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You’re not selling wholesale?

Scot

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To commemorate my 50th thread on the Fastlane Forum, I wanted to share a topic that is very core to my business.

It’s a simple concept.

If you sell on Amazon, but not wholesale to other retailers, you’re throwing away millions of dollars.

Let’s look at this.

98FFE036-908F-4486-9F2C-37DADA0B9A8E.jpeg

On this pallet is 900 units. This sale took about an hour worth of work. To date, I’ve sold 800 units on Amazon.

Let that sink in for a minute. In about 2 weeks time, with about an hour of actual work, and 37 short emails back and forth, I sold more unit than I did on amazon over 3 months time.

We talk about how Amazon is killing Brick & Mortar, but that’s simply not true. Wal-Mart, Target, Auto parts stores, grocery stores, clothing stores, and many others are not going anywhere anytime soon. And hundreds of millions of people shop at them daily.

Would you rather sell on 1 Amazon site or 5,000 Walmart stores?

Wholesale is the Scale part of the equation and if you’re not using that multiplier, you’re missing out.

Lastly, amazon businesses for sale on business broker websites are a dime a dozen. And multiples aren’t all that healthy. But one thing that does improve a multiple and more money on an exit, is a wholesale channel to your business.


Evaluate how your products can be sold to B&M. If you think your product is too generic to be sold in a store, it’s probably too generic to be sold on Amazon. Think of who your customer is, then think of where they shop. Those stores are your customer too.

If this thread shows enough interest, I’ll dig in deep to how to enter wholesale, get customers, get distribution.

Pick up the phone and start dialing.
 
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Scot

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Getting into B&M

As mentioned above getting into a store isn’t as difficult as it sounds. Business shows like shark Tank want you to believe that the process involves getting a meeting with a corporate buyer, in a large board room, and month of negotiations and contracts.

But reality couldn’t be further from that.

The first step is to find out what stores your product could be sold in. for some products that may be difficult. For others, like mine, the obvious answer is grocery stores. However even when you know who your customer is, not every single grocery store chain is your target customer. For example, Save a Lot is a lower Teir store which wouldn’t be a fit and Whole Foods is also too strict on their guidelines for my product.

That does not mean that you should only be targeting large corporate chains. I use the above meerly as an example. A friend of mine’s product is geared towards people who own guns, so his obvious target customer (pun intended) is gun store owners.

There are pros and cons to targeting independent retailers.

Pro:
  • Easy to talk to the decision maker
  • Flexible terms
  • Much easier to close the sale
  • Personalized attention
Con:
  • Distribution is a nightmare
  • Terms can be different for each store you get
  • Managing all the different accounts is a full time job


@amp0193 mentioned the best way to get started above. A lot of what I learned, was from him. So I give him a lot of credit for the next part of this post.

Once you’ve narrowed down who your customer is, you need to start finding out who they actually are. There are several ways to do this.

  1. Find a scraper program and have it search google map listings for certain keywords. For example “auto parts store in California” will scrape google and give you a list of all maps locations that resemble an auto parts store in California. Some software programs can even give you publicly listed emails addresses and phone numbers.
  2. Hire a VA to do the same thing a scraper would. This can be helpful when the email addresses aren’t so easily found. For my list, I had about 3 steps per store to get the email address. It was simple enough, but time consuming. So I paid a VA $10 for a list of 200 contacts.
  3. Buy a list. This is simple. Find a list buying service, and buy and appropriate list.
  4. Follow your competitors. Does your main competitor have a “find us in store” tab? Well, mine did. Easy as just finding the stores they’re in and calling the stores. You already know they’re interested in your product category, so it’s low hanging fruit.
The next step is two parts. Email and call. You can choose which order to do them, but I’ll tell you how I used them.

If you are dealing with a larger store chain, I found the email was the best. Again, @amp0193 taught me this one. A simple short email is the best.

Subject: Appropriate Person?

