Sometimes our business aspirations get the best of us. It then becomes necessary to retrace your steps for your business plan and strategy for a poor performing economy. For instance, let's say you started your business out of your home to sell custom designed purses and at some point decided to provide your merchandise to some traditional brick and mortar establishments in the trendy shopping centers across this great nation of ours (or more importantly yours) while maintaining your web presence. Diversifying your marketing efforts can be a very good way to make yourself more accessible across a more diverse demographic.

As time went on, you built your business but realized with the economy and everything else going on that you could be more productive investing your time and money in your website that you have been running since you first started. Especially since you are now having to mass produce your "hand-made" purses and the quality will invariably suffer to meet the initial demand. Plus you now must maintain records to keep track of your expenses, distribution deals and raw material suppliers. You will also need to maintain a relationship with these other shop owners to make sure they are prominently displaying your wares so they have the best chance to convert to actual sales rather than becoming long term decorations for their store.

Possibly at this point you are spending all of your time trying to maintain your business which was most enjoyable when you were making some extra cash from your hobby. Perhaps you have realized that this level of success incurs too high of a price in terms of time and non-design tasks. In fact you may find you have no time or energy to refresh your line of products. The discerning clientèle which form your customer base are all too happy to move on to the new latest and greatest purses. Trust me, it happens quicker than you think. So you decide to take it all back and focus on creating more innovative designs to sell on your website.

You may miss some of the money you were gaining from these shops but what are you really losing? If handled correctly you can regroup and handle this situation in a way that allows for a smooth transition from your potential customers visiting a shop to finding the same products online via your redesigned website with substantial savings (at least at first to get them used to buying directly from you).

There is no shame in changing strategies even though having your wares in boutiques on Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills may have been an ego boost, how many purses were actually sold and did the deal you had with the shop owner really provide you with a good return on your investment? Possibly not since high end upscale stores do tend to command a lower percentage per sale for the distributor. Maybe it's time to regroup and redefine your business model. Don't get me wrong it is nice to see your wares displayed prominently in an exclusive boutique but sometimes this may not be the best approach to moving your merchandise. Consider the fact that most buying now actually occurs online and will only increase over time, especially if gas prices don't settle down soon.