How to Dropship Clothes In 2022

If you’ve ever been interested in starting your own online business, you might have heard the term “dropshipping” thrown around. But what does it truly mean? What’s involved? Why do we hear about it more every year? And, most importantly, how can it help you grow your business?

This guide will answer all those questions and more, including:

What is dropshipping?
What are the benefits of dropshipping?
How do I find a dropshipper?
How do I choose the best dropshipper for my business?

To learn more, read on!

What is dropshipping?

Dropshipping is the process of shipping goods directly to your customers from a third-party supplier or vendor, without an intermediary step (like storing the goods at your physical business location).

Here’s an example of a normal business model without a dropshipper :

Your business routinely orders products from a supplier to maintain the inventory on hand, often in Minimum Order Quantities (MOQs) to get a wholesale price
Your business stores the products until a customer orders them.
You process each customer’s order, package the goods and ship them to the customer yourself.

When a dropshipper is involved, the process looks a bit different:

A customer orders products from your business.
You pass the order info along to your dropshipper.
On receipt of the order, the dropshipper charges you a price for the product sold, usually wholesale plus a dropshipping fee. Then they package the goods and ship them directly to the customer. You do not need to store or package the goods yourself.

In short, dropshipping is the act of selling a product on your website without actually handling its fulfillment and shipping. Another key benefit of dropshipping is that you don’t pay for the product until the customer pays for it, making dropshipping an attractive option for people who don’t want to spend a lot on initial inventory or who don’t want to risk buying products that won’t sell. This low barrier to entry allows novices and professionals alike to pick a niche and run their own dropshipping-based ecommerce store.

Does that mean the dropshipping model is the right fit for you? The answer will vary depending on what your goals are and where your skills lie. To start, let’s take a look at the pros and cons of dropshipping.

Is it profitable to dropship clothes? Whether we are fashion entrepreneurs or filling a gap in the clothing industry, there is a vast potential in dropshipping clothes.

Although clothing is a highly competitive market, that’s good news for us. With rising demand for clothing, we too can carve out a slice of the pie and build a dropshipping store that makes sales quickly.

This article will teach us the vital steps required to dropship clothes successfully. Additionally, it will cover some of the most popular categories and clothing products that we can sell for a profit.

Why Dropship Clothes?

Source: Common Thread

Before we further explore the clothing niche, let’s find out why it’s worthwhile to dropship clothes in our stores.

For starters, clothes are a staple in everyone’s daily wardrobe. Regardless of age or gender, people from all walks of life shop for clothing according to their needs.

While clothing fulfills the function of covering up or keeping warm, it also impacts people’s personalities and confidence. As a result, many people splurge on clothes, whether it’s due to seasonal changes or the constant need to update their wardrobe.

Given how popular clothing is among consumers, there is no surprise that it is one of the biggest industries in the world. Moreover, people see clothing as an art in itself that requires creativity. If we as sellers can understand and cater to those kinds of buyers, we’ll build a loyal customer base.

Finally, fashion is the largest B2C eCommerce market segment with $752.5 billion in sales in 2020, according to Statista. Furthermore, Statista projects that the market will grow 9.1% per year till 2025.

Coupled with massive demand in the clothing industry the opportunity is far too good to pass up. It gives entrepreneurs at all levels a chance to dropship clothes for a profit without holding inventory and taking little, if any, risks in the process.

Now that we know about the potentiality of dropshipping clothes, here are ten easy steps to dropship clothes in 2022:

Step 1: Identify a niche
Step 2: Choose clothing products to sell
Step 3: Find a supplier
Step 4: Choose a selling platform
Step 5: Choose an automation software
Step 6: List your products
Step 7: Market your clothing store
Step 8: Fulfill your orders
Step 9: Provide excellent customer service
Step 10: Keep track for success

With these general steps in mind, let’s learn about the nitty-gritty of this process and how to execute it flawlessly.

Step 1: Identify a Niche

The first step to dropshipping clothes is identifying a niche among various clothing categories—for instance, women’s dresses, winter gloves, gym wear, etc. Although there are many niches in clothing, the trick is to experiment with different niches until we find one that works the best for our business.

Aside from experimenting with different niches, another method to find winning products is market research.

That can include finding out what is trending most and choosing a micro-niche. Or picking a category of clothing that hardly anyone is selling.

