San Diego-based festival apparel brand uses Inventory Planner by Sage to reduce its inventory, make what it knows will sell and boost cash flow on an impressive scale…
Freedom Rave Wear (FRW) is an online apparel retailer specializing in sustainably made rave and festival wear, started in 2014 by festival enthusiasts Mike Hodgen and his partner Alyssa Erickson.
Bringing the party in-house
A unique selling point for FRW is that design and manufacturing is all done under one roof, meaning the merchant isn’t at the mercy of lead-times and supply chains. Most of the items sold are made to order, but without forecast data to rely on, that wasn’t a sustainable method as the business grew.
Having implemented Inventory Planner in 2018, Freedom Rave Wear was able to create a slick, profitable inventory planning system – meaning that despite market shifts and unpredictable external factors, the team could plan effectively around seasonality and outdoor music events.
“Our whole business model is built on responding to demand. This way it doesn’t matter if demand goes up or down 50%, we have the flexibility to adjust how much we’re making. It has always been intentional for us to create something that wasn’t going to be a ball and chain as a business, but a dynamic, real-time response to what our customers wanted.”
Mike Hodgen, Co-Founder of Freedom Rave Wear.
Something to rave about
Mike and the team use Inventory Planner’s purchasing recommendations as a blueprint for what items need to be manufactured with priority; they’re sent straight to the production team. This means items have an average shelf life of 7-14 days.
Alongside this, Inventory Planner’s in-depth inventory insights – which allow users to target potential revenue boosts and identify slow-moving items clogging up the warehouse – meant Freedom Rave Wear was able to cut its inventory by two thirds, from a $300k holding to $100k. With this slimmed down inventory, the brand managed to double in revenue growth.
With such reliable forecasting, purchasing and reporting functionality at their fingertips, the team at Freedom Rave Wear is aiming to create a $3M business in the next few years.
“Inventory Planner enabled us to see early on, there’s huge value in making winning picks – whether you’re putting in a purchase order, or in our case, going to the production team. If you buy the wrong items and they don’t sell, that could end up being a six-month long mistake.”
To read more about Freedom Rave Wear’s story, as well as the experiences of our other customers, please visit here.