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DavidL

Info For New Business Owners- Random Thought And Rant

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big production- decent quality/high volume sale vs. high quality/ low volume sale is one to consider.

Best case scenario is hitting - high volume/ high quality/ high price - cost less for materials(use less, cuts down on time)- this rarely happens

you will NEVER hit best case scenario until you find someplace in the marketplace where your item has high value(in terms of quality and pricing) and popularity.

Starting out price your items at the regular price that you want to sell your item - say $42 for a bi fold wallet that cost $13 in material plus- time/rent/skill

The goal when starting your business is to establish your product into the market and to get many sales fast in the beginning so people at least have your product in mind. You can do this by discounting the wallet for $6 for a sale price of $36. Discounting your product too heavily say 20 dollars for a bifold and afterwards selling for $42 would effect your sales negatively, since the consumer already assumes that your product is low quality since it was sold at such a low price and now it is priced for over double with no apparent change in quality. Social media - Facebook, twitter, pintrest, contacting blogs and offer your product for them to write a review, tumblr, youtube stars, men/ women on youtube that are known for showing off products that they buy and share to their viewers. No matter if no one is active on those media sites keep posting, its worth the effort. Do NOT change the price of your product dramatically too quickly and too frequently unless there is a reasonable reason (leather price increase, quality of product changes) unless it is in a bundle or clearance sales. Changing price frequently will make the buyer suspicious. Make the product desired by people at a price above what they are willing to pay and then lower it to just slightly more than they are willing to pay and they may bite. May be best for high priced products that will go on sale once in 3 months.

Sell 5-10 different and products - that are all different colours, different thread colours, different types of leathers. What this does is that it places in the mind of the consumer that the items being sold are not "craft" homemade items and are professional products- insuring that the photos are take professionally and highlight the key areas of the wallet. Unless the homemade craft look is what you are going for(high quantity, low price). If no product sells keep adding new products to the line every 4 weeks. If you are really desperate sell a few items of a kind and you can show it as sold out on your website (no one knows how many products were available and the consumer will think that the products are good since people are buying it).

Open up your store and sell more item in more than one website.

Make an item that sells for a huge amount of money that you do not have any intention of selling and put a lot of effort into the product and that it is actually worth the amount ( such as elephant wallet for 350 or ostrich leather wallet). The more information that the customer has the better, they will see that you have actual skill and that the skills will be transferred into the cheaper well priced wallets. For instance when I look at dream cars that I want to buy they go for 100 thousand- 500 thousand. When i look at a motorcycle at 15 grand that looks just as sleek at that split second I will have an urge to buy that motorcycle because comparatively the motorcycle is just as fast, looks just as good as the 100 thousand dollar car - bars do the same thing selling spirits - They have a 50 shot whiskey and 22 dollar for the second single shot of whiskey. People always want the best - but most can't have it - but if you offer a product with similar value but slightly inferior they will still feel they got a good deal, but in reality they just spent 22 bucks on a single shot.

Sell products bundled with other peoples product - idk the official marketing term (doesn't really matter). Having both companies together will only help each other out. You may have to actively search and contact people. For instance you see someone who sells hand made wood business cards and has engravings for peoples companies and sells these to business that are big. Adding your product to his store will generate more exposure to you and possibly future partners that will get custom stamped wallets for the coworkers as a gift.

Pricing of products is very important - look at apple's pricing for instance. Every iPod has its own category.( guessing the price might be 20 dollars off_

Large capacity - iPod classic - $269

small portable - iPod nano $129- $169

muti media - iPod touch- $229- $299- $350

iphone 5s- business/ flagship

iphone 5c student phone/ mass market

IF a product is not selling make the item more desirable by clearancing the product, bundling with another product, giving it away as a free promotion (it wasn't selling anyways and this brings in potential future revenue for cheap, word of mouth and other people looking to also get a free product to not look at your line of goods).

The prices of the iPods do not overlap (excluding the iPod classic). This enables people to be categorized by their demographic into a specific iPod class. Need less space for music, using for a run, strapped for cash - iPod nano. Loves to have a big music collection, keeps movies and needs tons of space - iPod classic. Needs all around music player- decent amount of space, touch screen - iPod touch.

So what does that mean to you then? Sell your products at different price ranges to hit specific audiences. Young crowd that just likes to compulsively buy and has a bad credit rating - sell cheap products that can be made quick and fast and of decent quality in relation to price. You wouldn't mind buying a pair of sandals for 10 bucks if they looked ok and looked like they could last a year.

Taking all that information - I didn't hit all the areas, but is a general overview and set up a mock store platform. compare to your competitor and price accordingly. Most useful thing if you take anything out from this rant is to pretend you really want to buy a wallet and need one. Pretend you are a teenager looking for the next trendy wallet - look at forums/blogs and see what people are buying, emulate the style and sell for cheaper than the brand name. Pretend you are the person that wants quality handmade goods (most people on this forum are in this category). Make something that those people will want to buy. Pretend you are a pretentious highly bred CEO who wants the most expensive, exotic and best made item and price an item for that person.

Trying to hit all demographic of people. Find what works and if something is not working fix it, alter it, change it, or remove it. Making a business work is like playing poker, know when to make a move, when to just hold on, when something doesn't work react to it, think like the other person and you will always beat the other player. In business it is just like in poker sometimes things go your way sometimes it doesn't even if you played it out the best it could possibly be.

Cheap card wallets - price to make $6 ($4 dollar vegtan per sq, thread, dye, finish(optional))- hits the mass population High volume- low price- sale price $15- 20 depending on complexity and amount of card slots/ features - preferably flashy, red and black, orange thread, green thread, purple leather - this group of people tend to buy what looks best - regardless of where its made, how it is made, type of leather. Mostly impulse buyers.

Your cheap card wallet - but in a higher quality leather - hits a more mature audience that prefers things made in canada/us, hand stitched, American leather- promote highly on these things on your website or in the info box that the viewer will see when they click on the item. Pricing - $24-28

Bifold wallet cheap easy to make and fast to make. Same as cheap card wallet but priced slightly higher. Pricing $30-35

Bifold in better quality leather. pricing $45-50

Highest quality leather, most detail - hand tooled, hand dyed. $100-300.

Random piece of information- the brand abercrombie and fitch and nike town ( a division of nike) do not make a single dime of profit at their largest stores, they actually lose money. Nike has a store in NY that has a few stories, if they sold 25 percent of their inventory in 4 months it still wouldn't even be a fraction of what they have to pay staff and to run the store. They use the store as a 3D billboard which you can walk into and try on the products and a reminder for people of nike as a top brand since people will walk past the store every day.

Thats all the info that I have stored in my brain. Disclamer- I am in the process to start up a store and these are not proven by my own self. If you do this and don't make any sales don't blame me for it. All this information comes from watching a bunch of T.V, Dragons den, my father was a business man and his father was a business man and so on- having the mind for business,ect( i know this makes me sound shady, but thats total transparency and honesty. I took a high school marketing course and did well and also took a course in university. I dropped out of university to try my hand at leather working to start a business, since I believe I have the knowledge in my mind and if you look hard enough you will see the dots and you can connect them and make sense of why people buy, how, what works and what doesn't- comes with experience and trial and error.

If you made it to this part of the post good for you. And sorry for the disorganization and overall bad english - its not my strong point.

NOW GO MAKE some hard earn money.

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