This week, Josh and Dane are joined by Brooke from Out of Town Clothing for Retail Receipts and Actually That's Smart. Topics include: the camera fear post everyone's seen in every Facebook group (Dane threw up before his first big presentation, and his actual advice is better than that sounds), and Dane's hot take on wanting to close your store and go fully online: the premise of that question is rude.

Also: why Brooke cut her men's department six years ago and never looked back, the moment she stood in the middle of the mall and walked into whichever store a customer walked into because she couldn't staff both, and whether tightening your weekly launches from 50 products to 25 is actually smart. Josh says your launch is not the curated part. Your marketing is.

This week, Josh and Dane get into the Shein conversation nobody in the boutique industry is having honestly: how to handle it when an employee promotes it on your page, how much energy is actually worth spending on it, and why the retailers winning right now have mostly stopped talking about it and started leaning into what nobody else can copy.

Also: a boutique doing $10 million a year in live selling, a vacation, a margarita, some quick math, and a panic attack. The case for building a business that works when you're not in the room. A TikTok retailer doing $3 million a year whose core customer is women 60 and over (Dane is still not over this). And why the Facebook group consensus on how bad business is right now is probably not the consensus.

But that doesn't mean you accept sloppy folds and phones out. This week, Dane shares the interview trick he used on every single store-level hire: throw some paper on the floor, toss a hanger, drop a tank top. Walk the candidate through it during the tour. If they don't bend down and pick something up, walk them out. That one test tells you everything you need to know.

Also: why "I just don't like being pushy" might actually be failing your customers, the GLP-1 gold mine most boutiques are sleeping on, and a real breakdown of whether AI should be writing your purchase orders and shooting your product photos. Spoiler: one is fine. One is not.

Josh and Dane don't buy it.

This week: why posting that question in a Facebook group is already the wrong move, the counterintuitive case for raising your prices when the economy gets weird, and why the local marketing agency that does everything for everyone is a bad idea no matter how nice they seem.

Also: what actually happens when a kid with chocolate hands touches your inventory (and why your reaction in that moment could cost you a $700 sale), whether you should go to a retail event alone, and the one trait Dane says almost every successful retailer shares.

Spoiler: it's not what you think.

Josh and Dane get into all of it.

This week: what to actually do when a competitor starts carrying your brands, why asking your customers what they want is usually a terrible idea, and the Mahjong story that had Dane completely skeptical and then completely convinced.

Plus: Dane names the silent killer of most retail stores. Not the economy. Not the competition. A math problem hiding in your P&L that most owners never see until it's too late.

And: should you let AI run your marketing? Dane says probably not. Josh has a Claude tip that might change your mind.

Josh and Dane get right into it: a trade show employee who couldn't handle the heat, the exact week you should flip your store from summer to fall (waiting for fall weather means you're already late), and the question successful boutique owners keep asking: should I add a men's section?

Spoiler: no. Hard no.

They also tackle the side hustle question, and Dane answers the one thing he's never been asked on a sales call: what would you actually say if you could say anything?

His answer might sting a little.