My Turn. Pulling the trigger on my first ecommerce business!

[bclark85]

Quick update: I finally have everything in place today with a forwarder and broker to arrange for my products to be shipped over. It took a little more work than expected to find a decent forwarder and broker combo, but I think it will work out well now moving forward for future orders.

I am having a difficult time finding decent drop shippers here in the USA to fill my store with additional products. I have reached out to about 15 sources so far, only 2 of them have responded, and only 1 of them will offer prices to me that will still allow some room for mark-up on my end to make a small profit. I am considering looking into worldwidebrands or doba, but some seem to think they aren't worth it. I would really like to hear some thoughts from those of you that do use them. Is the selection and quality of drop shippers worth the money to join?

 

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[fsna.hartley]

I think drop shipping is great if you don't have the stock yet. Good luck on finding the best one!

Your updates inspire me a lot regarding my business plans.

 

[Brentnal]

Hi everywhone i want to start my ebay business to but i have totally no experience i watched some vids on youtube about another teen making money with it he has already made thousands of dollars this is the channel Aaron Jones - YouTube

So what should i do i only got 490 euro's now thats 659,98 USD
And one more question what should i now before doing this?

 

[magnificent]

So what should i do i only got 490 euro's now thats 659,98 USD
And one more question what should i now before doing this?

If you're only 16 don't you want to finish high school first and then think after graduation?
Been there done that.

If you're serious, look for items in garage sales that you think may have high value.

Good Luck

 

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[Brentnal]

i em going to finish school until i reach university or the highest form of schooling in here but i want to do this as a side job i dont want to work at a mcdonald or something for 5 dollar an hour

 

[bclark85]

I worked on my website a lot this weekend, and got quite a bit done. I designed my logo and started to pre-fill some products on there. I heard back from about 3 distributors over the weekend, and I am in the process of trying to work out the logistics with them to see if it will be feasible for me to list their products on my site. I am still reaching out to more this week as well. We are negotiating prices and if they will offer drop shipping for some of the products. I am also waiting for my order to be built by my overseas manufacturer for the actual product that I am importing so I can get it over here and start selling it. So far the most difficult part of this whole process has been sourcing suppliers to drop ship my products, but it seems like it is slowly coming together. I hope to have my site live and selling by the end of next month.

 

[McNandez]

It's been super exciting to follow your progress. Thanks for keeping us posted, and I am looking forward to seeing what happens!

 

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[bclark85]

It's been super exciting to follow your progress. Thanks for keeping us posted, and I am looking forward to seeing what happens!

Thank you, I appreciate it. I spoke with another member on here today and he provided me with some great feedback and advice on some ideas to generate some traffic to my site when I am done building it. I also spoke with another member about a week ago and he provided me with some great pointers and helped me with the shipping and customs side of things. I really appreciate the help that other members are willing to give me so I am just trying to pass my info and experience on along the way to help others.

After going through all of this, I can see how it would be easy for most to quit. Starting a business isn't easy, and if you think it is...you might as well quit now. It takes work and dedication, and you really have to focus on what you want it to look like in a year, two, or even 5, and set milestones to reach to get you there. If your goal is to just make tons of money, I can guarantee you most likely never will until you lay out a clear plan of the steps you need to take to get your business there. With that being said, I can see why many of the vet members don't really take many people serious or even bother wasting their time replying to many people's threads like these start up threads and offer advice. I can only imagine how annoying it is for them to offer great advice and literally show people how it is done, and people never actually utilize their advice or follow through (as Vigilante would say- action fakers). It must get tiring after awhile, so they just weed out the ones that they can tell probably won't follow through when things get tough. Hell, as I have been researching and reading through other start up threads, hardly any of them are any further today than they were when they started their thread 3 years ago because they quit when they hit a road block. Winners don't quit, and quitters don't win. Ok, I am done with my rant...