Hello,

Are you the person who makes buying decisions for the widget category? I am Scot, owner of Acme Co widgets and was inquiring about the widget section at your stores. If you’re not the correct person, could you please forward me to the correct person? Thank you!​
This is a great way to find the category manager or buyer for your product. This was how I found the buyer at Kroger, a 2,500 store chain. It only took about 5 emails before I had a call scheduled.

For smaller store locations, The best option is to simply call. People don’t realize this, but even store chain managers have the ability to make buying decisions for their stores. Call as many stores per day as you can and eventually you will develop a rudimentary script to follow. Get a simple CRM like Hubspot to track the stores you’ve called to keep notes and make follow ups.

Always close. If they seem even barely interested, ask them if they’d like to try a few units in their store. I’ve had customers that were on the fence answer yes to this.

- - -

More to follow, I’ll cover margins next.
 

Tom.V

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Way to go @Scot - moving product like it's going out of style!

Don't forget, people looking to buy in bulk often start their searching journey on Google or Bing. Targeted landing pages focused on wholesale or bulk <insert your product(s) here> with simple contact forms and contact info can be an easy way to accelerate this channel and have a net in place so they can come to you when you aren't dialing or sending emails. ;)
 

amp0193

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Allow me let you in on a little secret...

The magic of wholesale is in the follow-ups.

Are you organized enough to consistently follow up until you get the results you want?

*hint* It's not that they don't want to talk to you... store owners/buyers are extremely busy. Those who can follow-up, and stay on the buyer's radar, will win.

Here's the one tool that's taken my follow up game to the next level: Streak for Gmail.

No extra CRM to manage. No separate tool or website that I have to enter data into. I'm literally in Gmail every day already.

Step 1: Send an email.
Step 2: Use the streak sidebar to set a follow up date.
Step 3: Streak reminds you to send them an email on that date.

So simple... and it's the only CRM that I've been able to stay 100% on top of.

I don't remember what it cost, but it has already made me thousands of dollars in sales in the 6 weeks or so that I've used it.

It's really a no-brainer. Even if you aren't doing wholesale.


p.s. Streak support told me integration into the gmail phone app is coming soon. That will take Streak from a 10/10 to a 12/10.
 

amp0193

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This thread is pure gold.

I have a product in the Beauty category (on Amazon) and every once in a while Beauty salons contact me as they want to sell my product in their place.
I also got an email from a pretty big e-tailer based in the UK, but I had to turn down the offers since I couldn't find a good source to learn this process from.

I would highly appreciate if anyone could refer me to a consultant/Online course/Youtube vids/ ANY source that might help me learn this process further.
Thanks :)

Dude, turning down business instead of just figuring it out? Really?

I got into wholesale when I was invited to a private trade show for franchise owners for a big chain. I had 3 weeks to learn the entire wholesale process and tradeshow booth design. You think I turned it down? No, I just figured it out, and 3 weeks later I had 7 wholesale accounts.

Beauty - Sell to stores/dealers at half of retail. Make em pay credit card up front. If it's a large store or chain, offer them 30-day payment terms. Define a minimum order, like $150 worth of product, for example. If $150 is the minimum, then offer free shipping (or free product) on orders of $300.

That's literally all you need to know.

Having some sort of cardboard display is helpful, but not necessary to get started.

Making a fancy "sell sheet" with all of the above info can be helpful for reaching out to cold contacts, and makes you look more professional, but again, not necessary to get started.
 
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amp0193

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-Where do I ship it from?

Doesn't matter.

How do I take care of the shipping? Do I simply use UPS?

Doesn't matter

What do I do with returns?

Accept and refund.

Do I change the price depending on the location of the buyer?

No.

Payment method is a bit tricky since I'm not a US citizen

Figure it out. Charge them through Shopify. However.

How do I prevent the buyers from selling the item on Amazon?

Only sell wholesale to shops with a physical presence. *Maybe* to a large online shop. Tell them no Amazon or other marketplaces. Drop them as an account if they violate this.

