Blake's Business Diary

[BlakeIC]

Intro

I decided I might as well start a progress thread now even IF I do possibly fail

"My" (will explain below) product helps reduce a specific problem that millions of people have that causes
them physical insecurity.

I am a consumer of my product, so I do know the consumer base much better than someone who doesn't suffer from what many people do.

What I am doing differently right now
So considering I don't have the most money, instead of trying to find manufactures with too high MOQ

I decided this, why don't I buy the components I need from other companies first and throw together 5 prototype units?

Once I have all the components on hand, I will sell the 5 protoypes. If I can sell all the prototypes in a decent time span

I will pull the trigger, get myself a JOB so then I have a stable income to start building my brand
and make the bulk orders I will need so that my margins don't get entirely sucked into the negatives
---------------------------------

That is it for now, i am off to the gym

 

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[BlakeIC]

All the of the components ares till being shipped

So still no updates thus far

Although a minor set back in terms of capital as I now have to buy new/used tires for my car as mine are now completely bald and I ended up popping one

of them today anyways.

Oh well, have to keep moving forward and make due with what I got

 

[BlakeIC]

Received everything between today and yesterday which makes me happy

As all of the tracking numbers were showing that all of the items would arrive between wednesday-thursday of next week

I also applied at my local safeway which is about 1 mile from me & around 5 minutes away from the gym

I received a call today and was able to schedule an interview for monday at 1pm, i applied for the job because I believe I might need more money for advertising/getting the ball rolling. So when I do run out of capital I have a job that I can use to put money into it continuously

After I am home from the gym, i have to make a 4 hour round trip to get my social security card, so no time to put together prototypes

Putting together the prototypes will take at least 10 hours if I work non stop, downside is I can only put these together during the day when everyone is awake because I will have to make a quite a bit of sound to make these


edit: I did not realize this but I also need to get a very small funnel for this too, hopefully I can find one in stores instead of waiting another week because of shipping time

 

[BlakeIC]

Was able to make my own funnel very easily

Problem is making these prototypes is going to be a much bigger pain in the a$$ than I expected

Looks like I will have to buy more of everything that I currently have, as I will have way more prototypes that will fail

I am going to take a look around and see if I can find some co packer of specific sorts to possibly automate this process for me

 

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[BlakeIC]

Doing what I did above^ was not going to work, there would have been too much trial and error I would have been wasting too much money too quick

Capital is close to running dry, i am still searching for a part time job that can fit my hours of availability

At this point, i KNOW my product fulfills a need/ That is no longer of a worry for me

To conclude, the plans for packaging the items myself is scrapped. I will go ahead and source from manufacturer -> co packer or just straight from manufacturer

In the mean time I will continue to search for a job to help me jump start the business

 

[BlakeIC]

@MJ DeMarco could you possibly rename this thread to "Blake's Business Diary"

If possible, i thank you in advance

 

[IceCreamAction]

Update?

 

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[BlakeIC]

Update?

I have just recently got a part time job and they flipped the hours on me and tried to make me go full-time which I could not do

I am back to looking for another job for funding

Although I am building a credit score for myself so I can purchase a triplex with an FHA loan in the future

edit: With my current arrangements it also makes it difficult to find a job that won't require a 1 hour commute minimum

If any of the forum members have lived in King County, WA they would know what traffic situations I am talking about

edit: I am ashamed of myself to say I haven't moved forward much either

 

[BlakeIC]

MOQs MOQs MOQs!
That is my road block

I was able to find a new job very quickly

I make only $12/hr as a dishwasher at high end restaurant/golf course

My hours vary between 24-35 hours a week so I make a little below or over $1k a month

The only expenses I have so far is gas ($200-$250 a month) and I also plan to save 10% of my income

In the mean time I have been trying to get the sourcing arranged for my product but I cannot get past the barrier of MOQ's in the ranges of $5000+


That is where I am at right now, i already know exactly what I am going to do when I have the product, now i just need to get it in my hands

 

[ExaltedLife]

Tell your supplier you need samples for your various franchisee store owners to test in order to confirm a large order for the MOQ price, and you expect MOQ price on the small samples. Also consider telling them you are considering various suppliers as you will be making many large purchases in the future. Pretend to be the assistant of the owner of the business so you aren't final authority, so if they have a problem with that, tell them you need more time to 'check with your boss'. That will buy you time and also give you negotiation power.

Might work. My name is Blake too. Cheers.

