Business on social networks. Business idea - a machine selling women's tights Selling hosiery as a business

Have you ever wondered why everyone became interested in social networks as a sales channel, and why social networks are of business interest to you? Today we’ll figure out what business is in in social networks.

Business on social networks

When there were a lot of online stores, and the continued existence of many of them seemed unprofitable, an objective need arose to search for new sales channels. Social networks have become such channels. Why? The answer is simple. At this point, among hundreds of social networks, there are about two dozen main ones - those that have the largest audience. Remember: which social networks are you registered on? How long ago? How often do you use social networks and for what exactly? For communication, for shopping?

Think about how people most often search for something on the Internet? They either use a search engine or immediately go to the final site they need (if they know the address of a site that they themselves discovered, that friends suggested to them, or that they learned thanks to advertising).

For example, some girl decided to buy herself warm tights for the winter. She will probably look for what she needs in a search engine using the query “buy warm tights”, or “where to buy warm tights”, or “warm tights online store”, or come up with some other request. The search results will most likely contain links to pages of specific products in online stores or sections with warm tights that best match the request. The girl will follow 5-10 links, and if she doesn’t see anything suitable for herself, she will probably go surfing social networks, or use modern versions of price aggregators like Yandex.Market.

If our girl is an ordinary user, then her browser will remember what she was looking for, and with a high degree of probability, on newly visited sites and on social networks, the girl will begin to be haunted by relevant advertising - warm tights and tights in general.

If a girl is an avid online shopper, and also likes to save money, participate in promotions and look for discounts, then she will probably continue her search on social networks.

Social networks have their own already formed audience, including those who are already accustomed to making purchases on social networks. It is for them that social networks come up with payment methods; there are internal advertising tools for them. Social networks have become competitors to search engines. Therefore, you either have to choose where to promote your online business - in search engines or in social networks, or have time to do it everywhere.

How to sell lingerie and tights on social networks

design of a page or group;
creating a catalog (product cards);
information content;
communications with potential buyers;
organization of delivery and payment processes.

People buy lingerie and tights with their eyes. Therefore, high-quality illustrations are the first thing you need to stock up on. Secondly, these are concise and comprehensive descriptions, which additionally encourage purchase. Or at least they will force you to remember some little thing.

Which social network to choose?

Each social network has its own characteristics. For example, there is a stereotype that VKontakte is used by schoolchildren and schoolgirls, Odnoklassniki by grandmothers, Facebook by office plankton, Instagram by those who have an iPhone and like to show off it. Choose your target audience!

Social networks differ not only in audiences, but also in functionality. For example, Twitter allows you to publish messages no longer than 140 characters (although the limit is going to be increased), on Facebook it is difficult to gain followers and likes, because there are strict limits and your account can be blocked.

What is better for sales: a group or a page?

Groups and pages provide different formats of communication. The group is for denser and more informal communication, the page is like a one-way information channel.

You should choose based on how you plan to promote in the future and how you plan to conduct a dialogue with the audience.

An important factor is which social network you plan to create a commercial account on. For example, if you create a page for sales on VKontakte and ask to subscribe to it, then you should remember that subscriptions to pages are visible in personal accounts in the “interesting pages” section, and participation in groups can be hidden. On the one hand, the visibility of pages promotes your page, on the other hand, it repels those who would not like to demonstrate their interest in lingerie and tights.

If you decide to convert a page into a group or vice versa, then this may also be possible.

We will tell you in detail about the choice between groups and pages in one of the following materials.

Risks

What do you risk by having your own online store on your own server? From a technical point of view - because evil viruses will come to you, because your site will be hacked.

Social media business is pre-limited to each individual network. From a technical point of view, everything is extremely simple: you will not be able to take everything that you have generated over months and years, be it photos, interesting posts, videos - and at one moment transfer it to another social network or to your website.

You risk it if you promote your group or page too zealously - it can be blocked or banned forever. Facebook is particularly strict.

To be continued.

