Looking for advice

[Guest]

Do you use your CubeCart to sell your own products? Do you use it to sell other people's products? Or mainly, do you use it for both?

I'm in the process of setting up a store to sell my own handmade products but am also interested in selling products from other businesses (re: baby related items like clothing, toys, books, etc.). How do I go about partnering with them? Is the only option through their affiliate programs? Any suggestions?

[Guest]

Hi

Best idea is to contact these businesses, and explain what you want to do. They may (or may not!) be interested in supplying you as a reseller. I have always found that the personal approach works better than anything!

Regards

Dave.

:ph34r:

[Guest]

I thought about that but didn't know if they would even bother to answer such a little person as myself. Is there ever a fee for doing this? I'm speaking on the level of name brands that everyone is familiar with.

Thank you for the quick response and advice. :alien:

[Guest]

God loves a tryer!!!!

There's nothing to loose, and you can't be charged for asking questions. WIth bigger companies, if you send an email to a "generic" address you might find that they won't respond to the "little guy", but if this happens, try calling them. It's a lot harder to ignore a person than delete an email!

Good luck.

Dave.

If they don't deal with small orders, they may recommend a distributor that you can contact.

[Guest]

In reading articles on the internet and clicking on "more information" at some big named companies, some of them reference having to have a reseller license and a "minimum purchase" sounding like I have to purchase items for "my store" to hold onto as stock. Have you heard of this? I'm guessing they don't deal with small time vendors but I know I've seen other small websites reselling. I know what you're thinking...why not ask them how they got into the business of reselling those products. On my task list to do.

Thanks again for the suggestions. :alien:

[Guest]

If you need to start off "small" and want to avoid carrying a large inventory, you may want to contact each of the manufacturers of the products you're interested in to get a list of their distributors. Then you can contact the distributors to find out about their minimum qty/$$ requirements. You will have to have a retail business license before they'll consider working with you.

If you don't want to carry stock, your options are limited to options such as drop-shipping or affiliate sales. Be very careful about working with drop-shipping companies; contact existing clients and the better business bureau before committing to membership fees.

Providing links to products through affiliate programs is the lowest investment, lowest risk way to go. You'll have to work very hard at search engine positioning to generate an income this way.

Sometimes it's better to start small and expand based on the sales of your existing products. Spend your time creating a professional website that highlights your handmade items. Market through search engines, eBay, your email sig tag, a sign on your car, whatever. As your visitor base grows, reinvest your profits into expanding your product line on products that compliment your current sales.

Good luck.

[Guest]

Janet,

first thing is not to say you are small. Describe it as a new start up business, or a new division of an established one. They know it can go either way.

If a company really is too big to sell to the trade (WTH), then they usually have WHOLESALERS. These are middle men who deal with smaller traders.

You should NEVER have to pay to deal with a company or IMHO never have to pay for a LIST of suppliers. I find that SIC !

If you use google and type in keywords like "baby clothing wholesalers" etc. you should find loads of great companies who will sell to you. If you're RELALY stuck I found a great wholesale list (FREE) which I can dig out of my bookmarks, but it would take me a while, so please try google yourself first.

Also things like yellow pages, yell, thompsons, white directory, and the phone book also list wholesalers.

Also find the TRADE MAGAZINE for your industry and look in it for wholesalers and manufacturers. They will have adverts and PR in there.

Yes you will nearly always get a quantity discount but this usually only add 5~20% extra discount. you should still get a proper retail margin.

IMHO you can be small - but don't think small ;-)

But I do recommend you find a "niche" - particular products you trust you can sell oodles of. Anything else can be special order. But stock holding should only be what you believe in and can afford to stock.

Some wholesalers also do a thing called DROP SHIPPING where you never hold any stock and they deliver it for you. Personally I hate these, but it's your choice of course.

Marketing wise obviously it's good if you can sell your products alongside the big names. it gives you instant credibilty. SO even if only make a small margin, you should sell your own stuff off them.

If you don't know what a proper retail margin is PM me. I'm not sure I should say it in public ;-)

JMTCW.

[Guest]

Ok, so what is the downside to drop shipping? Or rather...the negatives? Any positives?

[Guest twisted]

The positives are that you don;t have to invest a single cent in inventory. The dropshipper holds all the product stock. Basically, all you do is make the sale at your price. You then give the order to your supplier at their price, and they "drop-ship" it directly to the customer. You, usually, never even get to see it. The drop-shipper also handles product returns and customer enquiries.

The downside is, if the dropshipper screws up...YOU'RE the one who gets the bad press. You have to have faith in your dropshipper being able to deliver, not only the goods, but the right goods, and in a timely manner. And you have to find a trustworthy one. You can also sell something the dropshipper no longer has. I have found that dropshippers can be very lax in informing resellers when an item has gone out of stock.

Most of the dropshippers you can find thru search engines, are not genuine wholesalers, but other individuals who purchase from wholesalers, and claim to be selling to YOU at wholesale. While they may be cheap, they are not necessarily true wholesale prices. Finding a GOOD, GENUINE dropshipper, is harder than finding a true wholesale source. And the best way to find a true wholesaler? The phone book!

