Opening an MMA store

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ChrisL

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I am in the process of starting the evaluation and model building process of a martial arts retail establishment.

I wanted to get the public's opinion on retail establishments an any experience that you may have with one.

We plan on offering a full line of martial arts supply, but specifically mixed martial arts equipment as well as Boxing equipment.

We believe the store will strive over internet sales based on instant gratification, customer service, and availability.

The store will carry inventory, roughly 70k worth, in various sizes / styles / colors to try to accommodate everyone's needs.

Do you have a store in your area? How does it do, do you buy there over the internet? Why...

Thanks!

-Chris
 
There's a fight store in town, and the local fight schools all sell gear. That being said I still buy online: cheaper, better selection of better quality gear, and typically in-store gear sucks (it's like Century or some generic gaudy-looking brand).

So style, price, quality, and selection are why I buy online.
 
I do bjj and though the local fight store (30 miles away) sells gis and rash guards and stuff, I don't really care for the gis that they sell and they can't offer competitive pricing on stuff because of buying power, so I shop online where I can get a good gi for a hundred to hundred twenty bucks rather than a no name gi that shrinks for the same price.
 
I'd like to add that I do like being able to go there in person though and am sometimes willing to pay a slightly inflated cost on an item so that I can have it now rather than waiting a week
 
We plan on caring a lot of the big-name brands.

As it sits right now, and it is all in planning, or 3 big brands for mma/ bjj would be

1. Venum
2. Kimurawear
3. Reevo

Sub Brands would be:
1. Gameness
2. Breakpoint
3. Hayabusa (Its saturated here)
4. Badboy

For boxing, we would have
1. Everlast
2. Ringside
3. Title
4. Nike

Then a wide array of smaller / cheaper stuff like T-shirts and cheap gear. Fact is high end gear isn't going to be what carry's the store, its t-shirt and random foot traffic.

We really hope to have a wide variety of Gi's for the BJJ crowd, most of the gyms in this area do not have an inventory, so we hope to help that.

I plan on carrying a full line of our top 3 and a good selection of the rest. I suppose if no one has a shop like that, its hard to really compare apples and apples.

-Chris
 
Pittsburgh, PA.

I have several other businesses I run and operate here.

-Chris
 
Where is this store going to be located ? Are their many MMA gyms or Bjj schools around ?
 
Quite honestly the only reason I shop at my local fight shop is because the owner is a good friend, part of the community and actively supports/sponsors local fighters. If it wasn't for that, gear is gear and I'd just use the internet.
 
Chris imo you should go after an exclusive deal with Dragao or another major company that we can't get in the US. with a high start up maybe go after Reversal or a bigger named company from Japan?
 
My gym sells gear, but I typically purchase gear online because price is a big factor for me. I'd like to go to an actual store and try stuff on though. I've never been able to do that with MMA gear.
 
One of the things you could offer (I've thought of this) is maybe have one of each gi size so that customers can actually try the gi on and determine the best accurate size. This is one feature that you cannot do online, and would be a benefit if it was a feature you truly focused on in a store.
 
The goal is to have at minimum 1 of every size / color option of our major brands. The whole idea is that people would have the ability to try things on / get customer service.

I have bought 11 gi's online, 2 do not fit, and 3 do not fit the way I want them to. So almost half of my gi's I purchased could have been money spent elsewhere on something that does fit right.

Making the assumption that shipping = tax, there is very little price difference between our planned price points and those online, roughly 5-15% depending on the item. So if you have a $100 item, is $5 or $10 worth getting it right now?

-Chris
 
unless you can have prices equal to the internet you will go out of business in this field.

When On the Mat had their store in San Jose, everybody I knew at AKA would go there to try things on and get a feel for the quality, then go home and buy it at a great discount online.
 
nomilkforsanta said:
unless you can have prices equal to the internet you will go out of business in this field.

When On the Mat had their store in San Jose, everybody I knew at AKA would go there to try things on and get a feel for the quality, then go home and buy it at a great discount online.
Click to expand...

So you would rather wait 5-10 days to get a product and save $5-$10?

Also realize, tax isn't shipping. I just bought a $150 gi, paid $18 to ship. Tax on the $140gi is $9.

Personally, if I drive somewhere, spend the time and gas to get there, and they have what I want in my size and I can leave with it for a couple bucks more than the internet I am not losing sleep over $10.

-Chris
 
ChrisL said:
So you would rather wait 5-10 days to get a product and save $5-$10?

Also realize, tax isn't shipping. I just bought a $150 gi, paid $18 to ship. Tax on the $140gi is $9.

Personally, if I drive somewhere, spend the time and gas to get there, and they have what I want in my size and I can leave with it for a couple bucks more than the internet I am not losing sleep over $10.

-Chris
Click to expand...

with that said, add on your gas price and it seems more than $10...and plenty of places have free shipping, so you don't pay tax or shipping for the product
 
Long Nguyen said:
with that said, add on your gas price and it seems more than $10...and plenty of places have free shipping, so you don't pay tax or shipping for the product
Click to expand...

Look, there are always going to be people who sit at home and order their stuff online. And there will always be people who order stuff and are not 100% happy with it due to how it fits.

We provide a setting that allows you to try things on before you buy them, and get them instantly, of course if you count gas going both directions you can save on that by shopping online, but you can't try things on if you don't get there.

We picked at random 10 "Gear" items today, where we expect our price points on those items to be, and compared it to items online.

The largest difference was $22
The smallest difference with $3
The average difference was $14
Drop the largest and the smallest the average difference was $8

Non-Gear items the pricing was much higher, as we expect it to be, if you buy your day to day clothing online, thats your deal... But we expect the foot traffic to be high enough that the clothing will carry the gear.

We are confident either way that the store will succeed, if the gear section can not carry itself it will quickly be eliminated. But in my mind, and maybe I am slightly older than some, if someone is willing to hold $50K+ in inventory so I can walk into a store they pay rent for, be greeted, have a professional explain the differences in gear as well as answer any questions I have, try on different sizes, styles, and colors, as well as value added services like repair / patch services I would be willing to spend the extra $10 with them to get the item at that time.

But I do appreciate all of the response.

-Chris
 
I buy practically all my stuff online. If it doesn't fit then I send it back (most companies send a return slip with the invoice). I don't mind the wait especially if it's cheap or free shipping. Once in a while I'll go down to the local fight shop down here and buy something to show some support but the prices online can't be beat.
 
My friend owns a company named Manimal Athletics. They offer pretty good quality stuff and it looks very cool. Check them out bro!
 
Integrating an online platform along with your brick and mortor store would probably help to keep sales steady and divert local online traffic. Offering more than just gear and apparel may help increase the volume of customers to your store. An all around sports store with a focus on Martial arts would, in my opinion, be more successful than only selling mma equipment.
Be creative and partner with local gyms, fighters, and promoters and I'm sure you're store will strive.
 
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