Since English is not my native language, it's difficult making the sale via phone

So do email. My last business I had 120 stores, and 90% of them I never spoke to on the phone.

I do make progress but I feel it's too slow. That's why I'm looking for a good source to learn from

You're in the right place ;)
 

amp0193

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It's not easy to get into retailers (as a retailer, I reject about 90% of the products I'm pitched to) and it will complicate your supply chain. But, as Scot said above, it is a huge advantage both while you're in the business and when you decide to exit.

Sure it is!

You just need a big enough list and a good product.

If you're trying to sell fidget spinners to hobby lobby's within 5 miles of your house, than good luck.


If your product is like @Scot's, it sells itself once you make the phone call...


yes, complicates supply chain I suppose. More importantly though, it complicates cash flow. Too much wholesale, too early on, can be a cash-killer for sure.

But it goes back to having a good enough product.

If you have a good product, that no one else is selling.... you set the terms.


Wholesale is the long-term play. You take the smaller profits in the short-term, in exchange for building a sellable business that's worth millions later.


FWIW, do both. Having a B2C base gives you street cred and ammunition to approach retailers with.
 

amp0193

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There are pros and cons to targeting independent retailers.

Pro:
  • Easy to talk to the decision maker
  • Flexible terms
  • Much easier to close the sale
  • Personalized attention
Con:
  • Distribution is a nightmare
  • Terms can be different for each store you get
  • Managing all the different accounts is a full time job

80/20 rule.

80% of your sales will come from 20% of your stores.

Not every account is worth it. If they never re-order without 8 follow ups, and it's always the minimum possible order. Might be time to let them go.

Or get a sales rep or two to manage all the peripheral accounts like this to free up your time.

You don't want to be tied to *only* Kroger. That's a big lack of C right there.
 

Scot

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Getting new customers through email lists

I'm going to lay out my current strategy to build up my customers through an email campaign. This current strategy is untested, as I am starting it in 2 days. Here's what I have done and will be doing with it.

The goal:
To get a larger footprint into independent stores, i.e. "mom and pop" type stores.

The method:
Build list by using a google maps scraper, targeting keyword business types. Build automated email campaign to create leads.

The hypothesis:
I'm going after low hanging fruit. I am taking a regional approach, targeting my own state and the two closes states. If I can build an automated funnel, I can hopefully get a 5-10 new customers out of this with relatively little work.

The follow through:
Add customers into a CRM, probably Hubspot. This will allow me to follow up on orders, set reminders for reorders and new stock.

About 70% of my list that I've built does not have email addresses attached to the business listings. I will sort these out and target the most likely business types to stock my product and start a phone call campaign. Buying customers will be added to the CRM flow. If I can get a contact email, they will be added to a separate automated funnel which will try to convert warm leads.


To build the email list I used BotSol from botsol.com However, I imagine most google maps scrapers will do the trick. The main goal for mine is to obtain email addresses, so you'll want a scraper that specifically targets emails addresses. This is important, because google maps does not list this. Your scraper needs to actually go to the website to pull the email.

A trick I do is to search key term, in my case "natural food stores" and do it by area. I googled "list of cities in Florida by population" and just went down the list. "Natural food stores near Jacksonville, natural food stores near Miami, natural food stores near Tampa, etc etc" Combine the whole list into one master one.

Now its time to clean up your list. First, add filters to your headers. The first tab I went to was business category. You'll find a lot of random store categories that don't match yours at all. For example, google pulled a lot of pet food stores, beauty salons, pharmacies, gyms. I delete all those entries. Next, for the sake of this campaign, targeting big box stores was not the goal. So, I sorted out store names. Delete all the big stores, Walmart, CVS, Kroger, Riteaid, Wholefoods, etc etc.

After that, do conditional formatting. You'll want to highlight duplicate entries in the store names tab. This way, if say "Tom's Natural Foods" has 5 locations in 3 different cities, it will highlight all 5. You can sort out by cell highlighted color. Remove duplicates. For the purposes of this list, you are emailing the stores, so unless each store has an individual email address, delete duplicates.