[Guest OSKicks]

trial and eroor dropshiping is fine i did it for a LONG time positives are you don't gotta ship the stuff out which in my opinion is the BEST PART,-----Josh

[Guest]

JMTCW

but drop shipping epitomises everything that's TOTALLY CRAP about the internet!

Selling is about a relationship, an emotional transactoin, about knowing your product, understanding your customer. And knowing what you have in stock and that you CAN deliver it - complete with the screws/battery, etc. as a package.

Take that away and you're left with price and marketing wars and little chance for the small business.

If you think about which (sweet?) shops you go in locally - what influences your decission?

Product rnage, price, environment (you can find what you want without getting toes trodden) or the people ?

With brand name products pricing and product is basically fixed.

Would I buy from you because you offer personal service and I trust you and feel you care about my children, or because you can get me some big brand product 10p cheapper than wall mart?

What if you're 10p dearer? For a friendly service and known stock and convenience "personally" I'd pick you every time!

Especially if you also offer unique home grown products I can't get elsewhere at the same time ;-)

If you think hard I'm sure you all have places you'd NEVER shop again if you had a choice - whether cheap, well stocked or whatever.

Have you ever gone back to a shop that was rude to you or mucked you about with delivery ?

ALSO if a company's biggest ASSETT is their customer database (which it is) WHY are you just GIVING IT AWAY to a potential rival. What happens when the manufacturer decides to open their own Internet retail site?

Will they ever contact the customer directly for any reason?

Hmm !

No. 1 ecommerce complaint is being out of stock and worse getting no notification of such.

Third complaint is ME TOO stores.

I ordered some PC parts from ONE supplier recently. 10 items. I thought they were a real company.

First came in FIVE deliveries over 2 days via several couriers. I had little clue WHO had supplied it as there was no paperwork or sender. Luckily I only had one order outstanding so....

The SIXTH package didn't come for 5 days! This was ESSENTIAL to building the PC so I was totaly screwed. The store had said everything was in stock and delivery would be 3 days total.

ONE of their drop shippers had had a problem - end result I was cross ;-)

Would I use them again ? NOT a chance !

Deal with someone who had it on their shelves now ? What do you think ?!

Price - within reason I don't care - I was out of action for 2 exra days and that cost me way more than the 10% I saved :-(

OH and BTW 2 of the items were faulty - LOL

Did I mention I don't like drop shipping yet ?

PS I do NOT sell drop ship lists like some others might :ph34r:

[Guest twisted]

So, basically, midigod...you're against drop-shipping then?

hehe

In defense of drop-shipping...I would like to point out the following.

Would you say that Dell, L.L.Bean, Orvis, or Office Depot were big, name brand companies?

Of course you would.

Would you say that, as a big name brand company, you should be able to reasonably expect that any of THEIR advertised products are products that they would have in stock and on the shelves?

Of course you would.

But, you are just as likely to find that they DON'T have the product in stock as if you were dealing with someone who was drop-shipping their product.

The same, IMHO would be just as true with the small, personal business that "cares about their customer". You could sell out of an item, but not have this reflected in your store for a day or two, during which time someone could come along and order it. You're then stuck with sending them a "Sorry, that item is out of stock " notice.

While your argument does have valid points, it should also be noted that there are people who have had much success, and few if any problems with drop-shipping as a legitimate form of business...and no, I don;t just mean the drop-ship companies.

The key, I believe, is to do all your business with ONE drop-shipper, whereby all your products are at least only coming from one source. And find one who will put paperwork in the delivered package! ]

jMtcw

[Guest]

I'm not completely opposed to drop-shipping as long as the merchant clearly posts "shipped directly from vendor/manufacturer" in the product description, and as long as my item doesn't arrived repackaged in an old diaper box looking like it's been drop-kicked (instead of drop-shipped) all the way to my doorstep.

I definitely recommend thoroughly researching the company first, to include ordering a product and then attempting to return it. You'll be able to see how quickly the item shipped, what type of packing materials (and packing slips) were used and whether their customer service (regarding returns) meets your requirements.

[Guest pagoda]

I thought about that but didn't know if they would even bother to answer such a little person as myself. Is there ever a fee for doing this?  I'm speaking on the level of name brands that everyone is familiar with.

Thank you for the quick response and advice. 

Janet,

I thought the same way that i was just a little person and no one would want to do business with me the only the only thing that you can do is to contact the compaines and see what they require for you to purchase from them.

Some companies may say no or tell you to go through one of their distributors (one name brand told me that) but saying no is not good business for them since they would want to sell as much of their product as possible.

[Guest Festus]

I just bought a 37" LCD Flat Panel HDTV from TechDepot an OfficeDepot company and it was drop shipped from a distributor. That is a pretty big comany and even they drop ship.

You can always build a business on drop shipping and when you have some equity built up in your company you can start stocking the best selling items and move up from there.

Drop shipping gives you a chance to learn the market before jumping in with a big inventory investment.