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Stockings were sometimes indispensable as medicine. In the late 1930s, in Shropshire, a doctor was called to see a seriously ill man. The doctor asked his wife how she treated the patient, she replied: “Oh, doctor, and what did I do! I even put his stockings in a cross under the bed!”
Stockings helped against a sore throat: a dirty stocking was wrapped around the neck with the heel on the throat and left like that all night.

Starting your own business selling women's tights through a vending machine is a good idea for a budding entrepreneur! And you don't have to have a lot of money for this. It does not require much space, and there is no need to hire staff to maintain it. You can control the operation of such a device from a distance.

Tights are essential for women; no lady can do without them. But the huge disadvantage of these products made from nylon is their high sensitivity to external influences; they are very easy to tear, and at the most unexpected moment. A hole in tights can ruin your whole day, so in places that women often visit, vending machine selling women's tights it will be very useful. The demand for this product can be quite high if installed in the right location.

The advantages of this type of business, which does not require significant investments, include:

low rent for installed equipment (for its operation it is necessary to rent 1 sq.m. of space);
no need to hire staff;
the machine can operate around the clock, without breaks and days off;
the ability to install several machines in different places;
business mobility (if demand for a product is low, you can move trade to another, more profitable location at any time);
good forecasts for payback.

Step-by-step plan for starting a business

What do you need to start a business selling through vending machines?

To do this you need:

make a list of the places most visited by women where such equipment could be installed;
Having determined the installation location, you need to conclude a lease agreement with the owner of the premises;
purchase a vending machine that sells women's tights;
purchase goods at wholesale prices;
advertise the point of sale of tights at the point of sale by distributing flyers (advertising leaflets).

How much money do you need to start?

To buy such equipment, you do not need major capital investments. On average, such a device can cost from 250,000 to 260,000 rubles.

The cost of a pair of tights purchased in bulk is about 100 rubles. The price in the machine can be increased to 200 rubles.

How much can you earn from a pantyhose vending machine?

If you make approximate calculations, you can say with confidence that by setting a markup, for example, 100%, you can make a profit of about 10,000 rubles when selling 100 pairs of tights.

Approximate calculation:

The main expenses include:

automatic, costing about 260 thousand rubles;
rent 1 sq.m. area, approximately 2 thousand rubles per month (total 12 thousand rubles for 6 months)
Internet connection with modem 250 rub. per month (only 1.5 thousand rubles for 6 months).

The costs in this case will be 273,500 rubles. In order for it to pay for itself in 6 months, you need to sell goods worth 45,600 rubles per month.

In the product, this amount is expressed as follows. If you mark up the product by 100%, then with the average cost of women's tights being 200 rubles, the profit received will be 100 rubles.

To find out how many tights you need to sell per day, you need: 45,600 divided by 22 working days and 100 rubles. In total, you need to sell 21 pairs per day.

Where is it more profitable to install a vending machine?

Such a machine can give good results if the location for its location is chosen correctly. To get a good profit from this equipment, the most successful installation locations are:

large business centers;
educational institutions (universities, institutes, schools, etc.);
shoe boutiques;
places where many women work;
retail outlets selling underwear, etc.

You can increase the income from the machine by expanding the range of products sold through it. These may be products belonging to this group

footprints;
socks;
panty liners, etc.

The developers have equipped this machine with shelves to accommodate quite large quantity products. It can be adjusted using settings. This device is capable of independently giving change to customers.

The machine's basket, into which the purchased product falls, is conveniently located. You don't have to bend low to pick it up. The “smart” machine also collects sales statistics, and the number of products in the machine can be controlled using remote access.

What documents are needed to open?

To start your business as an individual entrepreneur and install a vending machine selling women's tights, you need, as at the beginning of any business, to register as an individual entrepreneur. Individual entrepreneur is the most acceptable option in this case, reporting in this case will be simpler, the taxation system will be more profitable compared to other types of business activities. The imposition of sanctions for individual entrepreneurs is much lower; he does not have to record his decisions and he can dispose of his own revenue more freely.

