In this exclusive documentary series, Maxim Sion, fashion entrepreneur and Business Development Manager at Bleckmann, shares his experience of building a brand from the ground up – providing valuable insights on the practicalities of making your vision a reality. In this episode, he discusses the challenges of moving beyond the start-up stage.
With the backing of an investor, a growing product range and orders flowing in steadily, Black and Gold was experiencing strong momentum. However, the brand’s infrastructure was struggling to keep up. As Maxim explains, a lack of integration between the brand’s website, accounting system and inventory management set-up proved problematic.
“You’re creating orders in the IT system, but it wasn’t matching our warehouse at that moment, so everything was manual,” he says. “We hired somebody for marketing, and she was 50% of the time working in the warehouse. So, after a time, it was getting too much for the team.” In short, operations were taking energy away from brand building.
Press play on episode 5 to learn how the team addressed this complex situation.
The scale-up dilemma: Building internal capabilities versus outsourcing
As the operational challenges became harder to ignore, the young brand faced a critical decision common to many fast-growing businesses: invest further in building knowledge and capabilities internally or work with an external partner. On the one hand, in-house facilities allow you to keep all your processes ‘under one roof’. On the other hand, the costs and time requirements of expanding your capabilities can be significant.
In the end, Maxim and the team decided to invest in new racking, a significant outlay for a growing company. However, this didn’t address the ongoing problems related to inventory management and workforce availability. It was time to widen the net and consider another path, one that would allow Black and Gold to re-focus on its growth.
Check out the next episode to learn more about Maxim’s decision-making process and how he unlocked Black and Gold’s next expansion phase. And, if you want to take your brand to the next level, get in contact for a free consultation with a Bleckmann expert!
