where money is good. Like I have boutiques that are doing really well, easy high five, six figure months.

good profit, we're trying to run around 57, 62, 64, 65 margin, right? On tight inventory, good buys, like boutiques are doing well right now. And so it's interesting when someone says, Target's flat to last year. Well, Target has grown in the past four years. Like remember COVID? That was insane. That was not real. We basically saw across the board in retail, this huge spike and then

now it's coming down slowly and people are freaking out because some people are going down faster. And I want to talk about that. I'm going to stop and say, Hi, I'm Emily Benson. Welcome to the Boost Your Boutique podcast. I am having a little bit of a riff episode where I'm going to talk about a lot of topics around this time of year. So it's very like, listen now just like the clothes in your store very wear now right? I love

being on the cutting edge and giving you guys kind of my minute to minute thoughts on what's going on across the board. Now, I think it's gonna be interesting when we see Black Friday numbers and Cyber Monday, like all of the stats come out. I don't think it's bad at all. I think actually the threat of tariffs has made people buy now and make the economy look good. And because everyone's saying, buy XYZ before tariffs go up in January with the new president.

in office, we've seen him % tariffs from Canada and Mexico and an additional 10 % from China. We have a lot of goods that come from there for what we sell, and it's going to affect the overall economy. The things that we import from Mexico, it's wild. So I just think that has probably driven some purchases now. Hopefully, we're seeing in your numbers. I feel like I'm seeing pretty good numbers across the board with

my clients, it's really what we expect. Here's the thing, when you have a plan, as long as you're tracking to your plan, there's no big deal, right? If you're still out there winging it saying, hope this works, I hope this plan works, I'm going to run a sale here, I'm going to try this there, that just is not going to work anymore, especially if you're making around $10,000 month. If you've hit that milestone in your business and you don't have a buying plan, a markdown plan, you're like,

you know, thinking about the year in a total instead of just like month to month kind of winging it. Like it's time to start to do that for 2025 because it's not getting more competitive out there, but we're going to have to be smart with our money. And I think, you know, every year this happens where people learn like, wow, sales didn't go as expected, or I thought I could take a margin hit on things and I'd be okay because things were affordable. Like the market's changing all the time. And I think

you have to remember that flat to last year is fine. That just means you're doing the exact same numbers as last year. You might be at a different unit volume. You might be at a different profit margin. But if you're at least if you're flat to sales year over year. So last year you did $10,000 this month. This year you're going to do $10,000 in the same month. That's great. That means you're maintaining your sales. That's very consistent and that's sustainable.

I think across the board, we all get obsessed with growth, growth, growth, and that's the capitalism in ours. Truly, we have to decide how much enough is enough. I have a chapter in my book, The Retail Mindset, which is available on Amazon. If you haven't read it, this is a great time of year to read The Retail Mindset because I talk about all these mindset moves you can take to stay positive. When we get tired, our mindset suffers. If there's one thing you can do at this time of year, it's sleep more.

prioritize your sleep hygiene, go to bed, brush your teeth, get off social media, schedule yourself on social media, reply, maybe you have help to do that, but stay off of it, stay focused on your business right now. When you decide what enough is enough, right? I have a chapter called, What is it called? I have a chapter, mindset move number eight, enough is enough or is it? And I talk about clients who...

just always felt like they were chasing. Like there's a moving target. They never had goals. They never had a sales plan. They never understood how to do that because here's the thing, guys. If this is your first time listening to me or your thousandth time listening to me, you know I'm an advocate for a plan, whether it's a social media plan, a buying plan, a markdown plan, an inventory plan, period.

Inventory is why we make our money. It's the only way we make our money, right? And I'm going to go back to basics always and remind you, your product assortment is queen energy. Like that is where you have to put all of your energy. What departments are you buying? What trends are you on? You are a microcosm of trend and fashion for your age woman, your age kids, whatever, you know.

Gifts wherever you fit in the world, right? Of course, a lot of you guys listening are women's fashion clothing boutiques. Great. Like I love that. I actually feel that more large retailers, department stores should be competitive shopping boutiques. I think you guys are doing such a good job editing and presenting looks and styles and new inventory that women really want. Like, right? That's the goal is our boutique should

be selling things where someone walks through and says, I want everything in here. That's the goal. I want everything in here. That's the perfect boutique. what is enough for you in terms of how much money you want to make And what does that translate to for the store? I think it's important to remember that the store makes is not like directly your pay, but it's a percentage of that.

