REVENUE DRIVEN FOR OUR CLIENTS
$500 million and countingIn this Wytpod episode, host Laura Faye interviews Bellamy, the founder of Retailytics, a boutique agency that specialises in helping retail businesses grow through strategic inventory and financial planning. Bellamy shares her journey from finance to retail, discusses the challenges of managing inventory, and highlights the importance of aligning with sustainable and mission-driven brands. She also provides key insights into why being understocked is better for business growth than overstocking.
Retailytics is a boutique agency specialising in data-driven inventory and financial planning to help retail businesses grow profitably.
Hi, I’m Laura Faye. I’m the host of Wytpod and today we have Bellamy from Retailytics. Bellamy, welcome. I’m happy to have you.
Thanks for having me. I’m glad to be here today and chat.
Yeah, absolutely. I’m looking forward to it. I’m going to just jump right in. Why don’t you share with me a little bit about yourself and how you found your way to your business?
Sure. So I sort of fell into my career while I’ve been in retail and e-commerce for the past 15 years. I actually started my career in finance. Really wanted to break into the fashion world. So usually when I describe my job to people, I’m basically in a finance role for fashion or retail companies. It’s a little bit of FP&A, financial planning and analysis and strategic planning.
So I like that I can marry both the math and analytical side of things also with the product side of things.
Yeah, yeah, I can see how that’s an interesting combination for sure. And it’s funny how you plan one thing in life and you wind up somewhere else or meshing that plan with something else, something you may never have thought of. Share with me a little bit about Retailytics?
Yeah, so right now I have a boutique agency called Retailytics that really focuses on the data side of things to help you grow a business more profitably and a little more intentionally as you’re starting to cross that threshold from $20 million plus brands. I really focus on the data infrastructure setting you up for success. So not only can you do a pulse check in a temperature track of where your business is now, but be able to improve against those KPIs from a reporting standpoint. So that can touch anything from merchandising, demand planning, inventory management, and then just general merchandise analytics. So I work very closely with finance teams, depending on the size of the company, that’s either outsourced, fractional CFO or internal, and then also marketing teams.
If you look at larger organisations within retail, they actually have entire teams dedicated to what they call integrated business planning, which makes sure that the silos of finance marketing and inventory are all talking to one another because they really impact one another from a finance perspective an Inventory business in inventory is could be your biggest line item on your P &L It is an investment and you need to buy it before you sell it and then also from a marketing perspective You’re bringing people in to buy that product. You want to make sure you’re in stock So those aren’t wasted dollars and you have a poor customer experience.
Yeah, it seems like everything must work in sync to be successful, if I’m hearing you correctly.
Right, sort of the tagline for merchandise planning or inventory management usually is bringing the right product at the right time at the right price.
Yeah, yeah, and that’s what you specialise in, which is great because without that, I can’t see how a business can succeed. So that’s such a critical part of a business. What are some of the challenges with your business that you have faced over the years, you know, on the path to success?
Yes.
I think especially starting a small business as a team of one is figuring out what your niche is and what you’re good at. So I do think one of the challenges that I had in the beginning was struggling between should I be a generalist because I do have a very wide experience in terms of companies I’ve worked at, products I’ve worked with, teams I’ve worked with, or be a specialist.
So, While I have worked across the entire product landscape of physical goods, everything from CPG to mattresses, hard goods, soft goods, I realised I do have the most experience in apparel. And CPG can be a little bit slightly more tricky because you’re dealing with food, health and safety, expiry dates, lot size. So usually those teams also implement some of these strategies earlier just because they have to with health standards and whatnot.
Right, right. Would you say that your experience and your background is one of the things that differentiates you from somebody else?
Yes, so I think because I’ve had the opportunity to work at both Fortune 100 companies, worked at Walmart, I’ve worked at Gap, I’ve also worked at a 10 person bootstrap startup, really seeing the full circle of problems and how inventory can impact everything in the entire life cycle of a company. I’ve also been through acquisitions, sold to major.
One of the companies I worked for was sold to HBC and we did a merger with Saks in Saks Fifth Avenue, sorry, off Fifth. So really having seen the perspective of all of those growth parts and declining parts of the business. So I do think seeing both those failures and successes helps round out my perspective on things to avoid and things to put in place to avoid some of those failures.
Yeah, I can see why you are very knowledgeable in what you do because you’ve experienced it from many angles. And that gives you just a better understanding across the board of everything. That makes perfect sense.
With the services that you offer, I have to assume that word of mouth is always your number one source, but outside of word of mouth, what have been your most successful marketing strategies?
So because I’m still a team of one, I don’t really market that much. I will say I do use LinkedIn. I like to thought leadership, things I’ve learned. And I really post on topical things that are happening with my business and with my clients. So I like to talk about things, little nuggets of wisdom that I feel like I can pass along and based on my experience can help someone else. So I definitely think LinkedIn is a big area of growth for me.
And then also I’ve started to go to more trade show events and learning how I can network with both SaaS providers out there, different agencies, because like I said, at the end of the day, especially when it comes to inventory, every single company is facing the same issues. Usually what I do is referred to as looking in a crystal ball and that’s not always perfect. Even the AI and tools that are out there today, you still need a human to help operate them in an owner, dedicated owner to managing the process. So I like networking with different agencies, the different SaaS providers, and then obviously the different companies that come to the conferences. And that’s also been a fun new experience for me that I didn’t really do that much in my prior life. So it’s been, it’s been fun.
That’s great. What is one of your golden nuggets that you can share with somebody who may be looking to use your services?
So there’s two times when people typically hire me when they are way overstock or they are way understocked. If you’re trying to grow a business profitably, it is so much easier to do it if you’re way understocked. It’s definitely a better situation to go out of stock and then build that pipeline back up. Whereas overstock can be very costly on your business and sometimes kill your business because you’re holding your, Essentially, you’re tying up your cash flow in your inventory. And so you may need to go out and get loans or things that you weren’t comfortable in stretching the business. So I’d say my nugget is it’s way better to go out of stock than be way overstocked.
Yeah.
Yeah, that makes sense. Having had a business myself many, many years ago, retail clothing, I would agree with that 100%. It’s like having money that you can’t spend. You also mentioned a crystal ball. So if I was holding the crystal ball and you could look in it and you saw the future of your company, what are your long-term goals?
Exactly. Exactly.
Long-term goals right now are, now that I’m lucky to have a full pipeline and lots of clients right now, is being a little bit more selective with the clients I work with. Having worked in fashion for so long, it can sometimes be a really ugly industry. So I’m really trying to support the brands that I want to align with. I’m trying to work with sustainable, mission-driven, female, and also local brands is where I want to focus my efforts.
Right. Excellent. Excellent. Bellamy, it’s been so interesting that you put everything together with so few words, but got a great message out. It’s been really interesting to hear about what you do and how you can help businesses. I think what you do is either a key to somebody’s success or without that could be a potential failure. So, I hope that our listeners really paid close attention because you bring a lot of value and I wish you nothing but continued success.
Thank you so much.
You’re very welcome.
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