Catherine Erdly [00:00:01]:
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Catherine Erdly [00:00:54]:
I'm Catherine Edley and in the next few minutes you're about to get powerful real world retail strategies from insights shared both from my guests and myself, backed up by my 25 years in the retail industry. Keep listening to learn how to grow a thriving, profitable product business. Let's jump in with this latest episode. Today I want to talk about something I'm genuinely really excited about and that's Retail by Design. I am just about ready to kick off the 10th cohort of my one to one program retail by Design. And this year I have taken all of my learnings from working with over 60 businesses across the last two and a half years. And I have taken all of those learnings and the work that I've done with people where it's worked really well and I've made some adjustments to the program and I'm super excited about that because I feel like this version reflects everything that I've learned from working with product businesses over the last few years. So why did I create Retail Bar Design? Well, I launched it originally in 2020 because I recognized that I had group programs such as Retail Sales Game Plan for example, but I really enjoyed working with people in a much more in depth way.

Catherine Erdly [00:02:10]:
I've actually worked with people as a one off or as a mentor, ongoing mentor since 2018, so nearly eight years now. And I wanted to take that one to one support which I know is really, really important for when your business gets to a certain point. And I wanted to take it and put it into a program that was designed to to wrap around the founder, lift them up and give them the support that they needed. So that was the original thought process behind Retail by Design. All about how can I best support founders and give them everything that they need to succeed and to help them manage some of the stress points as they grow. There is a stage where people get out of that feeling of the only thing I need is more sales. Once they've locked in who their customer is, what product is that they're selling, they're starting to see some data, decent revenue. The idea that a lot of us have is that once you get to that six figure stage or whatever it might be, that it'll suddenly start to feel easier.

Catherine Erdly [00:03:06]:
But it definitely, in my experience, talking to lots of different people over the years, it doesn't feel like that it gets heavier, the sales are coming in, but decisions feel riskier. Things like stock, cash flow, planning all starts to live in your head. It turns into you reacting instead of leading. And it's not about a motivation problem, it's a structure problem. The big phrase with retail by design is what got me here isn't going to be what gets me there. It's also a recognition that we can self teach a lot about running a business, but you will get to the point, especially for product business, where you'll identify that there are things that you just don't know or you don't know what you don't know. And all of this can be quite difficult because what happens is as the business grows and gets more successful, everyone also assumes that you're doing brilliantly. So it can be harder to find who to ask, it can be harder to find who can help you see what the path is to move forward.

Catherine Erdly [00:03:59]:
And it can be harder to find the answers that you need and the support that you need. Everything that I do is extremely specialized. I only work with product businesses, I only work with E commerce or bricks and mortar or wholesale first businesses or people who are a mixture of all three, which is more common than you might think. So retail by design it is for established product businesses. They are usually at six figures or beyond. They are people who have identified that they've got great products, strong potential, they really understand who their customer is, they are action takers. But the founder is beginning to feel stretched, decision fatigued, and they want clarity and calm, not more tactics. As I said, one of the biggest myths that I see is people feel like once you hit a certain revenue level then all of your problems will go away.

Catherine Erdly [00:04:45]:
But what I see instead is that you get to a certain point where relying on instinct, relying on your ability to wing things, relying on the fact that you're probably really, really intuitive business owner and you really understand what your customer wants and the products that they want, which has really helped you get to the point that you're at. But now what you need to do is introduce a certain amount of structure. So Retail by Design, as I said, it is a essentially a one to one program at heart. It's six months high touch. It's not a course, it's not diy. It is ongoing support, planning, decision making, space and it focuses on structure, clarity, better decisions and sustainable growth. So what has changed this time is that I'm also incorporating into Retail by Design the services of my done for you service Stock Doctor. So Stock doctor is a brilliant service for you if the main thing that you have an issue with is stock.

Catherine Erdly [00:05:42]:
If you are an independent retailer, for example, or an E commerce brand and you feel like I've pretty much got everything nailed, but I really don't understand stock or I really feel like I should be paying myself more or I really feel like there should be more money in this business and I just don't have a handle on stock. I don't feel confident about it. Then Stock Doctor is for you if you are somebody who thinks all of those things, but then you're also thinking, well, I'm kind of at a crossroads. I really want to decide where I take the business now. I feel like there are so many different parts of this business. I don't know what support I need, what structure I need, what strategy I need, or you're undergoing a major change, for example, opening a shop or moving to a different fulfillment center or anything like that, and you really feel like you need some support with that, then Retail by Design is for you. So when I talk to people on calls to discuss my services, I'm usually listening for if they say everything's fine, but I just really would like to get my stock under control that sits under Stock Doctor. If they're saying I really want to understand my numbers more and I really want to look at the business as a whole, then that to me says Retail by Design.

Catherine Erdly [00:06:49]:
But what I found was that when I was doing Retail by Design previously, a lot of the founders, they also had the need to understand more about their stock, to have it managed for them, to have somebody sitting them down and telling them exactly what was going on. And so therefore it was something that I realized that having both stockdoctor and Retail by Design together was a powerful combination. In fact, I had some clients who did both of them at the same time, both stockdoctor and Retail by Design. And it was so beneficial, it worked so well in tandem that I decided to make it part of the core program. One of the things that makes growth feel really scary and uncertain is because the numbers feel uncertain. And so having somebody taking care of your stock, which is for most people the biggest expenditure that they have in their business, it felt like a no brainer to work with a stock doctor and myself to give the person in retail by design the benefit of two experts looking at their business. So in terms of how that breaks down, then the stock doctor looks at sales and stock every month, keeps plans up to date, flags risks early, maybe things that you might be selling out of, or things you need to buy more of, or things that you're sitting on that are trapped cash that could be freed up to make the business more profitable. They are experts at modeling.