And you know, here's the easy piece of it is you could say I want to pay myself 20 % of my sales. So that's like on every $1,000 I make, I'm paying myself $200. Okay. So you say, okay, $100,000, right? That's $20,000. And, and so on and so forth, right? So to be at a place where you're making $60,000 personal income, you probably need to be around $300,000 a year of total revenue 350.

400, somewhere in there, depending what your location is, how many employees you have, what your margin is, how quickly you turn your inventory. mean, it's all a little to who you are and what you sell. But I think it's important to understand that you can easily percentage that out. I've had clients say, I think I need to make to be able to support myself and my debt. no, no, no, she needed to make like 22.

17,000 a month, you know, which, for a lot of people listening, that might feel like a lot, but for her, she's really not that far off. And my gosh, how much lower than 50,000 is that, right? Like, that's like a deep breath, right? I think it's really important that we start to get deeper with our numbers and understand that as long as we understand our path with sales,

and we back into how much we need to buy, we're gonna be fine.

That allows us to pay ourselves.

I think if you are up to last year or you are in a position where you're making $300,000 a year this past year for 2024 or more than that, I would say $300,000 is like a really nice number to make for a boutique, whether you're online or brick and mortar or pop-up. I think it's a little hard to do that with pop-up, but I think you could potentially if you did like big holiday market. I mean, I have people that I know who have...

booths at Bryant Park. I'm sure they're doing half a million in, you know, 10, 12 weeks. It's a great location. It's a lot of traffic if they have the right product. Of course, it's expensive, but I think they're making that money back, right? You have to remember, if you're doing more than that, that's like the 1%. You're in like the 1 % of boutique land. I know that sounds crazy, but there's a lot of boutiques that are open that really aren't making money.

you might just not notice them. Again, you tend to notice people like you and you might say, my gosh, everyone in my circles makes so much money. would say, is really unique to me, someone who's doing than 20K months. I think 20K months is like a lot of I think once you get to the 50, 60K months and even like 100 plus K months, it's rare air. It's There aren't a lot of you guys. And if you are listening,

know that. Like me, I'm being really honest with you. I think there's not a lot of people out there talking about how much money they're making. And I see what everyone makes. I know the insides of so many businesses. And I will tell you that average brick and mortar boutique makes between $20,000 and $60,000 a month. Average-ish. Depends where, depends, you know. that could be 4,000 square feet. That could be 1,000 square feet, to be honest with you. It just totally depends on the makeup of that location.

But I still think boutiques are thriving. I think for 2025, I want you to start to consider, what do you want that to look How can you zoom out on the whole year right now, just because you've been through a year? How can you look at 2025 and say, what do I want it to look like? Feel like, when are my vacations? What markets am I going it out. Nothing's going to happen unless you make it happen. And so I think.

we have to put a little bit more energy in an effort into moving ourselves forward for 2025 you know, the more I hear the message from other people in spaces that I exist in, talk about just the idea, like, all you have to do is show up and you're winning. Like show up, create the content, be consistent. you will surpass anyone else if you just have consistent it's the least.

interesting thing about having a business is consistent content. tell you, I talked to so many people who once they start to look at content as more ephemeral, meaning like, they're going to gather up as much b-roll and footage. And I mean, if you have a brick and mortar, there's no reason why you shouldn't just be like filming all the time. Like, I know that sounds crazy, but.

Like really walk around your store, have a tripod and just move it around and fix things on the walls and walk in front of it. And to be honest with you, I have been trying to set my own studio up where it's just not messy all the time. And I can just consistently film in here all the time from like any angle, right? I'd love to just like stand here and like do a talk, but I'm not there yet. I'm gonna, I'm getting there.

And that's your challenge to get there. There's some of you who are there. Can you double down on what you're doing? Could you produce a little bit more? Could you post on another platform? know, honestly, I think there's space even on on YouTube to do style videos. I have a client who came to one of my retreats back in like 2019, 2018. And in the audience, she was like, I really want to start a YouTube channel. Like, I know, Emily, you have one. I mean, at the time, truly, I was just putting my live streams from Facebook.

up on my YouTube channel. And it was really interesting because I was actually gaining a following from it and I was so passive, but she wanted to be more intentional. She wanted to really do styling and she has over a hundred thousand subscribers now. Like I feel like it's a valid source of income. She still has one store. She had two stores when we first met, but one store is like the perfect store for her. She has a great manager. I'm pretty sure the last time I spoke to her, got me a great manager, but she has her YouTube channel now.