Next, sort A-Z by email address. This will bring all the listings with an email address to the top of the list. I went through and found listings with multiple emails. I would create a duplicate listing for each individual email. The thinking behind this is, if it lists bob@bobsfoodmart.com, susie@bobsfootmart.com, tim@bobsfoodmart.com I don't know who the best contact is, so why not email all three? Sorting them into individual listings will make it easier to add to your email platform later.

After this, I sift through the listings with emails to make sure everything looks kosher. I found about 10-15 listings I'd missed that just didn't fit my target, i.e. delis, restaurant, juice bars.


I'm using MailCheat(Chimp) for my emails. Its free and simple. My campaign flow looks like this.

First email:
Basic email, 3 lines, plain text. "Hey, is this the correct cantact for the person who makes buying decisions for your store? I'm Scot, owner of BLAH BLAH Co. If not, can you please forward me to that person"

Second email condition : If contact did not open email 1

Follow up, plain text, a little longer. Ask similar question, change up the subject, add a little more info about your business/product. Keep is less than 2 paragraphs.

Third email condition : Follow up 3 days

Start marketing, add product info. Add graphics. Make this a sales piece, get creative.

Fourth email condition : Send 2 days later

Get crazy. Lost of images, marketing, sell sheet. If they're not going to respond to you, last ditch effort to wow them.


That's it for now. I've got 200 emails between Florida and Georgia I'm going to plug into this system on Monday. We'll see how it goes.
 

Scot

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The game of margins

If you’re selling on amazon and following conventional wisdom on pricing, good news is you should be fine with margins for wholesale.

You have two tiers of pricing you need to take into account when selling wholesale.
  • Wholesale to retail
  • Wholesale to distributor

The biggest thing you need to find out before you start pricing out your products and selling is what expected margins are for all parties involved. Retail stores will expect a certain range of margin for them to take on the risk of selling your product. Distributors have overheard costs of shipping, delivery, and order taking and will also expect a healthy margin.

Margins will always vary by industry. For example, 20-30% margin is completely reasonable in the grocery category. But for other categories, may want we high as a 100% markup. Distributor will typically operate in the 20-30% range as well, but may vary on the difficulty of product to distribute ie refrigerated items or large/bulky.


Here’s an example of Distributor margins.

Widget A has an MSRP of $14.99

Store wants a 35% margin - $9.74

Distributor wants 30% - $6.81

So, you need to have your landed cost per unit below $6.81 to break even. $3.04 gives you 50% margin.

You may be thinking, if distributors take so much of my money, I’ll just ship direct. That may be the case in some scenarios but here are sone reasons why that may not work.

  • Store chain requires a distributor delivery or won’t order direct from you.
  • Shipping costs are prohibitive.
  • Your target customer are independent retailers, managing dekover to 100’s of unconnected stores is a logistics nightmare.
The second bullet point is why I prefer distributors. My product consists of heavy glass bottles. Shipping a fragile 15lb box is expensive. Per case, typically $12-15. If I can manage to sell 4 cases, I can get it to around $10/case. That destroys my margin. Because, your retailer is not going to pay shipping on top of that. You can certainly work shipping cost into the price you give them, but they better still get their margin they want. For my product it’s cheaper to send a pallet via LTL and give them 30% margin to deliver on their trucks.

So, in summary, depending on the logistics of your product, the net profit may be very close.

This is why it’s very important to get your product at the lowest price prossible. Wholesale eats your margins up. But, you make up for that through sheer scale.
 
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MidwestLandlord

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  • Store chain requires a distributor delivery or won’t order direct from you.
Mind if I chime in @Scot ?

Grocery stores get product 3 different ways.

1) From their own DC. This is especially true of larger chains
2) DSD distribution. This is where a local distributor delivers direct. Think Coke/Pepsi/Bread
3) Via common carrier or FTL/LTL

Looking at this from a retailers point of view, why would they insist on a distributor?