On a positive note, I spoke with two other manufactures today and things are looking promising. One gave me the go-ahead to start selling their products on my site, and the other said I need to get my EIN and business license to carry theirs, however after speaking with me about my niche, my site, and what I plan on doing, they want to work with me. They are based out of the East Coast and said they don't have a distributor here on the West Coast. They it would be perfect if we worked together because all of their West Coast shipments could go through me, and that they were actually just getting ready to reach out and search for a West Coast distributor. Talk about good timing. This is a higher end version of the product I am selling, and they seem to sell a lot. The numbers they gave me for my portion of the sales on my end are looking fairly promising, and I will still be importing and selling my main product so this is just a bonus and addition to my store. The only down side that I am seeing is that they seem to want me to hold a lot of their supply at one time, and get a business license and business insurance, so I am not sure how that is going to work out. I am not sure if I am ready to go as far as to getting all of these additional expenses just to bring this supplier/ manufacturer on. I did file for my EIN and will be applying for my LLC within the next couple of weeks. Things seem like they are slowly but surely coming together. The search goes on for additional suppliers/ dropshippers.

 

[machin576]

i em going to finish school until i reach university or the highest form of schooling in here but i want to do this as a side job i dont want to work at a mcdonald or something for 5 dollar an hour

Troll is weak.

Sent from my Galaxy Note ll

 

[Brentnal]

Troll is weak.

???

 

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[machin576]

What 16 year old Internet user chooses the user name 16yearoldboy? Troll IMO.

Sent from my Galaxy Note ll

 

[ubiquitous]

I am not sure if I am ready to go as far as to getting all of these additional expenses just to bring this supplier/ manufacturer on. I did file for my EIN and will be applying for my LLC within the next couple of weeks.

You should do it the other way around and apply for the EIN with the LLC.

Also, don't forget: Scared money doesn't make money.

 

[bclark85]

Been awhile since I have posted on here, so I figured I would provide some updates...

I finally got my site all built out. Took me a long time, but I had to learn how to do most of the coding myself to get it all right. I was going to hire someone to build my site for me, but to save money I decided to just go along and figure it out on my own. I am glad that I did because I actually learned a lot, and it is going to make things go way easier when I get started on my next site. Need less to say, I am pretty happy with it.

I also found a couple of other small items to import on the side to make some quick cash. They aren't generating huge returns, but I am making about $232.00 back on a $41.00 investment, so it is helping fund some of what I am putting into getting my main site and business going.

I also found an item that has a high demand and is pretty hard to find. I searched around for about a week, and couldn't find anyone offering a decent price. I ended up purchasing one of the items and shipping it over to a manufacturer overseas. They are making a mold for it and reproducing it for me for 82 cents each. I had to pay $600 to have to mold made, but these things are selling out fast when they do appear on the market for about $40.00 each. I ordered 500 of them, so I should be seeing over a 10K + profit when they are all sold. I plan on using this to fund some of the products for my main store and eliminate the drop shippers that I have in place right now. This will bring in way more profit for me once I can afford to buy it all in bulk and store some of it on my own.

I have been putting in a ton of work trying to pull this all together, but I am finally starting to see some results.

 

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[bclark85]

Back to the drawing board.

 

[JasonR]

Did you happen to get the idea of selling Ghillie Suits and Camo Netting from Biophase on this forum?

 

[bclark85]

No, my family is pretty big into hunting, so I am pretty familiar with using blinds; one of my suppliers offered ghille suits as an option and I figured they would fit the theme, but to be honest I am not familiar with them so will most likely be dropping them and leave that to a ghillie specialist like Bio. Hunters use camo covering to cover their blinds. Do you think the store would be better off without them? The main theme is the hunting blinds themselves so I am considering doing away with the ghillies and camo.

 

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[wade1mil]

but to be honest I am not familiar with them so will most likely be dropping them and leave that to a ghillie specialist like Bio.

I would hope that you would drop copying the exact same business as the person who helped you do what you're doing. I think it's cool that you've taken initiative and are working on creating a business using the techniques from people on the forum. I also think is a shady douche bag move to sell the exact same product. I would think that idea through before the support stops

 

[Russ H]

Yes, get rid of the Ghillie Suits.

It's exceedingly unethical to steal someone else's business who has personally helped you. You may not realize that's what you're doing.