To register as an individual entrepreneur, you need to prepare a package of documents:

application (form P21001), which indicates the OKVED code;
copy of the passport;
receipt of payment of state duty;
a copy of the individual's TIN certificate.

It is important to know, what is the KVED code for vending machine selling women's tights. In the classifier, the activity of trading through machines has a code of 47.99, more precisely 47.99.2.

Registration with state registration authorities is carried out within five working days. After the end of this period, the entrepreneur will be issued a Certificate of state registration of an individual as an individual entrepreneur, and an extract from the Unified State Register of Individual Entrepreneurs.

Do I need permission to install a vending machine that sells women's tights?

You do not need to obtain a license to trade using a machine. When purchasing a machine, you need to ask the seller:

certificate (letter) from the certification center stating that such a device is not subject to certification;
conclusion of a sanitary and hygienic examination of the device;
technical passport for this device;
invoice;
warranty card;
invoice.

The vending machine must operate according to the rules established by the Civil Code of the Russian Federation (Article 498) regarding retail purchase and sale, and be guided by the Law of the Russian Federation No. 2300-1 of February 7, 1992 on the protection of consumer rights.

Article 498 of the Civil Code requires that the owner of the machine familiarize buyers with information about the seller of the goods. This step is easy to complete: you need to place the following data on the machine:

about the name of the seller;
where can it be found;
its operating mode.

It is necessary to provide the machine with instructions (sequence of actions) for using the machine.

A vending machine selling women's tights is a great idea for budding entrepreneurs. The demand for such a product is quite high, and the income received from its work is stable. At the same time, investments in the implementation of this business ideas will be one-time maximum at the very beginning of activity.

Trading from a machine can be either an independent business project or additional to the main activity, for example, if you already have your own small store or a chain of stores selling shoes, underwear. In addition, if this business successfully develops, you can invest in the same machines to expand your distribution network.

What equipment to choose for business

Vending machines for women's tights come in different configurations. For example, they take into account the possibility of payments by bank transfer and cash, various options for issuing change from certain bills, etc. The higher the level of configuration, the greater demand will be for the goods from your machine. If you plan to place a vending machine at the airport, then the mechanism should also accept the currencies of different countries.

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Men, who among you at least once in your life has not rushed around your apartment in the morning looking for a pair of clean socks? Ladies, how many of you have never been nervous about their constant “mysterious” disappearance?

Moscow student Evgeny Novikov claims he has found relief from these worries. He came up with the idea of selling socks not in pairs, but in whole boxes.

Money in a sock

It all started a few years ago, when Evgeniy and a friend decided to distribute socks in bulk to students. The idea was borrowed from the West. There is a place where you can, just like a newspaper, subscribe to socks and receive them by mail. Each envelope contains three pairs. Our students didn’t dare contact the post office, so the idea had to be transformed. They created a website where they offered to order identical socks not in pairs, but in boxes. Lost one after washing - no problem, get the next one. Profitable and without nerves. We counted on our own, but it turned out that orders came from all over Moscow: the site ended up in one of the search engines.

At the first stage, young businessmen worked, as they say, “on wheels.” We received the order and purchased the necessary goods on the same day. We also delivered socks to clients ourselves. Couriers needed money, and the business was created without start-up capital.

Demand for black, domestic

But it was impossible to do further without investments. Evgeniy, after graduating from university, found a job. He invested the money he started earning in his own company: he organized a mini-warehouse and a warehouse (all in one apartment), hired his first employees. Social networks did good advertising for the new business. It is through them that future clients of the company still learn about this unusual service. Other types of advertising, according to the businessman himself, did not work. Although they handed out leaflets near the metro, and established relationships with corporate clients.

