"Healthy" Competition

Rarity sat at her desk, staring at the notebook holding the logs of her sales and customers. Through the entire week, she only had three customers, all of which only placed relatively small orders. What am I going to do? How did it get to this? This is bad enough as is… But with Hoity Toity coming next week, and he sees how empty the boutique is?He’ll never believe I’m able to manage another shop! Everything was fine until I lost that one client. What if he decides I’m not up a pony suitable enough to make it in Manehattan! What if… Rarity cut herself off, hitting head on her desk. She didn’t want to think about it anymore.

“Rarity… are you in there?” Sweetie Belle creeped into Rarity’s room. “I was yelling for you downstairs. Didn’t you hear me?”

“I’m sorry Sweetie…” Rarity picked her head up from her desk. “Your sister has had a lot on her mind recently.”

“What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing new, Darling. Did… did you happen to see if any pony was around that new store?”

“Yeah, I walked by it on my way home. Is that what’s bothering you?”

“Is it that obvious?”

“K-kind of. That and with the way your shop’s been so, well-”

“Dead?”

“I wasn’t necessarily going to say that…”

“It’s okay, Sweetie Belle. It’s very much true.” Rarity let out a heavy sigh. “Maybe I’ve just lost my touch. Maybe I just lost... Oh who am I kidding? I’m ruined!” She slammed her face back on the desk and began to cry.

“That’s no way to talk, Rarity. You can get out of this. I’ve seen you going through worse and come out better!” Sweetie Belle walked up to Rarity, putting her hoof around her.

“Y-you think so?”

“Yeah, like the time with that pony who stole from you, and how you managed to get yourself out of that. You could make just as big a comeback!”

Rarity lifted her head up, and wiped the tears from her eyes. “You’re right, Sweetie!” Her eyes started to twinkle, as she brought herself together. “I know exactly what I can do! I still have some time before Hoity Toity comes over. If I can take some of my cheaper fabrics, I can create a rush sale. And with that I’m sure to draw up some business by the time he comes over. He’ll see the boutique is still doing incredibly well and can support a new shop in Manehattan. Oh it’ll take a lot of work, but I’m sure it’ll pay off.”

“Are you feeling a bit better, Sis?”

“Oh most certainly!” Rarity hugged Sweetie Belle. “You helped me feel so much better.”

Sweetie Belle replied with a squee.

But if I’m going to do this, I have to make sure I can stay a cut above Fabrica… “Sweetie… could you do one more thing for me?”

“Anything!”

“I need you to go down to Apparel Avenue one more time, and I want you to tell me the average price of what’s being sold there.”

“Well, isn’t that—I don’t know…”

“It’ll be a big help, Dear. Just do it as a favor for me, please?”

“O-okay!”

Please, please work.

Rarity let out a heavy sigh, and locked the door to the Boutique. This is fabulous, the boutique has been attracting entirely new customers for almost a week! It’s been incredibly tiresome to prepare, but it brought some business back fortunately. Despite only having a few days, she managed to pull everything together. It took all she had in her, staying up night and day creating new designs, cutting up fabrics and piecing them together, but she did it. Fortunately for her, the sale was a tremendous success. In fact, it was so successful that by the third day, word spread beyond Ponyville of what was going on, and new clients from places such as Fillydelphia and Canterlot came to stop by.

However, this was all only possible thanks to Sweetie Belle. As per Rarity’s instruction, she went over to Apparel Avenue and found the exact prices of Fabrica’s lines. With this information, Rarity then cut her own prices so they would be about sixty-percent of whatever Fabrica sold similar clothing for. Enough to just barely make a profit for her, and enough to be a cut above Fabrica. Rarity kept trying to tell herself it was within good reason, especially after finding out that Fabrica sold her designs at an average price of one-hundred and fifty bits. Convenient, especially considering Rarity just so happened to tell her that her own gowns were typically worth around two-hundred bits.

