Retail

12 trades. Same grounded system, tuned to the realities of each one.

12 kinds of retail businesses

Pick yours - every one has its own numbers, leaks, and 90-day plan

Boutique / Apparel Grocery / Specialty Food Convenience Store Hardware Store Bookstore Gift Shop Florist Pet Store Sporting Goods Jewelry Store Furniture Store Ecommerce / DTC Brand

How the money works

Retail runs on 2 different business models

Two shops in the same industry can need opposite advice, because they sell different things. Find the model you actually run on.

Retail unit margin

You sell one item off the shelf

Your profit is not on the shelf, it is in the turn. Gross margin times inventory turns - GMROI - decides whether a store makes money. Slow inventory is cash you cannot spend, sitting in a box, becoming a markdown. Attachment and basket size beat foot traffic in almost every situation you can control.

Your ceiling: Working capital tied up in inventory, and square feet of selling space.
Biggest leak: Reordering by gut — You reorder what you like and what sold last time you noticed. Run a sell-through report before every buy.

11 business types

Online direct-to-customer

You sell one order, one customer acquired

You are running two businesses: a product business and a media buying business. Contribution margin after ad spend, shipping, and returns is the only number that matters, and it is almost never what the ad platform reports. Repeat purchase rate is what turns a break-even first order into a real company.

Your ceiling: Cash conversion cycle and how much you can pay to acquire a customer.
Biggest leak: Trusting platform-reported ROAS — Reconcile ad spend against actual bank deposits monthly. The gap is usually 20 to 40 percent.

1 business type

Ecommerce / DTC Brand