Catherine Erdly [00:08:06]:
This is something that I really can't stress enough if you are a fast growth business. For example, stock doctor is able to come in and model what stock you would need based on various different scenarios. And they're also able to adjust those each month when they update your plans based on what actually happened. So all of the stock doctors that I have working with me, they all have a really strong deep retail merchandising background. And running different scenarios and looking at the impact of growth is something that is second nature. They are able to really help with that modeling, help with buying decisions, help understand how to make the stock work harder, how to free up their profit. And the amazing thing about stockdoctor is that it 100%, based on the numbers that we've run, is something that pays for itself. For example, when we looked at the data behind people who had worked with a stock Dr.

Catherine Erdly [00:09:01]:
For six months, they were seeing 10% more sales with 10% less stock, which for many of them, based on around a 50% margin, meant that they were adding around 5,000 pounds additional profit per 100k of revenue. And that was after the cost of the program. So we designed Stockdoctor and delighted to see it paying for itself and making a real difference not only to the bottom line for retailers, but also to their peace of mind. So it's a really, really powerful program. The way that the combination of them works is that you get your monthly support call with your stock doctor to go over the numbers, to go over the plans, and to go over any decisions that you need to make about buying, as well as giving you really great insight into trading actions that you can take, not adding extra things to your to do list, but all of those things that you have to do anyway. This is not about adding to your to do list. So you always have to do your marketing, you always have to do your buying. But Stockdoctor is able to give you direction on both of those things so that you are able to do them more effectively and without the guesswork.

Catherine Erdly [00:10:06]:
And then you have a monthly strategy call with myself. So Retail by Design starts with a kickoff call with me. We map out the six months, what it is you want to achieve. We identify the areas of the business that you want to work on. You'll then also meet the stock doctor, have them do a full audit of your sales and stock to understand where you're at. So you've got those two tracks of support, one all about strategy and one all about stock. So you've got the two together, giving you space for decision making, focus, time and headspace. And then Retail by Design also comes with a whole host of other benefits such as ongoing support with myself via email or voice note so that you can ask me anything you like in between sessions, weekly group calls where you can check in, jump in, say hi to other people in the cohort, ask other questions of myself or other people.

Catherine Erdly [00:10:56]:
And you also get work with a Mindset Coach. You get three sessions across six months with our fabulous mindset coach, Annabel, who is just really brilliant at helping you work through any of those mindset issues that come up when people are building businesses. The transformation with Retail by Design As I said, I'm so excited about adding in Stock Doctor as well because we already saw such great transformers information founders moving from feeling really reactive to feeling much calmer. They're able to make decisions more proactively and with confidence. They second guess themselves less often. They have a clear plan that they can trust and they feel supported in their business. And now with the stock doctor element, we know that that is all taken care of. So even if you're having a busy month, you've got a crazy quarter, then somebody is there running those plans for you, updating you each month.

Catherine Erdly [00:11:46]:
So it really reduces the amount of time that you as the founder have to spend doing work on your numbers because they are being done for you. Feeling overwhelmed, stuck in reaction mode and tired of winging it. Retail by Design is my six month, one to one program for six figure product founders who are ready for clarity, strategy and proper support. Using my signature focused framework, we turn scattered businesses into calm profitable ones with hands on help to sort your structure, cash flow and sales. If you're ready to feel confident and in control again, head to resilient retailclub.com and click on Retail by Design to book a call. So I'm so excited about this new version of Retail by Design. I feel like it's so powerful and I'm excited because I truly believe this is what business support should look like. Really structured, really supportive, really able to meet you and your individual needs.

Catherine Erdly [00:12:41]:
Completely personalized, very, very effective and very much focused on your bottom line. Everything that we do is zero fluff. It is about sales strategy, about structure. And we also do support you as a founder through all of our email and voice notes, support our group calls, and our mindset coaching as well. Retail by Design. It's not for people who are first starting out. It's not really for anyone who wants a quick fix. It's for people who want to have time, space to work on their business over an extended period of time.

Catherine Erdly [00:13:15]:
They don't want just templates or generic answers. They want something that is super tailored for them. And they don't want to be spending hours and hours and hours on this program. They want to know that they can turn up to their monthly meetings without needing to spend hours and hours out of the day. But then everything that they are doing is going to be helping them run more effectively, be more productive and efficient in their business, and most importantly, feel supported. Feel like they've got a team behind them. They've got that support wrapping around them and that you're not feeling lonely or worried or nervous. Because even if numbers are growing and it feels exciting, it could be scary exciting too.

Catherine Erdly [00:13:58]:
And it's great to know that you've got really, really deep industry knowledge and expert backed support behind you. Growth doesn't have to feel chaotic. You can have support and structure in a way that feels aligned with you as a business owner and doesn't feel restrictive. If you're nodding along, listening to this and thinking this sounds like you and you want to know more, then you can head over to resilient retailclub.com, take a look at Retail by Design. There's more details there and there's also a link to book in for a call. The next step is for us to have a chat. It's very relaxed. It's just an opportunity for me to find out more about where you're at in your business, what you need, and if it feels like the right fit.

Catherine Erdly [00:14:39]:
I'll tell you more about Retail by Design. No pressure, no hard sell, just an opportunity to talk about what's going on for you and see if we can't find you the right support to take you to the next level. Thank you so much for listening. I would love to hear. No, sorry. Thank you so much for listening. We'll be back next week talking all about how you create an award winning online store. Sam.