The Short End of a Long Stick - Part Two

This is the second part of a multi-part post in which I’m pulling the curtain back to share a raw, behind-the-scenes look at one of the many ways in which small brands have to deal with the impossible. I have a lot of Feelings™ about this, but I thought it would be helpful to me and insightful to you to write it all out. Grab a cup of tea (or coffee or whisky - you do you, friend) and settle in for the continuation of an epic tale of hope and woe. Read Part One here, in case you missed last week’s post.

And in this corner…

Once we’ve pulled the imperfect product from our shelves, our next task is to figure out what to even do with it. In general, we have the following options:

1. Throw it away. Large companies that make really cheap products usually go this route, because it’s easier to put damaged product down as “the cost of business.” 
2. Donate it. Large companies that make decent products will go with this option, because at least the product can turn into a tax-time benefit, even if it doesn’t add to top-line revenue.
3. Sell it at a discount. Turning the product back into cash - even if it’s not at a profit - will at least make the profit go away, and hopefully the customer either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care.
4. Fix it. Repairs eat into profits, but at least fixed garments can be sold at full-price if the repairs are done well. 

We went for option #4. Our values prevent us from simply throwing the product away (thus adding to landfills) or risking anyone associating Alpine Parrot with damaged goods. There’s a huge difference between accepting good enough and allowing bad - we reluctantly embrace the former and outright reject the latter. 

The race is on

We wasted zero time ordering new zippers - we were promised a lead time of 2-3 weeks, so we lined up a tailor in Los Angeles (our warehouse is on the outskirts of LA, for those who are curious) and got ready to swap out the zipper pulls from non-locking to locking. 

Four weeks went by, and no zippers. We hounded our broker, who said there was a slight delay, but that it would be resolved soon. Another four weeks went by, and still nothing. We’re chomping at the bit, because by this point we are absolutely out of stock on some size/color combinations, and our waitlist is growing. Our poor broker is getting weekly emails from us, and finally we learn that YKK has decided to halt production to remove PFAS from their supply chain, which requires a total rehaul of their factories and processes - it could (and did) take another few weeks before they could continue. Our broker helps us find alternative zippers, which we gratefully accept, but then learn that they are incompatible with YKK zippers, which means a total zipper replacement.

Regardless, we take what we can get, and we ship everything off to our tailor in LA. At this point it’s the end of May, and summer is quickly coming to a close. If we have ANY hope of fixing these shorts, we need to get them fixed ASAP!

Time waits for no one

In the months since we first reached out to our tailor, he (rightly) sought out work to keep his team occupied and prevent any interruptions in cash flow. I have no control over what kind of work might come his way, and unfortunately he landed some really big projects from larger brands that require his full team’s attention. I pleaded, I begged, and I even offered to drive down to LA from San Francisco to assist. Finally, understanding our tight deadline, he agreed to squeeze some work in the evenings.

But wait! There’s more!

In our packages to the tailor, we sent all of our damaged goods along with both a small selection of sliders we were able to eke out of YKK and a full set of non-YKK zippers. Our tailor started with the non-YKK zippers, discovering that the total zipper replacement would take a lot more time (and money) than simply changing the sliders, so we asked him to ignore the full zippers and just replace the sliders that we have on the units that are on the longest waitlists. Entrepreneurship lesson #74: It’s better to have some good units than zero good units.

I received a text message this morning: the sliders are missing and one of the boxes has a hole in it. Our warehouse team assures us the sliders went into the shipment. And our tailor swears the sliders are nowhere to be found. 

Now what?

Stores start selling (and customers start buying) fall apparel in August. Seeing as it’s now mid-July, the chances of us getting fully fixed Cypress Shorts back on the shelves before August are pretty much zero: 

1. We can purchase new sliders, but it will take at least 3-4 weeks to receive them, and we’ll have to hope we can get our tailor and his team to schedule the repairs.
2. We can do full zipper replacements, but at twice the cost of replacing just the sliders, we will lose money on the shorts even if we sell them at full price.
3. We can go back to the drawing board and either toss the damaged goods, donate them, or sell them at a discount. 

I’ll be honest: I’m still trying to decide what to do. We’ve missed our summertime window, and we have spent so much time and energy trying to do the right thing that we have missed out on other opportunities as well as any chance of getting the most money we can out of this product. 

Small businesses really and truly lose when things like this happen: we can’t afford to write it off like bigger brands can, and our team is too small to try to fix it while also growing the company in other ways. Entrepreneurship is risky - sometimes you win big, and sometimes you lose big. Playing it safe is a valid option, but it’s hard to go back to that when your cards are already on the table and your bids are already committed. 

What would you do?

Hold up - I’ve got questions! So many questions…

Soon I’ll do a full series on the money side of apparel (because whew, it’s a doozy), but I’m sure many of you have a LOT of questions about how this whole journey went down. Send them in! I’ll do a full Q&A post and do my best to share the nitty gritty details (while also being respectful of the various parties involved). 

Warning: I will outright ignore any questions that involve personal attacks. Mistakes were made, lessons were learned, and tears have been shed. Every entrepreneur will tell you that things like this happen all the time - so we’re not going to point fingers or call anyone names.