I know it’s not particularly right, but it’s what I had to do. I didn’t have a choice. Besides, according to Sweetie Belle, Fabrica had several ponies over before. Her business must be doing just fine. Despite trying to keep a neutral mindset, it quickly changed at the sight of the unfinished gowns for Persnickety. So far, these were the only custom garnments during this whole flash sale that nopony even so much as glanced at. They were an incredible burden on her, and weren’t going anywhere. She’s clearly doing fine if she can just take away clients like that. And she stole my dress. She said she’d return it several weeks ago, but still hasn’t! She must have just used it as a template to make her own lines.

In frustration, Rarity let out a loud groan. Stealing clients, lowering prices, taking my dress, being snoopy around my store...she started this! I’m not doing anything wrong! I’m just doing what I can to stay ahead! Suddenly, seemingly out of the blue, the doorbell rang, shattering her train of thought. That’s odd, now who could it be at this time?

“Yes, coming!” Rarity trotted to the door, and was immediately shocked to see none other than Hoity Toity standing on the other side. “Hoity T-Toity! I thought you weren’t coming in until tomorrow morning!”

“I originally planned to, but when word of your booming sale reached Canterlot , I simply had to stop by to observe what was making it so incredibly popular!”

“Why yes, do come in and look around! I just finished closing up, but feel free to look around at what I have completed!” Rarity stepped aside to allow Hoity Toity into the boutique.

“My, it really is looking quite extravagant! You know, your sale must be so popular, because on my way in, I saw another store had a sign up as well advertising a sale! Oh but I wouldn’t believe they’re doing nearly as well as—”

“I’m sorry, did you say another store was having a giant sale?” Rarity’s eyes twitched while saying that. She knew she didn’t even need to ask, she figured out exactly what was going on. At this point, she was just trying to hold back an outburst.

“Yes! It was Apparel something, I believe that…” Hoity Toity’s words just trailed off, Rarity stopped listening at that point. What was building up over days and weeks had finally reached a tipping point, a point where Rarity had enough, and decided it was time to address this blatant copycat attempting to bring her down. “…But I cannot stay here all night,” Hoity Toity continued on, “as I had not planned to and only intended to come by to view your current success. I shall have one of my assistants bring everything regarding the new location. All you need to do is show me your presentation for the line, and tell me whether or not you’ve decided if you will be running this location.”

Rarity shook her head, snapping out of her reverie, bringing her back to the moment at hand. The designs! I was supposed to have them prepared for tomorrow. I completely forgot about them while organizing this whole ordeal! She gave Hoity Toity a fake smile. “Yes of course! I’ll have that all prepared. Don’t you worry.”

“I will be back at noon on the dot tomorrow and not a second off.”

“Yes of course, I will see you then!” And with that, Hoity Toity went on his way, and Rarity shut the door. I wish I could deal with setting up a new line at this second,but how can I knowing that she is trying to take something else of mine too? I need to go over there right now and give her a piece of my mind! Who does she think she is? Stealing clients, ruining my gown, copying my ideas… Rarity threw on her evening wear as she made her way out the door. I mean, the audacity of it all! Rarity slammed the door behind her as she left to Fabrica’s.

Rarity finally made it to Apparel Avenue. Hoity Toity was right. There was a gigantic sign above the store that read ‘SALE!’ The nerve of her! Rarity knocked on the door, and at this point, she was finding it very difficult to hold back her anger and not break the door down herself.

“Hello? Oh, it’s just you.” Fabrica creeped open the door. “Is there something I can help you with?”

Rarity exploded, with all the pent up frustration from the past weeks “Yes indeed! Might I ask what in Celestia’s name is going on here? What do you think you’re doing? You’ve taken my clients away, you’re copying my methods, spoken bad about how I do things. Because of you I have these incredibly expensive custom gowns that are just wasting away because I have absolutely nothing I can possibly do with them! I then start losing customers so I do the one thing I can and you copy that too! And what about that gown you said you’d fix of mine that you ruined? I suppose you have that up for sale at this point! Why don’t I see if—” She pushed open the door a bit more and stepped inside, and was completely disheartened at what she saw.

