When do you cut loose from a losing store?

Six weeks with no sales is pretty rough.

I know my fashionista friends do keep mall/satellite stores dotted around (often themed- maybe only the beachwear section if at a tiki styled club). For me, the single private island location I share with my partner works ok, but people come specifically to see houses more than browse past them while shopping in general, so that's a different market.

I don't know how many products you have on show, but I do think that more is more. I mean if you walk past a lonely looking store with three items offered, it (to me) seems like it's not really worth visiting. But at L$2000 a time for the whole setup per item, that's a hefty cost. Mix and match options might help also, with the "complete look" offered as a package deal.

Scratching my head because I never shopped for shapes, but the ones I remember seeing, were always alongside/close to skins for sale. Shapes need skin to look the part, so if you can find a certain skin maker who'd be happy to share mall space with you, then you could coordinate maybe? People would shop for skin, maybe pick your shape because they can see how it looks. The avatar appearance is a balance of the two, and by not selling skins, you're relying on other people's products to make yours look right. That's a tough situation I think.

picking good locations where to rent a both (in malls) is the best thing you can do.
Adding a classified for each place you set up a vendor might worth. Of course you'll pay something (at your choice) weekly to LL, so e sure you'll sell more than you pay for the classified post, trying for a couple of weeks surely worths!
When adding a classifies try to search the best words to describe your product. Think of what people could search to find your product.

Another tip is to ask the owner of the mall if they might add your product in the place description, in your case "shapes" so that it can be searchable through places.
Most mall owners will be glad to do that if your product might increse traffic on their mall, on your side it will give you much more visibility.
Of course description of places can't be lng and the mall owner needs to check the best keywords to gain the best visibility possible.

On my side I place my vendors in places that I rather know it worths, depending on the product for sale. Check traffic on every place where you set a vendor, higher traffic means more people hangin there. I have vendors in some malls with no classifieds and no advertizing that sell good being in the right malls

6 months without a sale, would mean for me to stop renting there if i can't have my product listed in the place description.

That's not a likely option for my business because no one set of skins -- even assuming I could partner wiith the designer -- is going to work for all my shapes. I have plans for dealing with that issue, but I can't really put them in place until I build a main store.

If I weren't selling any shapes, then I'd rethink my entire business premise. But (when SL is working), I'm not doing so badly from SLE, SLB and my own little kiosk on my land.

Bsed on all the comments provided so far, I'm pretty convinced the biggest issue is that I've simply chosen the wrong location. So l be vacating tonight.

Mall lag definitely is a bummer. I was in one last night and wandered into a store that had a lot of stuff I wanted to buy. The lag was so bad I couldn't even get the buy windows to come up. There were no LM's to the main store. Luckily one item I was ablr to buy had the LM so I was able to find the Main Store. I wound up spending WAY too much money there.

LOL - aw man, thanks for my laugh of the day Vale. It's totally true

To be a good merchant, you must first be a dedicated consumer. I am not yet a merchant. But I am an exceptional consumer.

I agree with everyone who says that lag kills.

Even without lag, when I appear in the location, the merchandise I want should be right in front of me. I shouldn't have to go searching around for what I want. For those who have big stores, I appreciate teleporters to different sections.

My mood to spend money only lasts a short time. Don't make me wait to spend until my mood is gone. When I am ready to throw my money around, be immediately ready to take it from me.

When you set up your store, have friends come buy for test shopping. Is shopping there easy for them? Listen to their feedback. I don't know how many stores I go to have complicated buying procedures, that are too complicated for me to figure out before I give up, and I have to wonder if they had ever tried to buy something at their own store.

Consumers try to be thoughtful and educated shoppers. But the reality is that most sales are emotional, not logical, choices.

The primary method I use when searching for products is Search -> Places.

Recently, when searching for events, I have stopped filtering so that the commercial events come up as well. Events showcasing a new product or a limited time freebie will get my attention and get me there. I also like chatting with shop owners (when they are there for their own events). I don't like someone pushing sales on me, but a friendly shop owner makes me linger more and makes me more likely to buy something.

A Lucky Chair will bring me to a new place. I'm not a fan of Mob Vend. Freebies only attract me if they are freebies that are exclusive to the store, representing the kind of product I can buy in the store. I'm not going to come to pick up a different box of the same freebies I got from Freebie Warehouse.

If the Lucky Chair updates with new products, or new exclusive freebies are periodically offered, I will come back.

I don't go to malls just because they are malls. If I'm at a mall, it's because I went there for a specific store. But if the mall is a small, open mall, at which I can do a 360-turn and see what other stores are there, I will take a look at other stores there that catch my eye.

For a store to catch me as a passerby, it needs to have an attractive presentation, and an uncluttered layout.

Put less expensive products toward the front of the store, and more expensive toward the back. If the first thing I click on is a piece of clothing that costs $500L, I'll say to myself, "This store is too rich for me," and move on. If I find that item after looking over other reasonably price clothes, I'm in the mood to consider that the $500L piece that I finally run into is reasonable.

You can take advantage of passerby traffic. But the core of your sales are going to be based on your own marketing. Get that part worked out first before you start considering how to attract the passersby into your store.

Got that part down pat!

As for all the rest, wonderful post with some very useful insights. Thank you!

Well, I agree that if you aren't getting sales from a spot, it's probably a good idea to drop it. I can tell you your own store will usually be the source of most of your sales, if promoted. And funny as it sounds, one of my laggiest vendor spots also happens to be my generator of the most sales among vendor spots. So I wouldn't judge on lag alone. It's good to keep in mind that lag is relative. What's laggy for you may be just fine for others. Other than that, all I can say is good luck!