Whatever the case is, testing out products in the live market is the most foolproof way to conduct market research. Since we’re dropshipping, it carries little risk and gives us the best evidence we can ask for.

Step 2: Choose Clothing Products To Sell

Once we select a broad niche like ‘winter gloves,’ we can choose specific items to sell under this niche.

For instance, kid’s winter gloves, pink gloves for girls, and camouflage gloves are some of the types of winter gloves that we can list. Adding these varieties to a clothing niche can attract more customers looking for winter gloves.

Step 3: Find A Supplier

In Step 3, we should find clothing suppliers selling the clothing products we’ve chosen for our store. Since we are dropshipping, we need to find an online supplier with a large clothing selection, good customer service, and reliable logistics.

Choosing a quality dropshipping clothing supplier can give us a competitive advantage in the field and keep our business revenue high. As long as they have variety, are reliable, and have fast shipping time, we can run a business that customers can trust.

Since choosing the right supplier is crucial, WIIO has partnered with plenty of solid dropshipping suppliers, many of which have a significant selection of fashionable, in-demand apparel items.

Step 4: Choose A Selling Platform

The next step is to choose an appropriate selling platform where our customers can view our clothing selection and buy their desired products. There are two kinds of selling channels: marketplaces like eBay and Amazon and customizable eCommerce platforms like Shopify and Wix.

Marketplaces like eBay allow us to drive traffic to our store without any investment. That’s because marketplaces have a steady flow of visitors who may come across our items.

In contrast, customizable eCommerce platforms help us personalize our store with custom templates and designs, which allow us to brand our store and customize it for our target audience.

Step 5: Choose An Automation Software

Now that we have chosen a selling platform, we need software to automate dropshipping processes like listing our products or processing orders. Dropshipping automation software helps us save time to invest in other business areas.

However, since there are many dropshipping automation software in the market, which one is the best for dropshipping clothes?

Without a doubt, WIIO is the best automation software for dropshipping clothes. As an all-in-one dropshipping platform, it can automate more processes than any software out there and gives us the ability to scale our clothing business and any niche store we cant think of.

Let’s look at some of WIIO’ best features to understand how it can streamline our dropshipping clothing business.

Quick product importing: Product importing is the process of adding clothing items to our store with their titles, product description, and images. Manually importing products can take up to 10-20 minutes per product. Now, imagine how much it would take to import thousands of products.

Instead of manually copying and pasting the titles of our clothing products, WIIO product importing allows us to import tens of thousands of products in just a few clicks.

Product Research: It is crucial to research clothing products before listing them in our store. That’s why WIIO’ product research lets us find the hottest clothing products on the market from just about any niche or category.

Similarly, there are additional features that WIIO provides to their customers:

Price/stock monitoring
Order Automation
Fulfilled by WIIO
Automatic Price Optimization
Automatic Tracking Number Updates

Step 6: List Your Products

After choosing an automation software, the next step is to list products in our store. There are two methods to import products: Manual and automatic.

Listing products manually means creating a product page/listing by copying product information from our supplier’s website and pasting it into our store. Automating this process with software saves a lot of time copying all the product information.

These are the three ways to import clothing products automatically with WIIO:

One-Click Importer
Single (quick) Product Importer
Multiple Product Importer/Bulk Upload with a CSV file

Let’s take a look at the third feature in detail. The bulk uploader allows us to import tens of thousands of products at once. Therefore, it saves time taken to import products one by one manually.

Suppose you found a page of women’s cocktail dresses from Amazon, and you want to list all of them in your store. All you need to do is the following:

First, download the Chrome WIIO Dropshipping Helper extension. Then, head to the dresses page, click on the WIIO button on the bottom right corner, and click on ‘Extract.’

When you click ‘Extract,’ the box automatically fills with product IDs of all the dresses on the page. Next, choose ‘Export as CSV’ to download a CSV file.

After downloading the CSV file, on the WIIO platform, click ‘Add Products’ and upload your CSV file.

Next, click on ‘Add as Drafts’ to upload all the products to the drafts page where you can edit a product’s description, title, images, and more.

Finally, when satisfied, choose to save the listing and click ‘Import’ to upload it to your store.

That’s how easy it is to begin dropshipping clothes products, beginning with quick product importing.

Step 7: Market Your Store

After we successfully list the clothing products, we need to market our store. Marketing is essential when running a dropshipping clothing business because it makes our products visible to our customers and brings them to our store.