Today, 70% of the company's customers are middle-income women. And this is quite understandable. Men lose socks, tear them, and women are looking for a way out of the situation: she bought a box with 30 pairs and provided her husband with them for a year. By the way, Evgeniy tests socks himself: he buys several pairs, wears them for a while, and then, based on the results, decides on a supplier. He prefers to work directly with factories - both well-known and not. And not with Chinese, but with domestic ones. He says that he went to the Celestial Empire and took a closer look. Socks, like everything else, are, of course, cheaper there, but customers don’t like Chinese stuff.

Currently, socks are delivered by a courier service. The main clients are in Moscow, the Moscow region, and St. Petersburg. The best selling color is black. Sometimes people of color also ask. Attempts to trade also women's socks, as well as T-shirts, were not successful. So for now the range is expanding exclusively due to the colors and material of socks for the stronger sex.

Evgeny Novikov gives some advice to those who want. First of all, be confident in your project to the last: even if you are unlucky, it doesn’t matter, you learn from mistakes. Secondly, listen to other people's opinions, but always have your own point of view. Many people will say, “This won’t work,” and they will be wrong.

These are just a few long-established services, without which it is now difficult to imagine our lives. Not so long ago they were crazy ideas, the owners of which simply set a goal and confidently walked towards success.

From time to time in our country they also appear interesting projects. One of them can be considered a service for delivering socks in boxes Sock"n"Box. Only time will tell how successful it will be. Organizers Dmitry Yaroshevich And Nikita Parovoznik are confident that their idea is bound to be successful. It’s hard to talk about large-scale results yet, but after a couple of weeks of work, the first buyers and offers to cooperate appeared.

Where did you start?

The Sock"n"Box service has only been running for a few weeks, but there are already some results. Organizers say that every day they notice that everyone more people are interested in their service. They say that they wanted to create something inexpensive and unusual. After a couple of days of negotiations and searching through options, the idea of creating a sock delivery service was born.

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“Today the consumer’s world is built on visual contact, so packaging, accompanying materials and advertising should be aimed at the “eyes” of the consumer, so that he sees and wants to buy it. So we decided to turn banal socks into something original”, says one of the authors of the idea Dmitry Yaroshevich.

The guys say that the name of the service was born naturally. They deliver socks in a box - in English it sounds like “socks in box”, using a play on words they came up with the name Sock"n"Box - in the manner of Rock"n"Roll. They work from home, make the boxes themselves, develop models, choose which materials are best to work with, choose socks with optimal ratio prices and quality.

Attachments

Dmitry and Nikita had practically no start-up capital and decided to do an experiment to see if it was possible to create something with virtually no investment. As a result, we traveled around Kharkov, looked for materials, developed the design of boxes and came up with ways to interest buyers. They also organize delivery themselves: in Kharkov by courier, to other cities by Nova Poshta.

Dmitry and Nikita do not want to talk about profits yet, because they have only been working for a few weeks and have not had time to talk about themselves. They invested about 1000 UAH in the project. A little later they plan to attract investors and develop the project on a larger scale.

“We had few orders, so we have not yet recouped the investment, but we were noticed by one Kharkov store of original clothing, books, decorative items and handmade items. They offered to cooperate by displaying our product in their store for sale. We have already given them the first batch Sock"n"Box and we are waiting for the announcement on the showcase", - says Dmitry Yaroshevich about the first successes.

Product promotion

Advertise products on social networks. Dmitry Yaroshevich says that the creation of the site is not entirely justified yet. They want to first see how Ukrainians will like “socks in a box”, and then they will engage in this business on a larger scale and will create a personal website a little later. Moreover, this is not the main activity. Sock"n"Box is an opportunity to try yourself in something new. So far, VKontakte is paying off, besides, here you can offer services without special expenses in different societies and shine in front of specific people, and not hope for luck that someone will notice the site.

The guys say that their idea is not something special. They simply decided to prove to everyone and, first of all, to themselves that if you have the desire, you can make money on anything. Even at the banal sale of socks. A little creativity, creativity - and a new individual project is ready.

