How to get your products to sell well

[Lfrog]

9 hours ago, robs456 said:

Thanks for writing this up. Interesting stuff.
This is where I am now. Had a few meetings but nothing's came out of them. For me there's been no such thing as a discussion, more like "What do you have?...No, don't want it..." and I'm like "What you want then? I'm can make whatever." and they go "Make something and email us a pic and we'll go from there" and I'm like "F dat"...

 

Advice from anyone on how to deal with small to medium size shops/companies would be appreciated.

Did the customer get any prices from you at all? How much margin were you leaving for the retailer, retailers need good margins. Put yourself in their shoes, think like a retailer first then develop your product to fit the price point for that sector if you can. If your numbers are out for the retailer then orders most probably wont happen.

Just as a starting point if the product retails at $20 (thats where comparable products are selling at) then the retailer wants to pay around the $8 mark plus therir various government taxes.

Edited August 26, 2019 by Northmount
removed blank quote

[robs456]

3 hours ago, Lfrog said:

Did the customer get any prices from you at all? How much margin were you leaving for the retailer, retailers need good margins. Put yourself in their shoes, think like a retailer first then develop your product to fit the price point for that sector if you can. If your numbers are out for the retailer then orders most probably wont happen.

Thanks for the reply.
I try to make it so they can mark it up 100%. Sometimes that's not possible and I've noticed they're less interested then...

Edited August 26, 2019 by robs456

[chrisash]

@robs456 shops have limited space to display their items, and have to select items that are proven to fit their market. they are constantly invited to try new items and therefore have to be very selective

One thing you could try that may break down the door is to offer sale or return on a small selection of items for say a limited 3 month trial, you supply the goods and they only pay when the item is sold, at the end of the period the unsold goods are returned to you in new condition, Basically changing to a no risk for them to try the new items

The skills in selling to another business are vastly different from say selling to a private customer , some of these "Closing a sale" skills are available to learn in some business books, unfortunately the market is also filled with the crap "make a million bucks this year" type of book to confuse the issue

Good luck

[robs456]

2 minutes ago, chrisash said:

@robs456 shops have limited space to display their items, and have to select items that are proven to fit their market. they are constantly invited to try new items and therefore have to be very selective

One thing you could try that may break down the door is to offer sale or return on a small selection of items for say a limited 3 month trial, you supply the goods and they only pay when the item is sold, at the end of the period the unsold goods are returned to you in new condition, Basically changing to a no risk for them to try the new items

The skills in selling to another business are vastly different from say selling to a private customer , some of these "Closing a sale" skills are available to learn in some business books, unfortunately the market is also filled with the crap "make a million bucks this year" type of book to confuse the issue

Good luck

Thanks.

The sale or return seems to be available more with the smaller businesses, the downside is that they don't have any motivation to display it in a good spot. Happened to me once at least, I noticed it half way through, fixed it, but then I'm not there every day so who knows what happens when I leave...

[chrisash]

Agreed the problem with limited budgets, the large companies supply all the display racks and promotion items to get a great display where as the small guys are just not in that league

The selection of shop types also helps, in the UK we have a lot of mens country wear for shall we say the better off, Outdoor activities and also tack shops, both of which leather products can fit into nicely

[robs456]

13 minutes ago, chrisash said:

The selection of shop types also helps, in the UK we have a lot of mens country wear for shall we say the better off, Outdoor activities and also tack shops, both of which leather products can fit into nicely

Yes, you have like 60 million people  while in Sweden we have 8 million only, so trying to find the right niche. Lately been trying to sell belts to specialist jeans shops.

[RockyAussie]

1 hour ago, robs456 said:

Yes, you have like 60 million people  while in Sweden we have 8 million only, so trying to find the right niche. Lately been trying to sell belts to specialist jeans shops.

I'm not much for giving flip answers @robs456 and I as usual up to my eyeballs with orders to get by the end of the month. I do have a few suggestions but they will have to wait until the weekend I am sorry. For now I am curious if you could tell me why a person should buy Rob5? I don"t mean that product ....I mean the brand?

You may only have 8 million people there but 29.9 million tourists went there in 2017. Tourists in Sweden spent 317 billion kronor in 2017, enough to make it the top year for tourism of all time.

Could you tell me what is the nationality of the largest amount of tourists that go there?

Edited August 26, 2019 by RockyAussie
forgot something

[Tugadude]

RockyAussie, I am probably an outlier here.  I am a confirmed hobbyist.  I do not sell my leatherwork.  I make it for myself, my family and my friends.  I typically make things that would be very useful for them to have and that they likely would not buy for themselves due to the cost.

I may try to hawk some of my wares some day.  Or not.

But I found your post fascinating.  It was interesting to hear a bit of your history, where you grew up, etc.  Wouldn't mind hearing more.

The ideas you shared about marketing are timeless and they apply to most anything that is sold.  The principles also apply to things such as speech-making, know your audience.