There are both paid and free ways to market our dropshipping clothing business. Likewise, it also depends on which selling platform we use.

eBay marketing

eBay’s steady traffic flow is effectively a free marketing tool for our dropshipping clothing store. Additionally, we can use two methods for paid marketing on eBay: Promoted Listings and Promoted Listing Advanced PPC.

Promoted listings are a way to market our clothing items and get more notably featured across eBay. Similarly, eBay Pay Per Click allows sellers to increase sales by running ad campaigns on their products. eBay charges us a certain fee whenever a customer clicks on the ad.

Shopify/Wix Marketing

In contrast, Shopify and Wix are customizable platforms without existing traffic, making it more challenging to generate sales. That is why we have to drive traffic to our store so that our clothing products can reach customers.

We can use influencer marketing platforms to find and collaborate with influencers for that purpose. Influencers promote products to their massive follower base, convincing them to try the product.

However, Facebook ads are one of the most effective ways to market our Shopify/Wix-based dropshipping clothing store. This platform allows you to gain an audience that you can target in your marketing campaigns.

Facebook has more data than almost any other company about people and their interests. So, it’s an excellent way to make use of it and find your ideal customers.

If you happen to be among those who don’t want to spend money on ads or influencer marketing, you can try the top 5 low-budget marketing techniques and lower your marketing expenses.

Finally, WIIO’ free Shopify course is a great way to learn about marketing a Shopify dropshipping clothing store. The course is a step-by-step Shopify dropshipping guide containing detailed instructions on effectively marketing a dropshipping business.

Facebook Marketplace marketing

Like eBay and Amazon, Facebook Marketplace has many existing users giving us a steady flow of free organic traffic.

Additionally, promoting our products is not a difficult task on Facebook; it only requires a couple of simple steps.

For starters, we can always post clothing items on buy and sell groups to market them for free. Alternatively, we can turn our listings into ads, resulting in our products appearing higher in Facebook Marketplace results.

Step 8: Fulfill Your Orders

When we market our store, there is a high chance customers will visit and buy their favorite clothing items. That is why we have to be ready to fulfill our customer’s clothing orders. There are two methods to fulfill orders: Manual order fulfillment and automatic order fulfillment.

Manual fulfillment means going to the supplier website for each order, filling in customer details, and placing the order. Conversely, automatic fulfillment saves time and replaces those tedious processes by having software do it for us.

One of the best automatic fulfillment systems is Fulfilled by WIIO because it automates the whole process from the customer ordering the clothing item to the customer receiving it. Order automation includes fulfillment, tracking updates, one-click returns, and much more.

Most importantly, Fulfilled By WIIO solves the issue of using our personal accounts for processing and approving every order on supplier websites like Amazon. Instead, WIIO uses its internal accounts to process our orders and returns, so we don’t have to use our credit line at the banks.

However, it is essential to note that not all suppliers and marketplaces support automatic orders. Therefore, at times we have to settle for manual fulfillment and enlist the help of a virtual assistant when orders pile up.

Step 9: Provide Excellent Customer Service

Once the business is up and running, we should ensure excellent customer service. A dropshipping clothing store deals with returns, exchanges, and queries. We can keep customers in the loop about their orders and build a reputation that helps bring more customers in the future with efficient customer support.

Depending on the selling platform we use, there are some excellent tools on the market to help manage customer service operations.

For instance, eBay dropshippers can take advantage of WIIO’ customer support management that helps us manage all our customer service tasks from a single dashboard.

When we sell on Facebook Marketplace, any inquiries or customer complaints directly land in our inbox on Facebook Messenger.

On the other hand, the Shopify platform lets customers contact us with their preferred method or Shopify inbox service. Similarly, Wix lets us view and respond to messages from many channels like Wix Chat, Wix Forms, or our Facebook business page.

Step 10: Keep Track For Success

Last but not least, always keep track of your business, so you know what’s working and what isn’t. Furthermore, keep an eye on the products, marketing, customer service, sales, etc.

One way to keep track of sales is to use the tags feature on WIIO.

To make use of the tag feature, add tags to products based on the category they belong to. For example, label ‘jackets,’ ‘jeans,’ ‘plus size clothing,’ with their respective tags. Next, use filters on WIIO to check the performance of the specific tag (niche).

Accordingly, remove clothing from tags that aren’t performing well and replace them with other items from the same niche.

What Are The Best Dropshipping Clothing Suppliers?