 

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[BlakeIC]

Little update

I have been doing more negotiations with one of the manufactures who quoted me of an MOQ of $5000+

There is a chance I might be able to get a sample order of 50 units which might cost around $500

If it does come out to $500 (+-$75) I will instead buy 100 units for a sample (So I have more that I can sell/get a ROI on)

As of right now my work hours have changed, apparently I will be working 40 hours a week instead of 24-32 like I was originally told

Getting this job has been a kick in the mouth for me, since I am working 40 hours a week I have 0 time during my workdays to actually stop and relax besides right now (for only 15 minutes).

Here is my day

1) Wake up and go to community college (fulltime/all paid for free)
2) Immediately after I go to the gym
3) After the gym, right away I start making all of my food for the day (I track my calories/am cutting weight) and also clean my clothes
4) Just as I finish that I have 10-15 minutes to spare before I have to leave for work
5) I get to work and get off at 11pm, I don't get home till 11:30pm. To which then I have to shower and go to bed
6) Repeat


I have a love/hate relationship with this right now. I am happy that it made me realize I need to get shit done so I can have control
of my life. I'll be honest, i almost thought about buying a sportsbike instead with my money, which would just have prolonged me having to work like this and never have time to do anything to get myself out of the rat race.


Oh well, I cannot afford to make mistakes and over/spend money where I should not

Well it's 2:32pm I now have to head to work till 11pm

 

[ExaltedLife]

Here is my day

1) Wake up and go to community college (fulltime/all paid for free)

What are you taking at community college?

 

[BlakeIC]

What are you taking at community college?

Business administration

 

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[BlakeIC]

Considering it will be some time before I can work on my original brand again

I have decided I will play my cards with amazon and manufacture lower MOQ products through US manufacturers.

I have placed a sample order for a product I will package myself

Costs so far
Packaging: $31.50
Product: $32.30
Shipping: $31.43

Total: $95.23

Units producible: 50

Once I have verified I can sell my product, I will be able to make the bulk orders necessary to drive down my cost per unit around 40%-60%

my product is sold between the $20-$30 range. I will add more value to my product for my customers to leverage myself to a higher justifiable price.

I will be spending $50 for a residential proxy to sell on amazon too (monthly)

EDIT:

The reason for a residential proxy is because all of my general info in the past was black listed from AZ seller.

I have everything in place at this point to resume selling on AZ again, which will require a residential proxy vs socks proxy. Reason being is a socks proxy can be traced back to a data center where as to my current knowledge a residential cannot.

EDIT2: I will up date this thread with further actions I plan to take once I have received the shipment

 

[BlakeIC]

Well it has been 2-3 weeks since I have received the shipment

Initial shipment had a few things incorrect (my fault) so i had to ship it back and wait again. While shipping it back UPS did an incorrect shipping adjustment on my package charging me more money than they should have, so dealing with that right now.

I have already got the correct items and first 50 units ready to go. The other 50 units should be finished by this Friday at the latest.

I have also hired a label designer, label design is entirely finished.

I also had a logo re-design, all went well. One never delivered the product, other designer was copying others designs. 3rd designer finally delivered and had 0 issues.

I have now received label samples from a local manufacturer and now I am going out and getting opinions on the label color type.

Here are the color type options I have received

Photos are not coming out clear possibly because I somehow shattered the glass on my camera end

Tomorrow I will have decided on the label and will make my order for the labels. Once I have received the labels I will be ready to start selling the product.

Above I mentioned this product would be separate from my original brand, but I have decided to actually make it apart of it.

I mentioned I think it was 2-3 weeks ago I would have this done within a 1 week. I just want to say I way over shot that estimate. The process of this took much longer than I expected (which really was not a problem).

 

[Azure]

What did you do to get banned from Amazon ?

 

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[BlakeIC]

What did you do to get banned from Amazon ?

I didn't do anything. I got hit with a the ban because someone else in my family was previously banned.

What they did? Sold Netflix gift cards years go on amazon and never appealed their ban

 

[BlakeIC]

Picked up my labels today!

As soon as I got home I hand labeled all 100 units.

I will have my product available online immediately Saturday

I will have to wait till then because I do not have a camera with decent quality




Ahh I am so excited so to get this out there finally/even just getting something out there. Getting this product ready for market took me much longer than I expected

In the meantime I will have a 401 re-direct on my website to my amazon listing

I already have a few free product shoutouts from a few people I know who have high social followings

Anyways, will up date next friday

 

[stealth09]

Good work. Any sales yet?

 

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[BlakeIC]

Good work. Any sales yet?

Outside of family/friends no

I took product photos today, took me wayyyyyyy longer than I expected, ran into issues witht he lighting for amazon's guidelines

I also took photos for Etsy too

I am as of right now importing all the photos I took today and will be touching them up.