By 2002, he got bored with working in the press, and he switched to advertising - for two years he worked as a marketing manager for the Ekaterinburg Tinkoff restaurant, then he was appointed director of the advertising department of the entire restaurant chain and transferred to an office in St. Petersburg. Before opening his own business, he managed to work as a marketer in three more places - on the Geometria.ru website, at the St. Petersburg travel company Versa and the Novaya Pharmacy chain.

But Tonkov always dreamed of own business. “I’m a creative person, so I was looking for an idea at the intersection of business and creativity,” he says. “When I found out that the production of socks is quite affordable in terms of investment and management, I began to look into it further.”

I wanted to start small - place orders for the production of socks at existing production facilities in Russia. But it turned out differently. In the summer of 2015, Tonkov found an advertisement on Avito for the sale of the Noskof factory in the village of Razbegaevo Leningrad region. “I immediately went to see this enterprise,” says Tonkov. — They made black, gray and white socks according to GOST: not very wearable, but not falling apart after the first wash. It was something we could work with."

Factory with an area of 350 sq. m with a warehouse were sold for 10 million rubles. The previous owners had no time to deal with it: their main business was the production of metal structures. In addition, the business brought in almost no money. According to SPARK-Interfax, in 2014 the company’s revenue was less than 1.5 million rubles.

Tonkov did not have 10 million rubles, so he started looking for a financial partner. Sergey Zhivotov, his acquaintance from one of his past projects (he was a co-owner of Geometria.ru), agreed to become an investor. “I told him how, when and what we could come to,” Tonkov recalls. - Naturally, these were all assumptions. The business itself was still incomprehensible to us. But Zhivotov agreed.”

The partners acquired the company in early September 2015. The only condition of the Noskof seller was to leave all the workers who live in Razbegaevo at the factory. This was to Tonkov’s advantage: he did not need to look for personnel for production.

It took about two months and 2-3 million rubles to modernize the enterprise, search for yarn and determine knitting parameters. Tonkov's personal funds. From the very beginning it was clear that there was no point in selling cheap socks, which means they must be of high quality and contain at least 80% cotton. It was not possible to find such yarn from domestic manufacturers. “Russian manufacturers make only synthetic and blended yarn, which contains 50% cotton or less,” says Tonkov. “The fibers of this yarn are short, so there are a lot of tears when worn.”

In October 2015, Tonkov entered into an agreement with the companies Targen and Rivage, which distribute Turkish yarn, and began preparing the first collection. At the same time, he independently developed a website and set up online advertising. “I didn’t come up with the name St.Friday Socks right away,” says Tonkov. — At first I complained to friends that all possible words on the Russian and foreign markets were already taken. But once at a friend’s birthday they told me: the company is from St. Petersburg, call it Saint Socks. And then I remembered that Friday when the idea came and everything came together in St. Friday Socks.”

The first collection consisted of 80 models: 15-20 prints in different colors. The main difference from competitors was the aggressive color combinations: white and red, black and orange. “We opened urgently at the request of my friends. Everyone wanted gifts for New Year", Tonkov laughs. The first customers, who bought about 2 thousand pairs, came mainly through Facebook.

City fairs have become an additional channel for promoting St.Friday Socks. “The markets became free focus groups for us. I stood behind the counter and asked people everything. I wanted to see my clients and understand why they buy bright socks,” says Tonkov. — The most important conclusion I made is that we are on the right path. Most clients have only recently switched to designer socks. That is, demand is just beginning to form.”

Stylish detail

According to the Fashion Consulting Group, imports of hosiery in Russia in 2016 decreased by almost 30% compared to 2015, and domestic production grew by 7%. Most socks are sold in the budget segment (from 50 to 200 rubles per pair). St.Friday Socks belong to the middle segment; their retail price averages 300-400 rubles. for a couple.

“Socks from an intimate wardrobe detail have become an accent element of the image in the wake of the main fashion trend— individualization and freedom to choose your image,” says Anna Lebsak-Kleymans, CEO of Fashion Consulting Group. — In Europe and the USA, bright socks have already moved from the conceptual category to the category of mass-market products. The first to master it many years ago were, for example, the Swedish Happy Socks and the American Soxfords.”