1) Easier reclamation.

If a product doesn't turn, expires, or is defective...who takes care of that? With a distributor it is easier for retailers to manage reclamation of those items, as a distributor will normally just "take it back", which quickly free's up valuable space at the retail location.

With a brand using option 3, delivery via common carrier, reclamation becomes much more difficult. This is where a brand owner must give instruction for disposal or returns under the retailers reclamation process, and will have to pay a per unit fee.

2) DC and backroom storage

With a distributor (especially a DSD), the distributor acts as backroom storage for the chain, and they do not have to incur the expense of storing items (product doesn't sell from the backroom!)

They also save the expense of their own FTL's shipping those items from DC to retail location.

3) Cost of inventory on hand

A distributor also allows retailers to reduce the amount of money they have with inventory on hand. Keep in mind a typical large grocery store will do $100,000 + per day in sales. If they have a 30 day turn on hand (30 days of stock), that is $3m per location.

4) It makes operations easier.

Ever see a fedex truck pull up to the dock of a grocery store and unload the entire thing for brands delivered via common carrier? I've seen it dozens of times now, and wow, what a mess, my gosh.

Opening boxes, disposing of boxes, disposing of packing materials, breakages, labor to do all of that. Yuck.

5) Reduced vendor count

A distributor that carries 100 brands is ONE entry into their back office system. That's ONE check the book keepers have to mail. That's ONE entity to hold accountable and manage.

Now imagine all 100 of those brands were individual accounts?

There's other reasons, but those are the main ones.
 

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Great thread!

Currently awaiting payment for a near $8000 deal from a very big American company. I must say this happened quite coincidental.

I setup a website for my ecom brand and all of the sudden got their inquiry. They found my brand on Amazon and contacted me directly for +500 pcs of one of my products.

I could give them a much better price than the products I sell on Amazon and with still about 50% margin.

Now I'll add a "wholesale form" on my website and will definitely focus on more deals like that.

Here's one thing I learned though with similar transactions. You don't have to discount as steeply as you may think you do. Sometimes, they end up buying near full retail. If it is the government, ZERO discounts as they don't care what they pay. Most wholesale orders we'll only discount 10%-20% below regular retail.

That's not the same type of wholesale business @Scot set out to post about in this thread. Traditional retailers require traditional margin.

However, your job is to minimize discounts where ever possible. You might be surprised to find a customer that wants 500 will be happy with ANY discount you give them, because they almost paid RETAIL for it before they called you.

Expect more - get more.
 

Scot

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If I am selling to a distributor, do I have to worry about shipping cost?

Based on your example distributor needs a 30 percent margin when they sell to retailers. Which means that I will need to sell for roughly a 55% discount. If my MSRP price is $29.99, I will need to sell for $13.50. This will work for me if the $13.50 does not include shipping.

How did you find the big distribution deal that you were referring to?


When you give your distributor a wholesale price, offer them two prices. FOB and shipped. FOB means they arrange to pick it up and is typically a lower price. Or, figure out what LTL will cost you and add that in. For example, I gave my distributor FOB price of $39 and shipped $41.50. My freight cost $190.

So, long story short, yes, your pricing needs to figure out shipping cost too. Good news is, if you’re sending to distributor, you’re sending a large quantity and shipping on a pallet is cheaper per unit.


How I found my distributor? I was selling to their stores and found out through conversation they had their own internal distributor. I called them and got the buyers contact. Wasn’t all that complicated.

The best way to find the distributor is to ask the stores you sell to who their preferred distributor is. Once you find a common thread, approach that distributor. Once they know you’re selling to their clients already, it’s a matter of making the numbers work.
 

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Great Thread. For what it's worth, while I was in China this past October at the Canton fair, I was talking with anyone that I ran into that spoke English.

I just so happened to be in line behind a lady that told me an incredible story, but I will spare you the details.

Long story short, she wound up being the owner of a company named Finchberry Soap (See SITE Here). She shared how she had almost been homeless and struggling to start her business when someone suggested she go to the trade show in Atlanta called Americasmart.