I think that's so interesting because she can do both, right? I think the fun part about having a store or becoming an entrepreneur through owning a boutique is you gain power and insight and knowledge and confidence and this like sense of bravery that you never had. And a lot of you guys that I talked to are so hard on yourself, how cool you are and how much you've already done. an, you know, I laugh, I'm giggling.

I'm giggling because that's me too. I was like putting together a resume practice because I like keep my, I don't know, I like to keep my options open. I like to think like, what if I did apply for a job? I mean, that's not going to happen, I like the idea of having a resume that's of updated and I couldn't find one. I was like, you know what? I'm just going to do the exercise of creating this. And OMG, I was like.

You know, you have to call out like, what have you done? I've been an entrepreneur now for like 13 years, a long time, because I had my store, I had the fashion truck, right? And then I had the store, then I my books, like I've spoken on stages, I've hosted retreats, I have this education company, I have this podcast, I have my YouTube channel.

And I still am sitting here being like, man, I should be doing more. Man, my audience should be bigger. And what I say to you guys, like, every new person that discovers you means that there's more out there, right? It means like there's still more audience to be had. And that's a great thing. It means you're not tapped out, right? I think there are some markets that end up getting tapped out, and that's OK. But I love the idea that if things are moving all the time and they're fluid,

that you have the opportunity to influence someone new, to sell to someone new who needs what you have, like, because boom, they found could you expand in 2025? I know there's some of you guys that are adding like color consultations, or you're adding in-store styling, or classes. Like, I love all of it, OK? I love all of it. want you to remember.

how far you've come and how much you've already done and give yourself like so much credit this year. Like please celebrate this Please let it sink in how much energy and effort and intention learning and bravery and all this good stuff that you've done. I have this set of books that I read with Adeline we've had them for forever, but there are these little board books and they're

stories about real people. So we have one about Amelia Earhart. We had one about like David Bowie. We have a Mother Teresa one. it's funny, the ones she's wanted to read lately have all been women like doing like daring things or brave things and then also like helping people. And it's just interesting because that's really what we're all doing, right? Like I think to blow it up and be like, Amelia Earhart, she like paved the way for women to be pilots and

Da da da. mean, like, that's big things. But at the same time, I think we're all kind of doing that by showing up and being entrepreneurs and being small business owners. Like, it takes a lot of guts. And I've had people in my life who wanted to be entrepreneurs for so long, and now they're doing it. Or they're expanding. I'm just obsessed. I feel like, let's keep going. We're doing okay. Let's keep going. think part of keeping going is

A, like I said, remembering how much is enough. If flat to the last year being up 1 % is good, who cares? That's great, right? What do we want for 2025? And how are we gonna like slide into the end of the year? Like it's been the whole year. I think it's really hard because the end of the year, it feels like a lot of pressure, but I want you to try to enjoy this, enjoy seeing people.

Enjoy showing up for yourself. Enjoy showing up for your store. It's like only 10 or 15 or 20 more days. You know, it's just like, just you're going to get through it and then you're going to relax. here's the thing, the better care you take of yourself, the more confidence you're going to have and the more you're going to sell. Like that's it. So take care of yourself. And part of that, I think, is not stressing yourself out about

I need to do this last minute thing or this last minute sale or, you know, keep it easy for yourself. Do I think you need to move through inventory week after week and utilize your weekends to like maybe have a sale every weekend slowly but surely announce it each weekend, roll it out? Yeah, I think you could do that if you're overstocked in inventory or you're worried about maybe a certain department in style or you have some styles sitting around or things shipped late, right?

I want you to end your year with the least amount of inventory possible. But I also don't want you to worry about having like a 12 days of Christmas sale had you something every single day up know, the holidays. Like, please don't, don't stress yourself think you can do gift guides. I think you could send out an email or two yes, for sure. But don't feel like you have to be doing something every single day.