I've spent my entire career in sales and business development.  I also give speeches and product presentations regularly.  Knowing who you are speaking too is crucial.  You may THINK you know what they want to hear, but all too often you are wrong.  Better to find out what they want, what makes them tick.  Then tailor your talk accordingly.

Thanks for taking the time.  Between this, your videos and your detailed "how-to" posts you are  an invaluable resource on this forum.

Thanks!

[ABHandmade]

With my meager English, I could not express my thoughts in the same way as the @Tugadude did. But his words are as close as possible to what I would like to say to Brian.

Thank you, Brian!

PS. @Tugadude, sorry for some plagiarism

[robs456]

6 hours ago, RockyAussie said:

For now I am curious if you could tell me why a person should buy Rob5? I don"t mean that product ....I mean the brand?

Man, first I was thinking you're asking at the worst possible time, but maybe it's the best...'cos the truth is that I've been second guessing the brand over the summer. So right now I don't know.
I came out at the start with the main idea of 'Handmade in Sweden' -to make good quality product that's made locally and small scale as opposed to the 'made in India' stuff that's cheap and crap quality. Plan was/is to get in on the medium to high price scale with goods that people who knows good leather or even just those who can see and appreciate the difference between my stuff and the crap mass-produced bonded leather stuff everyone here sells.

I went with this fully knowing two big weaknesses: 1. It's more of an idea than a Brand and 2. I would have very few customers, but the ones I'd have would have money, class and the 'right' attitudes.
There are more cons of course and a few pros as well (or I'd not do it).

Now I'm second guessing the whole premise of doing this business that way, along with the brand etc.
First off, it's been hard to find customers online even though I'm marketing all over Europe (insta/FB -and that's another story...) and I'm beginning to think most non-Swedes don't care much for "made in Sweden".
Two, while meeting people in person in markets or other venues it has finally hit me how very few actually cares about:
1. Leather/Material
2. Quality
3. where it's made.
What most people seem to care about is:
1. How it looks on them (self-image)
2. Brand (Big Brand that is)
3. Money
(This list can also be reversed.)

This is quite funny as I've read and participated in forum posts and offline discussions about this and I've always 'known' this but now I KNOW it...
I have no inclination to pander to the 'Gray mass' and spend time making subpar stuff just to move product, I'm snobby enough to take a loss of potential gain just to do what I want to do. Another weakness for sure(?).  

So my conundrum now is how to (re?)define my brand and then how to market it/position it in the market.
And what market to go for, even though I've kinda already answered that one -upper mid to high level disposable income. Now for the niche, like I said above I've been talking to (not selling in) high end jeans shops as I figured if someone splashes 3-600 USD on a pair of jeans they's like a nice belt (maybe custom even?) to go with them. 
I like making belts and bracelets, keyrings because they sell (especially the cheaper ones) and various other small goods like carved notebook covers and I'm getting into wallets. Did do a lot of cardholders but they're getting so boring to make now, except if I can make an artwork out of them like the 'samurai' ones on my insta...
I should go into making bags as people love bags, but I don't really like making them for various reasons.

Then, knowing the above, there's the question of HOW and WHERE to market to the selected niche/demography... 

6 hours ago, RockyAussie said:

You may only have 8 million people there but 29.9 million tourists went there in 2017. Tourists in Sweden spent 317 billion kronor in 2017, enough to make it the top year for tourism of all time.

Could you tell me what is the nationality of the largest amount of tourists that go there?

Well, according to the same report you got the numbers from the top two by far is Norway and Germany, followed by the Dutch, Danish and Finnish. But those who shop the most I would guess is the Germans, Americans and the Chinese.

Though they tend to buy the 'typical Swedish things' which are not what I'd even like to do. 
One thing here though could be getting into homeware in the typical 'Scandinavian design' that's so famous. That's actually an old idea of mine and my shop even has such a category, though I've not really committed to any jawdropping designs yet. 

Oh, and about Scaling:
Some local Startup gurus here had a look at my stuff and my prospects for launching the business and they all went "Ah nice stuff..Can you scale it up" or "How will you scale it up"?
Thing is at the moment I'm at the mindset that I don't WANT to scale up. Keep it small scale, good quality and reasonably high priced and I'm good. No need to be the next LVMH.
If money starts pouring in that mindset might change , but right now I'm all for keeping it small.
And preferably without machinery to keep it handmade (though I'm seriously contemplating getting a sewing machine).
Leather companies that scale up too fast is one of my pet peeves. There's a few Swedish companies (like https://www.sandqvist.com) that launched as small companies making good product. That linked company now makes most of its stuff in India and the poor quality shows (loose threads, crooked alignments etc etc). I'm more of the mindset of 'If you're gonna do it, do it well'.

Wow, that got real long real fast. I don't know if I even replied to the original question and sorry for hijacking the thread with my rants. It was very therapeutic to write though.

Any comments and tips/hints from all and everyone are welcome.