Russia, as usual, lags behind, but now the market for unusual socks in the country is beginning to grow. Most of the large domestic manufacturers are focused on the traditional mass market and therefore continue to produce the usual monochrome assortment, which is in guaranteed demand. Main actors In the segment of bright socks, startups St.Friday Socks, Happy Socks, Funny Socks, Sammy Icon, Zaporozhets, as well as international underwear and hosiery brands(Calzedonia, Falke, etc.) and international chains (H&M, Zara, Uniqlo, Mango, etc.), which also included colored socks in their range.

Photo: Askhat Bardynov for RBC

Socks between books

When the New Year's rush subsided, Tonkov began to negotiate the sale of St.Friday Socks with grocery retailers (Azbuka Vkusa, Bakhetle, Metro Cash & Carry, etc.), fashion stores (TSUM, Podium Market, Streat Beat, “Econika”, etc.) and even bookstores, which are actively increasing sales of souvenirs (“Read-city”, Moscow House of Books, “Bukvoed”, etc.). But no one wanted to sell expensive socks. “I didn’t expect that we would face such a failure,” Tonkov recalls. “Everyone said: “We’ll keep an eye on you.”

We observed for six months. All this time, Tonkov was content only with retail sales on the website and single wholesale orders. With average revenue of 500-600 thousand rubles. the business was making losses per month. “I spent my own savings on advertising and employee salaries, plus my mother helped. That’s how we survived,” says Tonkov.

In addition, for some reason the aspiring entrepreneur opened an office in St. Petersburg. “We sat in this office for probably only six months, after which I realized that this was a wrong move,” Tonkov admits. — The sales department still sits at the factory, assembly also takes place at the factory. We closed the office because we were throwing 80 thousand rubles down the drain. per month".

Sergey Tonkov (Photo: Askhat Bardynov for RBC)

In the spring of 2016, he was finally contacted by one of the employees of the St. Petersburg book chain Bookvoed, to whom St.Friday Socks had offered cooperation back in the winter. She said that Bookvoed is ready to place racks of designer socks in the souvenir department. In May, Tonkov made the first delivery of 700 pairs, and St. Friday Socks appeared in several stores in the chain. Soon, on the eve of the World Hockey Championship, socks with hockey symbols were purchased by ABC of Taste.

In the spring of 2016, the entrepreneur released his first lookbook - a catalog of St.Friday Socks photographs. For the shooting, Tonkov invited stylists working with fashion magazines and department stores, and freelance photographers. In total, the catalog cost him 200 thousand rubles. However, it did not bring any new clients.

Then Tonkov decided to try his luck a second time; he decided to release a second lookbook - a series of photographs of the new collection, released in collaboration with famous Moscow designers. “The famous buyer Gosha Rostovshchikov, who at that time collaborated with Podium Market, helped me a lot,” says Tonkov. “He introduced me to designers Alexander Arutyunov, Oleg Ovsiev and Konstantin Gaidai and convinced them to release a joint collection.” Gradually, with the help of his acquaintances, Tonkov assembled a team of six fashion designers, under whose names six limited collections were released.

Thanks to the fact that some designers carried out the shooting themselves and sent finished photographs to the entrepreneur, the new lookbook cost only 20 thousand rubles. Tonkov paid the designers royalties based on sales. In the fall of 2016, he spent about 200 thousand rubles on royalties to all designers. “I tried to squeeze every possible PR opportunity out of the collaboration,” he says. “And I succeeded: the entire fashion elite drew attention to our socks.”

Retailers Podium Market, Yunost, Good Local, Expedition, Capsula, Moscow Socks Club, Trends Brands have been added to St.Friday Socks clients. Following them, the largest online clothing hypermarket Wildberries came with an order. In addition, the company began to receive requests for the production of socks under the chain's trademarks. For example, Tonkov made several sets of socks under the Testosteron brand for the Red Cube gift shops. True, most retailers took the goods for sale and did not pay immediately, but only after someone bought the socks. “Back then we supplied a lot for sale simply because we wanted to be present on store shelves,” says Tonkov.