As we mentioned earlier, we need reliable dropshipping clothing suppliers because it can be a game-changer for our business. But how can we find the best one?

Luckily, WIIO understands that anything short of the best suppliers is not an option and provides us with a list of excellent clothing suppliers to work with.

Here are seven proven and reliable dropshipping clothing suppliers that WIIO supports:

Amazon
Walmart
AliExpress
Banggood
CJDropshipping
eBay
Printful

If you want to learn more about these clothing suppliers, check out this article on top 21 dropshipping clothing suppliers.

What Are The Top Clothing Categories/Niches To Sell?

Even with a reliable supplier, we need to find products that sell well. However, not every one of us has the time to conduct in-depth product research.

Thankfully, we have a curated list of top clothing categories and clothing products under those categories that provide a high chance for success.

Here are some of the lucrative categories/niches to sell:

Women’s Clothing
Boutique Clothing
Dresses
Children’s Clothing
Mens Clothing
Plus Size Clothing

Next, we’ll learn more about these excellent categories and the best clothing items to sell.

However, keep in mind at all times not to list or sell clothing protected by copyrights unless you have express permission from the owner.

Check out eBay’s VeRO page for a comprehensive list of which brands to avoid.

Now, without further ado, let’s look at the best categories to sell on the clothing market.

Dropshipping Women’s Clothing

Women’s clothing is a profitable niche and an evergreen category in demand year-round. It is a versatile category because women love to shop for clothes, whether to make a fashion statement or attend a function. Additionally, there is always a demand for women’s clothing products with the constant change in fashion.

Here are three popular products for dropshipping women’s clothing that are hot right now and that will continue to show promise in the future:

Yoga Pants: Women find yoga pants to be a versatile piece of clothing that is both comfortable and cozy. They can be used as perfect regular wear for a fun day at the park or serve as an excellent workout outfit. Furthermore, Yoga pants are composed of stretchable material, which gives a comfortable feeling and extra flexibility.
Breathable cotton underwear: Breathable cotton underwear is an essential clothing item in every woman’s wardrobe. It prevents the accumulation of heat from being trapped in the material and allows air to circulate freely. In addition, breathable cotton underwear is inexpensive, non-irritating, and provides constant comfort.
Sweater and Cardigan: The sweater/cardigan has been a favorite fashion item of women for many years. It is ideal for use in the winter season, and its fashionable appearance makes it a favorite to pair with pants or skirts on any casual occasion.

Dropship Wholesale Boutique Clothing

Another profitable niche worth getting into is boutique clothes, as they appeal to fashionistas who want highly specialized and fashionable clothing.

More and more people are eager to be in the loop with boutique clothes. High-end clothing and accessories are rapidly growing in popularity and demand worldwide. That is why a wholesale boutique clothing dropship business is the perfect way to fill this market gap.

Here are two popular products from the boutique clothing category:

Vintage Dresses: Vintage dresses are 20 -100 years old, representing the eras they were produced in. Although vintage clothing is second-hand, there is a high demand for them because people are looking to own a piece of history.
Designer Clothes: Designer clothes are fashionable or luxury clothing items labeled by a famous fashion designer. Demand for Designer clothes has always been high since consumers love to buy clothing items associated with well-known brands.

As dropshippers, we’ll want to find a wholesale supplier to source our products from. That’s because clothing items can cost a lot of money, especially boutique pieces. For that reason, sourcing boutique clothes from a wholesaler for a lower price keeps our profit margin high.

Dropshipping Dresses

If we have a keen eye for fashion, we might notice that dresses are the perfect pieces to complete a woman’s wardrobe. Dresses can be worn for just about any occasion, from going out with friends on the weekend to business functions on weekdays.

Therefore, we can get a head start on this trend by dropshipping dresses as they are a rapidly growing niche among clothing categories.

Let’s take a look at three types of popular dresses on the market:

Cocktail dresses: Cocktail dresses are semi-formal party dresses that women wear to events and gatherings. Women feel more charming and confident when attending parties in their cocktail dresses. However, these cocktail dresses aren’t just limited to special occasions like weddings; they are year-round must-haves for a woman.
Bodycon: Bodycon dresses or clothing emphasizes shaping the contours of women’s bodies. Recently, bodycon dresses have been getting popular in fashion shows and in performances of pop stars. Due to that massive exposure, the trending bodycon style has become popular in the fashion industry.
Maxi dress: Maxi dresses are ankle-length dresses made from free-flowing and comfortable fabric. Due to its comfort, a maxi dress is trendy for women of all ages and can be worn on almost any occasion. It’s a fashionable item because it comes in various styles and designs complimenting the wearer’s persona.