You've mentioned doing "exhaustive research" to figure out your niche products, several times, but you have not outlined that process. It takes weeks, sometimes months, to define the size of a market, and the demographics. It's not easy.

A suggestion: You could very easily walk thread readers through your process on selecting these niches, and how you figured out the size of the market. You don't need to tell them what your niche is, ever. Just your process.

If you DON'T do that at this point, it just looks like you stole a successful Fastlane member's research.

I'm not saying you did steal it. I'm saying it looks that way when you don't show us your process.

-Russ H.

 

[Russ H]

16YearOldBoy-

Don't let the bluster of someone w/a Galaxy Note II trim your sails. I was in your shoes once, and I would have been too chicken to give myself the handle you chose.

I applaud your honesty, and encourage your participation on these forums.

machin576, I'm not a Mod on these forums anymore. But if I was, I'd gently kick you in the nutz right now. Be nice. If you think flaming someone this young is fun, or important, I'd like you to start your own thread giving your reasoning. You might be surprised at the comments you get from the vets.

-Russ H (a 51 year old man, with a Galaxy Note II )

 

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[bclark85]

Point taken. Site is gone. Thanks for the feedback everyone.

 

[AllenCrawley]

Do you think the store would be better off without them?

I think you would be better off without them.

 

[Vigilante]

Back to the drawing board.

Down for Maintenance

This store is currently unavailable due to maintenance. It should be available again shortly.

We apologize for any inconvenience caused.

 

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[DeletedUser2]

Site is back up.

so....

whats the plan?
you going to take it down? or are you going to piss in a mentors cornflakes?




Z

 

[Vigilante]

Digital Millennium Copyright Act - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[ubiquitous]

Digital Millennium Copyright Act - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Your avatar is pretty ironic in this situation even though this has NOTHING to do with DMCA unless someone copies privately owned content and distributes it without express consent.

The OP is ATTEMPTING to RETAIL one of the same product categories? and? It's not like it's that hard to go onto Alibaba source Ghillie suits and list them on Amazon, eBay, Google Merchant whatever, and throw up a bigcommerce website. (actually, it could be done BETTER within days...)

 

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[Vigilante]

unless someone copies privately owned content and distributes it without express consent.

this

 

[bclark85]

As I stated before, I am in NO WAY attempting to take business from Bio. My site is centered around hunting blinds and camo netting, ghillie suits are only a side option for my customers. Bio has a far larger selection of ghillie suits than I do, and I in no way intend to even compete with him on that. The only reason I even have them is because one of my suppliers said that they offered a few and said I can list them if I would like. As you know, they go right in line with hunting and concealment just as camo netting does. Hunters use the stuff together all the time. So because Bio specializes in something I am not allowed to offer it as a side option now? My site looks nothing like his do, and I don't even advertise for them with my google adsense, backlinks, or on any ghillie forum what so ever....so I will never pull up when someone searches for a ghillie suit, it is just an option for my customers. Also, a few of the suits that I offer, he doesn't. Does that mean I shouldn't be able to offer them to my customers because it is still a ghillie suit? He knows his stuff and has been very helpful and inspiring, as has vigilante.

My purpose of being a part of this forum was to learn and try to make a living in a different manner than I currently am. I have two kids that rely on me, so making a living on my own terms is my goal. I posted my site up on here for everyone to see an review and give me some feed back, and I appreciate all of the feed back I have gotten so far. If I was trying to "steal" someone else's business intentionally, I certainly wouldn't have posted it up on here for you all to see and provide feed back on, or email it to Bio directly to critique for me. But to say that I have to take my site down because someone else sells the same product is BS in my opinion. Once again, my entire store is not ghillie suits. As a matter of fact, I haven't even sold 1 yet even though they are one of the cheapest items on there. Bio emailed me and said that he at one time sold hunting blinds, but stopped because they were too big, bulky, and pricey to ship.....funny thing is I have sold quite a few of them so far with little SEO work, so I must be doing something right. There is obviously a need in that market and I am filling it He knows everything there is about ghillie suits and I will never be able to nor want to compete with him for that....they are just an option for my customers. Some of you may not agree with this, and that is fair enough. Everyone has an opinion and is entitled to it. I have worked hard on this site even though it isn't much compared to most of you experienced vets, but to me it is a starting point and something I am proud of. I am not going to just trash the site.

