There are two ways to start a clothing business in the UK: print-on-demand, where a partner prints and posts each order and you hold no stock, or buying stock upfront and shipping it yourself. One needs almost no money and makes a thin margin; the other needs real money and makes a proper one. This guide covers both honestly, along with the two costs that quietly eat new clothing brands: samples and returns.
Print-on-demand or holding stock?
Print-on-demand means you upload a design, list the product, and when someone orders, a printing partner makes that one item and posts it. You never touch stock, you never risk a box of unsold hoodies, and you can start with very little money. The trade-off is the unit cost: because the partner does the making and shipping, they take most of the price, and your margin is thin. Quality and delivery are also in their hands, under your brand's name.
Holding stock means ordering from a manufacturer or wholesaler at a proper unit price. The margin per sale is far better — but your cash is now sitting in boxes, and clothing multiplies fast: one t-shirt in five sizes and three colours is fifteen separate products to stock and count.
A sensible route many brands take: start print-on-demand to test which designs people actually buy, then order stock of the proven sellers. You do not have to pick one forever. The general groundwork — registering, naming, the basics — is in our guide to starting a business.
What it costs to start
One-off, to get going: your designs (your own work, or a designer's fee), samples of every product you plan to sell — more on those below — a simple online shop or marketplace listing, product photography, and brand basics like labels and packaging inserts. A print-on-demand start can be a few hundred pounds. A stock start adds the first order: manufacturers set minimum quantities, so expect to tie up hundreds to thousands of pounds before your first sale.
Every month, once you are selling: platform and payment fees, packaging, postage, returns postage, replacement samples when you add products, and advertising — which for most online clothing brands becomes the single biggest cost.
The margin, honestly
Take Leo, starting a printed hoodie brand from his flat in Bristol. Print-on-demand, he sells a hoodie at £38. The printing partner charges him £22 for the blank, the print and the shipping, and payment and platform fees take about £2. That leaves £14 — before he has spent anything to win the sale. If it costs him £8 of ads to bring in each buyer, he keeps £6 a hoodie. He needs a lot of hoodies before this pays rent, and that is the print-on-demand deal in one line: tiny risk, tiny margin.
Now the stock version. Leo orders 100 blanks and has them printed locally at £11 all-in per hoodie. The same £38 sale now leaves £25 before ads — but £1,100 of his money is in boxes under the bed, and it only comes back if the design sells. The plan's job is to tell him how fast, and our pricing guide covers how to set the £38 in the first place.
Samples and returns — the two quiet costs
Never sell anything you have not held and washed. Order a sample of every product, in your own designs, before you list it. Check the print after three washes, the sizing against the size chart, the feel of the fabric. Samples cost real money across a range — budget for them — but a bad product found early costs a sample; found late, it costs your reviews.
Returns eat clothing margins. Clothes get returned more than almost anything else sold online, mostly over sizing. Every return costs postage and handling, and a printed item can rarely be resold to anyone else. Two defences: publish a proper size guide with garment measurements, not just S/M/L, and build an expected returns rate into your price so a normal month of returns is already paid for.
Getting your first customers
Clothing is Instagram-first: this work sells in pictures, and nobody buys a brand they cannot see. Photograph your samples on real people, not just flat on a table, and post consistently before you launch — a feed with life in it is your shop window, and building an audience of even a few hundred genuinely interested people beats launching to silence.
Early sales usually come from your own network wearing the product and being seen in it, small "drops" that give people a reason to buy this week, and tagging and local hashtags that put the work in front of strangers. Want help getting customers? Our sister agency The Fractions runs ads and builds websites for small UK businesses — the pages, the ads and the enquiries behind them. Before spending on ads, our guide to marketing a small business covers the free groundwork.
The admin
Most new clothing brands start as sole traders: register with HMRC, keep records of income and costs, file a Self Assessment return. Samples, fees, packaging, postage and ad spend all reduce your taxable profit, so keep every receipt.
Two clothing-specific points. UK textile rules require garments to be labelled with their fibre content — your manufacturer or print partner usually handles this, but it is your name on the product. And product liability insurance covers you if a garment causes harm; our insurance guide explains the covers in plain English.
Turning this into a plan
A clothing plan comes down to five numbers: your selling price, what each item costs you to make or deliver, what it costs to win a customer, your expected returns rate, and your fixed monthly costs. Put those together and you can see how many sales a month you need to break even — and whether print-on-demand margins can ever get you there, or whether the plan quietly says "order stock".
Create a mini business plan in minutes with Plan.business. Put in your rate, your hours and your costs, and it works out the rest — what you will make, when you break even, and what you need to charge to hit your target.
Frequently asked questions
How much does it cost to start a clothing business? A print-on-demand brand can start for a few hundred pounds — designs, samples, a simple shop and some photography. Holding stock adds the first manufacturing order, which usually ties up hundreds to thousands of pounds before your first sale.
Is print-on-demand profitable? It can be, but margins are thin: the printing partner takes most of the selling price for making and shipping each item, and advertising costs come out of what is left. It works best for testing designs with no stock risk, then moving proven sellers to bulk stock where the margin is far better.
How much do clothing brands make? It depends entirely on margin and volume. Work it out for yourself: selling price, minus what the item costs you, minus fees, minus what it costs to win each customer, minus returns — then times realistic monthly sales, minus your fixed costs. Many small brands run for months before that number beats a part-time wage.
Do I need a licence to sell clothes in the UK? No licence is needed. You must register with HMRC as self-employed (or form a company), and garments must be labelled with their fibre content. Product liability insurance is strongly advisable once you are selling to the public.
How do I handle returns? Accept them gracefully and price for them. Online clothing has a high returns rate, mostly over sizing, so publish real garment measurements, build an expected returns percentage into your prices, and check what your print partner's returns policy actually covers before you promise anything to customers.
Figures correct as of September 2026. Tax thresholds, fees and rates change; check the linked GOV.UK pages before acting. Prices and costs shown are indicative and vary by area and by what's included.
What is Plan?
Plan is a free business operating system for people starting or newly running a UK business. It walks you, one simple step at a time, from your elevator pitch through brand, product and pricing, to a complete business plan — then uses everything it now knows about the business to help with the basics: logo and brand, marketing, a website, a bank account, funding, insurance, company registration. You can use as much or as little as you want.
Two ways to do this
Do it yourself, free. Plan walks you through the numbers — price, unit cost, ad cost, returns — one short question at a time, in your browser. Test the print-on-demand sums tonight and stop there if that is all you need.
Or get the shop and the selling handled. Our sister agency The Fractions runs ads and builds websites for small UK businesses — the pages, the ads and the enquiries behind them.