Dropshipping Children’s Clothing

Other than women’s clothing, there is also a high opportunity in the children’s category.

As we know, kids grow up fast. Clothes that fit them this year most likely won’t fit them in the following year. Additionally, with an ever-growing population, there will never be a shortage of parents seeking clothing for their kids.

With this consistent demand, dropshipping children’s clothing is a huge opportunity.

Here are three popular products from the children clothing category:

Waterproof Winter Gloves: Children wear waterproof winter gloves to protect their hands from rain and snow. Also, these gloves are composed of materials that ensure adequate warmth at low temperatures.
Ballet Dance Dress: In today’s world, ballet dances are part of school activities. As such, many parents are looking to buy these dresses online. Additionally, ballet dresses sometimes come with additional lacings or decorations, allowing us to offer a greater variety in our stores.
Cute Pattern Socks: Cute Pattern socks have attractive patterns and designs. Kids love to wear clothing items with patterns and designs and more so when they’re colorful.

Dropshipping Men’s Clothing

In recent years, the demand for affordable and fashionable men’s clothing has risen. Statista reports that the market is expected to grow annually by 3.53%. To take advantage of this potential growth, we should dropship men’s clothing.

Here are three products from the men’s clothing category that we can add to our store:

Cuffed Beanie: Cuffed Beanie is a beanie with excess material giving the wearer the ability to roll it up for a straight cuff. In addition to keeping our customers’ heads warm in the winter season, cuffed beanies are also a popular fashion item among teens and millennials.
Sweatshirt: A sweatshirt is a loose shirt with long sleeves, used as athletic wear, which buyers can also wear casually. Therefore, men can wear them while doing all sorts of activities like playing sports, lifting weights, and lounging around indoors or outdoors.
Running shorts: Running shorts are designed to be worn during jogs or workouts. They come in different materials, from cotton to linen and almost all colors. In addition to having a variety in material and color, running shorts are very comfortable to wear.

Dropship Plus Size Clothing

Usually, plus-size clothes are hard to find in retail stores because business owners find them difficult to sell. That is why many people who wear plus sizes have to go online or order catalogs to find items that fit them properly. Due to this reason, there is a fantastic opportunity to dropship plus size clothing.

Here are three examples of plus size clothing to add to our dropshipping store:

Fleece Jacket/Hoodie: Fleece is a fabric known for its uniqueness and warmth. Cozy and comfortable, the fleece jacket offers a hot experience during the colder months. Also, it is one of the popular items among plus-size shoppers.
Patchwork Denim Jacket: The Patchwork Denim Jacket is a fresh and stylish jeans jacket with an additional layer of patches resembling design or symbols. In addition, customers can pair them with high-rise and regular pants, which offer a very trendy and eye-catching look throughout the day.
Long Tailored Blazer: A blazer is a type of jacket that is both dressy and casual. Therefore, customers can wear at the workplace for official meetings or casual hangouts. When worn correctly, the blazer perfectly complements so many different body types and shapes, including plus size.

Tips For Dropshipping Clothing

Now that you have excellent clothing product ideas for your dropshipping store, here are some additional tips and tricks that will help you sell those products quickly.

First, we can attract a greater variety of clients with different tastes by listing a broad selection of different items from the same category.

Second, always remember to add as many sizes as possible because the more sizes we sell, the more customers we can cater to.

On that note, it is essential to source clothing from multiple suppliers. Not only will it allow us to offer a vast selection of products but it will also ensure that we don’t run out of sizes.

Furthermore, working with multiple suppliers gives us a competitive advantage over other stores and even our suppliers. When customers fail to find their size on popular sites, we can provide them with the missing sizes.

Finally, once an item in our dropshipping clothing store sells, we can add similar items to our collection to help increase sales.

Wrapping Up

Dropshipping clothes is a lucrative business because the demand is everpresent and continues to grow.

By finding a subniche and partnering with reliable suppliers we have a great chance to flourish in the clothing industry. What’s more automation gives us an edge that can help scale our dropshipping clothing business to new heights.

There are countless advantages to dropshipping clothing, so why wait?

What is dropshipping?

Why Dropship Clothes?