What challenges are impacting your business, and how are you solving them?

Fernanda Böhme | Co-Founder | böhme

Talking about online business, I don’t think it’s sustainable when you have TikTok, Instagram, Google—they’re the “kajillionaires” at the end of the day. We’re giving all our money to them in online advertisement because, unfortunately, you have to pay to play. When a newcomer comes in to do business online, they’re competing with the guy putting $50 million a year into online advertising. It’s not sustainable.

Suzie Turner | Founder | Gibsonlook

Founder & CEO | Stylebuy

We do well with our email and SMS and felt an app would be a good opportunity. It has been great, and the app is—for fashion, at least—so easy to change that we can constantly update what we look like and put a new trend out. Those types of things build community. The customer trusts that you’re thinking about why they came to you in the first place.

Utah businesses think globally. How have you built a diversified supply chain?

Zach Jones | CPO | Albion Fit

We have our own vertical operation, which at our size is pretty uncommon. Most of our challenges come from the raw goods or the sides of things we don’t control. Our thesis has been to try and bring as much of the apparel manufacturing process in-house as possible. That comes with a price tag, but we look at it almost like an insurance policy. Five or 10 years from now, we’ll see that down the road.

Laura Ganoza | Partner | Foley & Lardner

In terms of risk, it also lessens the risk of manufacturers ripping off your designs, intellectual property and things like that. If you don’t have control over where items are being manufactured and they’re being manufactured abroad, you end up losing some of that because when they’re not working for you, they’re working for somebody else.

Kacie Malouf | Owner | Downeast Home & Clothing

Diversifying the supply chain is important, but there’s something to be said about solid partnerships. We’ve moved to different manufacturing facilities in an attempt to diversify and then gone back to suppliers that we worked with before. We felt we should diversify when really our relationship with them was strong, the pricing was excellent and everything worked. Developing long-term relationships with different suppliers helps keep your IP and designs quiet. They’ll do that for you if you have that strong partnership.

Tommaso Cardullo | Founder, Owner & Designer | TOMMASO CARDULLO

We have about 16 different suppliers—some do luxury brands, some are just one or two people. It’s all about relationships. Post-COVID, we are more ethically inclined. It’s a win-win; you pay your supplier well, you make your customer happy, you are happy. 

Amy Rasmussen | Co-Founder & Co-Owner | Nani Swimwear

We’re working on our supply chains. It’s hard because swimwear is so specialized. The fabric is stretchy. It’s hard to sew. We love our factory; they’re like family. We visit them often, and they visit us. [One of the employees] calls us her sister. If you build those strong relationships, they go the extra mile for you. We know they have our back—they take care of us. It makes it hard to move.

Monte Deere | CEO | Kizik & HandsFree Labs

We’ve gone from one to three factories over the last two years, and we’ve asked these factories to know one another and work together, and they are. We have a summit every year where they come together. That doesn’t always work, but it’s worked for us. They realize, “OK, this is a company that’s growing. They are going to diversify. They won’t make all products in one factory, so let’s work together.”

Jacob Durham | Co-Founder & CEO | NOMATIC

We have one factory that’s been a stellar partner, and we try to take care of each other as much as possible. When COVID hit, they shut down their factory for two months, and we were in a bind. I wish we’d had a backup. One thing we’re trying to do is source new projects with new factories. You can start building that same stellar relationship with another one and another one but still give them all good business with the products they’ve developed with you.

What advice would you give to Utah Business readers who have entrepreneurial ideas and want to start a business?

Pualeiala Lynn | Owner, Fashion Stylist & Image Consultant | EDYNKEI

Learn how to listen to your intuition.

Rachel Nilsson | Founder & CEO | RAGS

I don’t think you’re ever going to be ready. You just figure it out day by day. When I was going on Shark Tank, I remember getting really good advice: “These guys all started somewhere, and they didn’t know everything.” When you’re sitting in a room, pitching big companies like Disney or Marvel, it helps you understand that these people are just regular human beings with normal lives. No one knows everything, so start somewhere.

Romney Evans | Founder & CEO | Shoptrue

So much is just about momentum. If you’re just starting, you’ve got to create a little momentum, and then you can use that momentum for more. You have to work as if it all depends on you. You’ve got to network as if it’s never going to happen without other partners or investors. And you’ll have to synthesize a lot of contradictory advice from many intelligent people. Ultimately, you’ll have to make some calls, and you’ll get it wrong sometimes … but if you just keep working internally and externally, you’ll give yourself lots of chances for a door to open.