Once that is completed, i am going to write a bit of my products copy and will make it available online tomorrow evening instead.

In the short mean time, i need to figure an optimal shipping setup.

 

[BlakeIC]

Good work. Any sales yet?

Thank you

 

[kkompoti]

you must feel great with your progress.
Nice work so far.
Now, you are going to strart.
when you sell your product to the first (out of friends and family) costumer, you will feel an explosion of emotions . From fear for what will happen next, to bliss for entering the world of producers.
then you must put even more work to it to multiply your sales.
this is your process from now on.
after a lot of sales keep an open eye and you will understand what you are doing wrong and what right. fix the wrongs and you will get more sales.
and then you scale.

Good Luck!(fastlane translation: Put your a$$ down and work as much as you can now!)

 

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[BlakeIC]

you must feel great with your progress.
Nice work so far.
Now, you are going to strart.
when you sell your product to the first (out of friends and family) costumer, you will feel an explosion of emotions . From fear for what will happen next, to bliss for entering the world of producers.
then you must put even more work to it to multiply your sales.
this is your process from now on.
after a lot of sales keep an open eye and you will understand what you are doing wrong and what right. fix the wrongs and you will get more sales.
and then you scale.

Good Luck!(fastlane translation: Put your a$$ down and work as much as you can now!)

Thank you for the encouraging words, i really do appreciate it.

 

[BlakeIC]

Little update

Looks like I have a major set back

For me to even begin to sell on Amazon I NEED a residential proxy (regular proxy would not work because they are traced back to data centers)

The original provider I had plan to go with jacked their prices from $50 a month for a state specific proxy to $1000 a month

I can find services that offer residential proxies by country but only 1 service that does by state



I contacted their support which is very slow to see why it is now $1000 a month instead of the original $50 a month


A residential proxy is my only option until I can afford to move out of my dads place because the prior banned Amazon account is linked their

So if they stick to their guns of $1000 a month, at this point, Amazon will be a no go

 

[kkompoti]

why does it have to be amazon?
ebay?etsy?even craiglist????
i will give you some tough love here and say that this problem you have that you need a proxy for is just not a problem.
go on facebook ads and google ads and make one simple really really simple site to promote your product.
don't stop and waist time with that issue.also send an email to amazon explaining your situation and wait. if they do not answer send them again and then call them.fix it!
dont go round and round one specific problem. this does show that you procrastinate a bit.
change that.NOW!
for your own good.

 

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[BlakeIC]

why does it have to be amazon?
ebay?etsy?even craiglist????
i will give you some tough love here and say that this problem you have that you need a proxy for is just not a problem.
go on facebook ads and google ads and make one simple really really simple site to promote your product.
don't stop and waist time with that issue.also send an email to amazon explaining your situation and wait. if they do not answer send them again and then call them.fix it!
dont go round and round one specific problem. this does show that you procrastinate a bit.
change that.NOW!
for your own good.

Traffic already there, i felt it would help establish the brand.

I am just about on Etsy (trying to setup LLC with etsy and not my personal as I don't want the income flowing through me), i do not want to launch my brand on eBay considering it is more of website for reselling and generic products.

In the mean time though, i will finish the final touches to my website (and setup FB ads along with the google) on the possibility it does not work out.

edit: Forgot to mention, in the last few minutes after a ton of searching I found a residential proxy provider for my state (different one). I am in communication now through email as I have to create a custom order

 

[BlakeIC]

Small update, i am on Etsy. I have started paid advertising within the last 5 minutes

I am on Amazon too now, (well not listed). My category is gated (thankfully). So I need to get new invoices with my up to date business information, so I am awaiting the invoices so I can become un-gated.

I will have my website up, near completion (or satiation) within the week so I can also set my self up with AZ brand registry

I checked out the platform squarespace, but decided against it because of the following
- No custom SSL (especially in the inability to use HTTPS with your OWN domain, they required you used domain.sqaurespace.com to get HTTPS)
- Less control
- Limited themes/customization for commerce

I also ordered boxes to that fit perfectly for my product, so that I can reduce my shipping costs instead of always using USPS priority mail. I ordered from Uline at 20 cents a box, i would have chose staples but it was either spend $2 less for staples and wait till next friday to get them, or pay $2 more and get the boxes the next day of the order.

@MJ DeMarco could you move this to the inside? If anything of value comes out of this, I prefer it to be on the inside so it makes an INSIDERS sub worth that much more.
- Thank you in advance