How to Start a Bridal Store in Nigeria

If you’re obsessed with fashion trends and wedding planning, starting a bridal store might be perfect for you. But before you help brides-to-be find their special wedding dress, it’s important to set yourself up for success by researching market trends, choosing an appropriate location, and planning your store layout.

look for existing bridal stores that you admire and analyze their website and storefront to get a sense of their aesthetic, style, and value proposition.

Bridal shop / boutique is the place to get all the need for that special day of their life, therefore a bridal shop is a very profitable business in Nigeria because of the latest obsession in the society today with glamour and trend. Most people getting Married want their wedding in a luxurious way that makes a huge profit for bridal shops / boutique business and also for event planning and management companies.

Every good business is successful because of a good business plan, without a business plan they cannot be checks and balances of your business, you cannot really venture into any business without sitting and preparing a good analysis of how you want your business to be. Your business plan can be a device used to attract potential investors.

Decide if you are going to be a brick and mortar shop or an online shop. Some shops are purely web-based, so they pay for hosting their website and communicate with their clients online. Other shops only have a brick and mortar shop, with a limited web presence. Think about whether you would like to maintain just a webshop or own an actual shop.

Most successful bridal shops have a physical location and a healthy web presence. This combination allows bridal shops to offer one on one fittings and face to face customer service, while still communicating and networking with clients online.

Understand the day in the life of a bridal shop owner. For most bridal shop owners, their days are spent focusing on the needs of their clients, the managing of their inventory, and the general running of the store. A typical day as a bridal shop owner might include:

Booking appointments for brides and their families to help them find the right dresses and catering to their needs. Depending on how large your staff is, you will work directly with your clients or check on them to see if your employees are giving them the help they need.

You will also communicate with fashion houses and distributors to ensure dresses are delivered on time and on budget.

You may use an in-house seamstress or outsource your tailoring to a third party service. Regardless, you will need to check on any outstanding alterations to make sure they are done on time.

At the end of the day, you will record the day’s payments and check your finances to ensure your shop’s profit margins are in order.

You may also seek out a mentor, someone who currently owns a bridal shop in your area or who you feel may be a good guide and role model. Ask this mentor if you can shadow her for a few days or get advice on how to start your own bridal business.

Some shop owners start as employees at a bridal shop and work under a mentor for several years before opening their own shop. This way, they are familiar with the financial requirements and the current bridal trends to then start their own business.

Find a store location. Don’t stress about finding a location on a high street or in a designer fashion district. If you build a reputation, brides will travel to find the perfect dress and the perfect shopping experience. Rent will likely be cheaper in a secondary or less trendy location. But ensure the location is near other fairly reputable business, gets some foot traffic, and has parking available nearby.

Building up a relationship with your suppliers is fundamental to the success of your business. If you are loyal to them, and their pieces sell in your shop, you can expect loyalty from them in return. Over time, some designers may offer exclusivity to your shop, but you will need to sell a high amount of their gowns every year and continue to sell their products at a high rate for this to happen.

Hire your staff. If your location is small, you may only need to hire one or two employees. Consider how often you want to be in the shop, handling the day to day business, and if you can afford to hire more than one employee. If you have a larger showroom, or a large client list, you will likely need to hire more employees to keep up with client demand.

Get ready for opening day. According to the industry, the best time to open a new shop is in September, as most brides will start looking for their wedding one year ahead. January is also a good time as brides getting married later the same year will start looking for wedding attire then.

Keep your operating hours simple and consistent, such as Monday to Friday, 10-5, and Saturdays, 9-5. Look at the operating hours of the shops around you and try to match their hours.

Over time, you may tweak your opening hours based on the frequency of your customers on a certain day of the week or time.

Make sure that you really understand your brand's story, and that you're able to communicate that story to your target audience. Once you do that, you get people approaching your business with interest since they have a good idea of who you are and what you stand for.

Social media is an excellent channel for building brand awareness. Bridal brands tend to perform well on visual platforms like Instagram and Pinterest, so make sure to snap quality photos or hire a professional photographer to create stunning images.

Profitability of Bridal shop / Boutique

Like we have already established, this is a very profitable business, the market is still much unsaturated but here are some important things you need to know. Due to weddings taking place every weekend the demand for bridal fashion is very high, this is a good reason to start and start today.

With the way weddings are taking place in this country on weekends, and the competition in this line of business is very low, you can venture into it and start making so much than you thought possible. If you have the skill and fashion sense together with passion for it then there is no telling of what you can make in short space of time.

The management of a wedding dress shop needs long term planning. In the process of planning how to open a bridal store and make good money, versatility is vital for expansion – all from increasing the number of outlets to improving your online presence. When managed correctly and with proper financial management techniques, the bridal business can turn out to be quite profitable and fruitful.

Get our training guide on How to set up a lucrative Bridal Shop in Nigeria. It will cover topics such as the necessary steps to take, the challenges one might face, and the best ways to overcome them. By the end of this training attendees will be equipped with the knowledge needed to venture into the Bridal shop business with confidence.

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