Biggest Reasons Retail Stores Fail

Retail is a business model that has been around forever.

We know that it used to go on the way before you and I were born. The rise of eCommerce and drop shipping has certainly disrupted the retail space, but there is still room to kill it.

Some of the biggest reasons that retail has been failing are below, and what you can do about it!

No Money

The first and most helpless answer to why any business fails is a lack of money to continue operations. Even though that is pretty obvious to most of us, some people just do not plan effectively to start a business.

There really is not a solution to getting more capital, other than getting a loan or producing more through operations or personally.

Lack of Focus

Everyone seems to want to start a business, but once it starts to live off, they relax. The problem is when it starts to rise that is when you need to strike and go all in!

A retail business is relatively low margins, so you have to keep everything in your business tidy and trimmed, or that margin could evaporate very quickly.  Also, you might not realize that you have a few leaks in your systems, and it is costing you money.

I would actually recommend that anyone who is not a seasoned veteran to go out and get a second pair of eyes on your retail company.  Something like a retail software services company might be able to help you gain an advantage.

Overreaching

Retail businesses operate on a small margin as I said earlier. A small margin at least compared to other sectors like technology.

So, you have to be calculated and precise with every move, because a wrong one could easily sway your business into not being profitable.  All of these points are related, and not being profitable is going to lead you to the first problem in this list, not enough money to continue operations.

Even though gaining market share is important, dying from expanding too much is also something that you can’t afford to do with your retail business.

Bad Customer Experience

You could be killing it and avoiding all of the previous problems, but if you do not have good customer service, then you can forget about your retail business.  Whether you are talking about shipping problems, in-store problems, or really anything with the customer, you can’t leave them with a bad experience that they do not come back from.

Customer experience may not seem big, but a bad word of mouth reputation spreads through your target market like wildfire, and that could lead to the downfall of your business and the sales that you make.

There are so many other things that I could point out, but I am just going to leave you with those 4 main areas that you should focus on with your retail business.  Once you knock those out of the park, then you are onto something.