According to SPARK-Interfax, the total revenue of the legal entities of the project, LLC Noskof and LLC Friday, for the entire 2016 amounted to 15.5 million rubles, profit - 236 thousand rubles. 70% of all funds earned came from wholesale sales, the rest came from the online store. “It got to the point that business stopped eating up my personal funds and I set myself a salary,” Tonkov rejoices. “But there was practically no profit due to the fact that we spent a lot on advertising and packaging testing.” Thematic sets of socks from St.Friday Socks are now sold in cardboard and even wooden boxes - this increases the manufacturer’s costs, but gives the product a premium look and allows it to be positioned as a gift.

Photo: Askhat Bardynov for RBC

In fact, designer socks are a very marginal product. The cost of a pair of St.Friday Socks is 40 rubles. (and ordinary black socks can be made for 3 rubles.) Their price on the store shelf reaches 400 rubles, but the retailer takes most of the margin. In September 2017, the company received 2 million rubles. revenue and about 200 thousand rubles. arrived.

The problem was also that the retailer was in no hurry to pay for the goods taken for sale. “For several months they simply deceived us, showing statistics on sales of 50-100 pairs per month. In fact, they sold many times more products, but did not transfer the funds to us,” says Tonkov. — For debts up to 30 thousand rubles. We didn’t even go to court.” Large debtors had to go to court: the entrepreneur won several cases, some are still being considered by the courts. For example, according to Tonkov, Podium Market paid regularly at first, but stopped in the spring of 2017. “We submitted an application to terminate the contract in April, and since then we have not been able to receive either goods or money,” Sergei sighs. The total debt of Podium Market to St.Friday Socks amounted to more than 700 thousand rubles. However, according to Vedomosti estimates, in total in 2017, 64 claims from counterparties were filed against Podium Market for a total amount of more than 1 billion rubles. Now the network, and no one knows when it will pay the suppliers. After this incident, Tonkov stopped working with retailers on sales terms and began demanding prepayment.

Tonkov associates the development of the project with supplies abroad. “We have already received more than a hundred requests from all over the world from people wanting to buy our socks,” he says. It is difficult to establish exports: the goods are inexpensive, and the cost of delivery eats up a significant part of the margin. However, St.Friday Socks are already sold in several offline stores in the USA, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Greece and Kazakhstan.

View from the outside

“We weren’t afraid to combine socks and books”

Olga Rogozina, head of the system communications department of the Bukvoed book chain

“We liked St.Friday Socks products right away. It was quite suitable for our new product group “products for self-expression”. It includes all products that allow a person to express his personal aesthetic tastes: T-shirts or bags with book and literary themes, quotes; caps, notepads, mugs. Such subcultural manifestations seem very promising to us. We are optimistic about the development of this product group and assume that it will occupy more than 5% of the company's total turnover. We were not afraid to combine socks and books, because we are used to surprising our customers and being ironic.

Sergey not only offered us his product, but also listened to our recommendations and changed the packaging design. The socks are popular, with sales peaking during the Christmas gift season. We are currently looking for opportunities to expand both the St.Friday Socks line and the entire “products for self-expression” trading group.

“Producing socks is one of the simplest”

Mikhail Labakhua, director of brand development "Zaporozhets"

“For the last few years, people have not been shy about wearing colored socks. Previously, it was a shame: people thought it was something indecent. Now they believe that such products can at least be given as a gift. Due to the increased interest in colored socks, new players have appeared. Since the production of socks is one of the most simple and quite developed in our country, the barrier to entry into the market is low. You can place orders at existing production facilities, or launch your own factory. The development of this segment can be judged by the appearance in shopping centers racks with colored socks. Now I can say with confidence that we have our own strong players in this segment. Their advantage over Western brands is in price and speed of delivery.”