“Well, not like you have any reason to storm in and shout at me, you got what you wanted. Let me go get your stupid thing. It must be so valuable.” Fabrica slammed the door, and walked away into another room, leaving Rarity alone to see what was really going on. Signs read ‘EVERYTHING MUST GO.’ and ‘BUY 1 GET 2 FREE.’ Rarity misheard Hoity Toity. Fabrica hadn’t put up a competitive sale. She was going out of business.

“W-wha… I don’t understand…” Rarity was bewildered. What could possibly be going on? I thought, I thought—

Fabrica quickly returned, and threw a garment bag at her. “Here’s your stupid dress. I couldn’t quite get everything together back in place but I did what I could.”

“I don’t understand, Fabrica, what’s been going on?”

“Like you don’t know,” Fabrica huffed. “You win, alright?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about? Win what? What are you saying?”

“Look, it’s obvious you didn’t want me around. But accusing me of taking customers? How can I when my shop is about as silent as a rock? And you putting up some giant bargain I can’t compete with. Well that’s just the final nail in the coffin. I’m done.”

Rarity was beginning to piece together what was going on. She placed the garment bag down and began to sort through her thoughts. Sweet Celestia. She wasn’t trying to hurt me! This whole time Iwas the one doing damage to her.I’m the crazy competitor!“But, what about Persnickety? Didn’t he place a large order? He placed an order with me and then cancelled it saying she wasn’t satisfied and found another place.”

“Well, that wasn’t me. I met a pony named Persnickety, and all he did was come to the store to look, apparently he didn’t like it. He didn’t buy anything at all, heck I’ve barely sold anything this whole time I’ve been here! I found out soon after that he gave me a bad name and told ponies not to come here! I’ve clearly made a mistake. At this point, I’m just going to cut my losses, and go.”

So… he didn’t buy anything from her, and he didn’t cancel the order with me because of her… I didn’t even look into the details, I just assumed! And if he gave her a bad rep, he must have done the same for me, and that’s why my business was slow! I just created a bunch of assumptions because of my own fears… And because of that, I’ve hurt somepony. Rarity thought to herself. “Fabrica, I’m so sorry, I didn’t know—”

“Look, I get it, you didn’t want somepony else on your turf. I know I might have been a bit… rude, and I’m sorry. I didn’t know what to say to try to get along with someone else who had a similar store. But I just…” Her words trailed off as her eyes began to tear up. “It’s just another failure of mine, I guess.”

“Darling, please. I can’t even begin to start to make up for what I’ve done based on facts I just assumed, but if you would let me try to help—”

“Help? What can you possibly do?”

Rarity took a deep breath. She knew exactly what she had to do in order to start putting things right. It was a bit of a sacrifice, as it was what she originally wanted for herself, but she knew it was the right thing to do. “Would you like to work in Manehattan?”

“Huh?” Fabrica rubbed her eyes, stopping herself from shedding more tears.

“Yes. I’ve been talking with someone high up in the fashion industry, we’ve been working to get a store open there. It’s in an extremely prime location. And well, maybe you’d be better off taking that spot than me. And don’t worry about the cost of the location, we have that taken care of.” She let out a sigh, and continued. “I’m deeply, deeply sorry. I got a wrong image of you, and created many assumptions founded on absolutely nothing true. And as a result, I’ve caused a mess, and in addition to hurting another pony, I’ve made myself into something really terrible. And it is horrible. Fabrica, I’m sorry. And I want this to be a new place for you to start.”

“I… I don’t know what to say, I didn’t think…” Fabrica couldn’t help it anymore, and tears started to flow down her face. Without a second thought, she jumped on Rarity, giving her a tight hug. “Thank you so much…”

“It’s what you deserve for me being so terrible.” Rarity returned the hug. “Please be at my place at noon, we can discuss the details then.”

“Thank you…” Fabrica let go of Rarity, and wiped her face. “Maybe now, we can get off on a better hoof with this behind us, huh?”

Rarity giggled. “Yes, I do believe we can.”