She told me she barley had enough gas to get there but made it. The rest is history. She was able to get about 200k in orders (mind you she had no inventory...I don't recommend doing this but it worked for her) her customers were a little pissed that it took her 30 days to get their order to them but today she is doing 5-7 million in revenue per year and has been featured on some major TV networks. She said going to a trade show like that changed her life by exposing her to bigger businesses looking for new products. I believe she said the December session is better because buyers need to spend money before year end or something like that, don't quote me on that. Just something to consider.
 
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Scot

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This is amazing, I never thought of doing this. You're totally right. Any tips for entering wholesale?

Yep, I plan on putting together a guide for this thread later in the afternoon.

I'm assuming you mean NOT wholesaling to other retailers. I think that's one of the great take-aways from your progress thread - getting into retailers isn't some insurmountable obstacle for us little guys. You just need to have a product people want, effort to find out who to talk to, and persistence to keep following up and overcoming their objections until they have no reason but to say yes.

It's not easy to get into retailers (as a retailer, I reject about 90% of the products I'm pitched to) and it will complicate your supply chain. But, as Scot said above, it is a huge advantage both while you're in the business and when you decide to exit.

Whoops, typo, I fixed it!

Agreed, getting into retail is much easier than people think. But it all comes down to good quality product and product-market fit. If your product is mediocre and it doesn’t make sense for that retailer, there’s no reason why they should carry it.

Also, thanks for the Rep$
 
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Scot

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@AlonN even though I’ve made this thread, I am by no means an expert in Wholesale. I’m posting things as I learn them. But thankfully we have guys like @amp0193 and @MidwestLandlord who have strong wholesale experience as well.

Do you know how I learned to do this? I said yes, and figured it out. Talk to the customers, ask questions. With my first distributor, I was worried about looking like an amateur, but I was more worried about messing up my order or screwing up my cash flow. So, I asked him a bunch of questions.

It’s all trial and error. I’m still figuring out the best ways to ship and fulfill my product without losing money. My first 15 stores, I either lost money on sales or barely broke even. But I learned a lot from those accounts and that knowledge will pay dividends.

Long story short, just do it. Learn as you go.
 

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Great thread!

Currently awaiting payment for a near $8000 deal from a very big American company. I must say this happened quite coincidental.

I setup a website for my ecom brand and all of the sudden got their inquiry. They found my brand on Amazon and contacted me directly for +500 pcs of one of my products.

I could give them a much better price than the products I sell on Amazon and with still about 50% margin.

Now I'll add a "wholesale form" on my website and will definitely focus on more deals like that.
 
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Scot

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New strategy Im going to try.

I applied to Wegmans through RangeMe. They denied my application after only looking at my profile for 6 seconds. And the buyer won’t answer my emails. Well, I’m going to get into that store.

How?

Most stores have preferred distributors they work with. I happen to know that Wegmans requires their natural and specialty foods brands to use a specific distributor. Distributors have buyers too.

I’m going to start reaching out to this distributor, confirm they are in fact carrying my competitors brand, and pitch my brand alongside it.

I’ll report back at the end of the week to see how this goes.
 

Vigilante

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To commemorate my 50th thread on the Fastlane Forum, I wanted to share a topic that is very core to my business.

It’s a simple concept.

If you sell on Amazon, but not wholesale to other retailers, you’re throwing away millions of dollars.

Let’s look at this.

View attachment 19709

On this pallet is 900 units. This sale took about an hour worth of work. To date, I’ve sold 800 units on Amazon.

Let that sink in for a minute. In about 2 weeks time, with about an hour of actual work, and 37 short emails back and forth, I sold more unit than I did on amazon over 3 months time.

We talk about how Amazon is killing Brick & Mortar, but that’s simply not true. Wal-Mart, Target, Auto parts stores, grocery stores, clothing stores, and many others are not going anywhere anytime soon. And hundreds of millions of people shop at them daily.