And the real bottom line is like, if you are in December and this is a make it or break it, like, I just hope it's not, right? I hope that this year has don't know, profitable enough. Like, I wanted to say like, you you've flourished enough this year that you feel content by the end of the year. That's my goal for One of the products I created to help owners all through the year is the Boutique Calendar.

I'm sure if you're listening, you've heard of the Boutique Calendar, you've seen the Facebook ad. We have a really great Facebook ad that's running right I actually used Facebook ads in a weekend, the trainings that I do, that I teach inside of the membership for Facebook ads, meta ads. I use those to run these calendar ads. We've sold like, we're selling a hundred to, I should check, it's probably about 120 for last month on Facebook ads.

just running right to my Shopify site. I like do it as a test. want to like, you know, I like learning new things. And when I sell a product like that, it's like you guys are doing for boutiques, right? And so it's fun to learn. And it's fun to sell the calendar. anyway, if you haven't gotten your calendar, they're at shopboutiqueceo.com. a 2025 printable wall calendar. The theme this year is Welcome to Boutique Land and it has the

mixture of Barbie land, boutique land, road to boutique land on it. And my friend commented on this image, we actually created it through AI, which we've been using more and more. And I have a love-hate relationship with it. I think AI has been really fun to play with and is not a save your life kind of situation. I don't don't think we need it so much. I like using my brain too.

But I like brainstorming with it. And creating images like this, this is not something I would have come up with. But basically, we fed it in. We want the mixture of this barbeque. We want it to be a long road. And I love how it ends up being kind of like, not all bright and sunny. The top of the sky is kind of dark teal, because there is this darkness in having a boutique, because it's hard. This is hard.

there's cacti like along the road. felt like that was really lovely because it's prickly and it's dry and it's like, the first little bit of like getting your boutique off the ground. It just is hard. Like it's hard to get into stepping into being an entrepreneur, stepping into having a business and showing up for that business. It takes so much energy and effort. And I think with so many women, especially so many of you guys are moms and wives and dog moms and

you have responsibilities, your daughters, your sisters. mean, like, there's very few people I meet, especially women who don't have some sort of connection with another human that they are semi responsible for human animal being, right, that they're responsible for. So I think there is this like prickliness in adjusting your life and navigating that road into entrepreneurship. And the craziest part for me

as I see people grow and expand and just become these amazing boutique owners step into the new store, step into the new concept or reinvent themselves somehow. Like a lot of people I see are like either moving or moving. We've had multiple people move locations and rebuild stores and it's so inspiring. And it's really, I'm so proud of them. Like I've just, there's so many.

Sydney and Jana and even like Rhonda I feel like keeps renovating. Like there's a bunch of clients who you guys keep doing more stuff and it's just so cool because you're reacting to what you need for your business and it's really fun to watch. So the boutique calendar, 12 months. There is affirmations on each piece of artwork. It's like has something that says like call all your friends back.

And it's like a fun graphic. And then I have sort of an overview of the month. Like, here's what February is all about. Here's what you should be thinking about. then inside the actual part of the calendar, it's a grid wall calendar. It will say things like, hey, stop buying spring styles right now. And mark down fall styles. Bring in winter styles. Don't forget Memorial Day themed things if you want to sell that. Or think about a sale this weekend.

It also has dates for trade shows and just other important dates. Like lot of our boutique land, especially for women's fashion, it really revolves around Easter and Thanksgiving. Like weirdly enough, those are kind of those hallmark dates. it's funny because everyone was commenting this year on how late Black Friday was and da-da-da. And I was like, yeah, next year Easter is super late. It's like April 20th.

And that was not to retail people. And I feel like it was so nerdy. But that's, think, what we're always looking for to understand how spring styles are going to sell. When are we going to start selling dresses? do we switch over to summer colors? All of that sort of hinges on the Easter Passover, that March, April swing moment. I think it's important to know your dates, understand the boutique and retail calendar period.

then see how your business works with it, right? I've been getting into some really detailed conversations with people who have hyper local businesses where we need to actually adjust the inventory to that locale. And I think it's important to see that the climate is shifting. If you were in California, a lot of places this year in September and October, it was still quite warm. So we saw like delayed sales in things like jackets and vests and things that it just wasn't cold enough to wear.

understanding all that is going to continue to be really it'll be interesting to see what happens in 2025 with the tariffs and with trend.