 

[Vigilante]

This will be the last post that I read of yours. Please don't draw any inspiration from me. Please stop mentioning me in your posts.

Because of you, the thread that you referenced written by me is no longer available for other people to learn from. You obviously misinterpreted the spirit of the reason I authored that information. After 60,000 views to that thread, you're the first person to ever take something from the forum as long as I have been here and attempt to use it against the person who authored it for your own gain to their detriment. He offered you help both on and off the forum. You copied his business. You then asked him to check it out and tell you what he thought?

You may be OK with it. I'm not.

What comes around goes around. Life is too short for this type of shit.

 

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[Amail]

You went into direct competition with a member who has laid out his entire operation for you to learn from. Who gives a shit if it isn't your "main offering".

You copied his shipping and returns page verbatim. Well done. Hope that didn't take too much time.

You have displayed one of the biggest betrayals of trust I've had the misfortune to see.

And now you come back trying to defend your actions. This is exactly what people like Biophase, Vigilante, DavidofMN, and a host of others (myself included) are afraid of when laying out our process. That someone like you will take that freely given information and act on it in bad faith.

 

[AllenCrawley]

1. No matter how you spin it, you are now a direct competitor. I'm sure Bio trusted that you would not sell items in the niche he basically owns. Blatant betrayal of trust here.

2. Your site may not look like his but you have indeed directly copy and pasted several of his pages into your own. Which is why Vig posted the Digital Millenium Copyright Act link.

3. You, and those in your defense, are missing the big picture. We all lose when people do what you have done. Valued members that share their wealth of knowledge and experience will stop doing so when people become copycat competitors. Vig has already removed his epic thread.

4. No one suggested you take down the site. We suggested you remove the products that are in direct competition with the one who mentored you.

As I stated before, I am in NO WAY attempting to take business from Bio. My site is centered around hunting blinds and camo netting, ghillie suits are only a side option for my customers. Bio has a far larger selection of ghillie suits than I do, and I in no way intend to even compete with him on that. The only reason I even have them is because one of my suppliers said that they offered a few and said I can list them if I would like. As you know, they go right in line with hunting and concealment just as camo netting does. Hunters use the stuff together all the time. So because Bio specializes in something I am not allowed to offer it as a side option now? My site looks nothing like his do, and I don't even advertise for them with my google adsense, backlinks, or on any ghillie forum what so ever....so I will never pull up when someone searches for a ghillie suit, it is just an option for my customers. Also, a few of the suits that I offer, he doesn't. Does that mean I shouldn't be able to offer them to my customers because it is still a ghillie suit? He knows his stuff and has been very helpful and inspiring, as has vigilante.

My purpose of being a part of this forum was to learn and try to make a living in a different manner than I currently am. I have two kids that rely on me, so making a living on my own terms is my goal. I posted my site up on here for everyone to see an review and give me some feed back, and I appreciate all of the feed back I have gotten so far. If I was trying to "steal" someone else's business intentionally, I certainly wouldn't have posted it up on here for you all to see and provide feed back on, or email it to Bio directly to critique for me. But to say that I have to take my site down because someone else sells the same product is BS in my opinion. Once again, my entire store is not ghillie suits. As a matter of fact, I haven't even sold 1 yet even though they are one of the cheapest items on there. Bio emailed me and said that he at one time sold hunting blinds, but stopped because they were too big, bulky, and pricey to ship.....funny thing is I have sold quite a few of them so far with little SEO work, so I must be doing something right. There is obviously a need in that market and I am filling it He knows everything there is about ghillie suits and I will never be able to nor want to compete with him for that....they are just an option for my customers. Some of you may not agree with this, and that is fair enough. Everyone has an opinion and is entitled to it. I have worked hard on this site even though it isn't much compared to most of you experienced vets, but to me it is a starting point and something I am proud of. I am not going to just trash the site.