

Ask HN: Rate my startup idea. - anujkk

Idea : A website that<p>1)Lets fashion designers upload their designs and share it with others publicly or among selected friends.<p>2)Designs may only include designs of anything wearable, not other designs.<p>3)Members can rate, like and give feedback about designs.<p>4)Top Designs are shown on home page<p>5)apparels of top designs will be made available for online purchase. The money will go to original designer but X% of sale price will be deducted as fees.<p>6)Optional - An online HTML5 based design tool.<p>What do you think about this idea? Do you know any existing startup/site doing same thing?
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scottporad
I don't know if this is a good idea. In part, because so much of a good idea
is driven by a unique understanding of a market that a founder has. Also, in
part, because I'm involved with an idea that nobody thought would work, but
actually does, so my calibration is off.

That being said, I have a few questions to ask that might help _you_ figure
out if this is a good idea.

First, "to what problem is this a solution?"

Second, who is the customer? Customers are different than users. Customers are
people who pay for goods and services. Sometimes your users and customers are
the same people, but other times they're different. So, you may have users,
but in order to be a business, you need to have customers, too.

Third, put the first two questions together: are there people who will pay for
that solution? If so, a) how many, b) how much, and c) (IMHO, most
importantly) how are you going to find them? In other words, you could have a
great solution to a real problem, but if you don't have a cost efficient way
to connect the two, then you don't have a business.

Obviously, this is not every question you may want to ask in order to validate
your idea, but I hope these are a few that help.

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anujkk
Thanks for your valuable feedback. As per my understanding this site will
connect fashion designers(user/partner) to online users who like buying
apparels online(Customer). So, in theory it is just another middleman like
site connection buyers with seller. Ofcourse, no one will buy designs but they
will buy apparels having good design. We need to bring a third entity here
i.e. manufacturers.

I really don't know if it will be viable and profitable. I need to think more
about it.

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andrewguenther
This reminds me a lot of Threadless' model. If you haven't heard of them,
check them out. I know their focus is on t-shirts, but the format is almost
identical.

The thing you need to consider is, if these designs are made available for
purchase, who will produce them? Will the creator be in charge of all of the
shipments? How will these orders be fulfilled?

Might I suggest a Kickstarter approach? Let users pledge to a design, if a
certain pledge goal is reached, you would take a cut, and liability lies
completely with the designer to produce the design. This, to me, would make
things a lot easier on your end, as well as increase the value of feedback.
Money is the best way to measure popularity.

Let me know what you think, I really want to see where this all goes.

~~~
anujkk
I know many similar sites such as threadless or myntra.com(India) which are
quite popular but they are limited in sense that they deal in t-shirts etc
only and their designs are just about adding some text or image on t-shirt.

What I am talking about is full-fledged designs by fashion designers. It
includes not only t-shirts but also other designs for females.

Putting up a site will not be a problem. The real problem will be dealing with
product life cycle after taking the orders. i.e. who will manufacture the
apparel(product)? What will be the minimum order required? Who will ship it?
How much time will it take? etc.

~~~
andrewguenther
I feel like the designer should be in charge of making the product. You
website should simply serve as a way for them to get the design out there.
Again, I think taking notes from Kickstarter would be good here.

Let the designer decide how many pledges they want before they will produce.
Once this number of pledges has been reached, you take a cut. Then all of the
shipping information for the pledgers is passed from you to the designer and
they are in charge of filling the orders.

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jonah
Some existing sites:

Submit, vote on, and buy designs: <http://garmz.com> \- Closest to your idea.

Promoting small designers: <http://fabricly.com>

Design fabric patterns: <http://spoonflower.com>, <http://fabricondemand.com>

Customize dress shirts: <http://blanklabel.com>, <http://propercloth.com>,
<http://shirtsmyway.com>, <http://worldofalfa.com>

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jonah
Apparel is hard. [1]

Beside the normal web startup challenges, a key challenge will be the
technical product development and production of the apparel designs.

There's huge amount of work that happens between the design sketch and
finished product. The design has to be turned into patterns and pieces, the
fit has to be just right, it has to be produceable, etc. Then you have to work
with (usually multiple) companies to produce the pieces. Lots of work. As with
anything short production runs are more expensive too.

[1] I've worked with quite a few apparel and footwear brands and have seen
this first hand.

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francisrmd
You could put your idea on MySocialVenture.com and get feedback and find
partners. Maybe a good way to get started

