I created an eCommerce site for a very similar business and what I would suggest is to create the marketing plan first. Like the business I made they got the products (knockoffs of top brands in this case) at excellent pricing.
But because they were not the manufacturer they were still a middle man and the $7.50 profit per item was quickly swallowed by all the Google ads. For 5-7? years they persisted with this hoping to somehow create traction but since they were not a brand what traction was there to make?
(Their marketing was supplemented with college fairs, festivals, etc... almost always sold out!.. did it create enough new customers?...nope...people like prefer buying personal items in person. Even if there's 10 of the same shirt, same color, same size, they're just not exactly the same and people prefer to choose (cause they want certainty).
People found them, and bought from them, because of price, not speed or service... it's hard to create loyalty for a distributor. People say they love k-mark or target or walmart but if a new fresh looking store opened with better prices then they would be the place to be... when it comes to shopping for commodity what's cool is getting it for cheaper, there's no cache to "I bought it at k-mart."... it's not the same as carrying around a Tiffany bag.
Prove it can work. The marketing research.