Would you rather sell on 1 Amazon site or 5,000 Walmart stores?

Wholesale is the Scale part of the equation and if you’re not using that multiplier, you’re missing out.

Lastly, amazon businesses for sale on business broker websites are a dime a dozen. And multiples aren’t all that healthy. But one thing that does improve a multiple and more money on an exit, is a wholesale channel to your business.


Evaluate how your products can be sold to B&M. If you think your product is too generic to be sold in a store, it’s probably too generic to be sold on Amazon. Think of who your customer is, then think of where they shop. Those stores are your customer too.

If this thread shows enough interest, I’ll dig in deep to how to enter wholesale, get customers, get distribution.

Pick up the phone and start dialing.

I LOVE this photo. I remember you smiling when you showed it to me on your phone, and I remember your wife's sparkle in her eye during the discussion. You knew you were on the edge of this finally happening. There's so much I could unpack just within the frame of this photo itself, but people would be so wise to understand the whole story behind the journey that made this photo possible that I am taking this thread now to (at least) notable so that people have the opportunity to discover your story through looking deeper at that photo and discovering the path that lead you here.

I will read through the thread later today and post some comments.
 

Scot

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Loving this thread. I'm working on my first wholesale customer as well. I called yesterday and the lady took my message for the person responsible.

It's a local restaurant and I thought about walking in, but decided calling to set up a meeting was more respectful.

Best part? I was so nervous, but the phone call ended up being pretty easy.


These phone calls go much easier than you’d expect. After my 3rd one, I had a script and routine down. Just dialed, said my spiel and 33% of the time, closed the sale.
 

Scot

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Here’s a great resource for everyone.

Go to www.range.me and check this website out.

It’s a wholesale showcasing website. You make a profile for your business and add your products to it. The website has buyers from both small stores, distributors, and large box retailers.

I believe the premium subscription is $1500 for the year, but this gives you access directly to buyers and allows them to come to you.

Huge disclaimer. I am in no way affiliated with this website, do not get paid a dime from them. They are simply a resource that I have found. @MidwestLandlord has already gotten a couple nibbles from there. I have not, yet. So, I cannot promise any actual success. I advise you look at their retailer list to see if any stores there for your market first.
 
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CareCPA

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@Scot

Can you give me your daily routine?

Every time I do something that you do. I win big.
I read somewhere that one day @Scot woke up, started hustling, and just never went back to sleep.
 

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If you sell on Amazon, but wholesale to other retailers, you’re throwing away millions of dollars.

I'm assuming you mean NOT wholesaling to other retailers. I think that's one of the great take-aways from your progress thread - getting into retailers isn't some insurmountable obstacle for us little guys. You just need to have a product people want, effort to find out who to talk to, and persistence to keep following up and overcoming their objections until they have no reason but to say yes.

It's not easy to get into retailers (as a retailer, I reject about 90% of the products I'm pitched to) and it will complicate your supply chain. But, as Scot said above, it is a huge advantage both while you're in the business and when you decide to exit.
 

Scot

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I'm struggling with the margin for the distributor as well. Isn't that different for every type of product and distributor? I quoted some prices for a distributor, but I think I asked too much because I don't hear him back.

Have you asked the distributor what kind of margins they need? For example, while speaking to a potential distributor, I flat out asked, “what margin would you need to make this deal work?” To which he replied, 30%.

I got into detail on this earlier in the thread while talking about margins. But it’s important you ask these questions. You need to know what margin the store wants to make first, then work backwards to what margin the distributor wants.

These numbers are flexible for every deal. I would never put these in your first email or contact. Agree on the merits of the deal and close the sale before you start throwing out numbers.
 
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Scot

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As posted in my progress thread on the inside, I will repost this here as well.

---

Here's @MidwestLandlord method for converting B&M. All credit goes to him.


Step 1: Identify appropriate stores
Pick a geographic region and google maps scrape businesses that fit your target customer. For me, natural food stores. Clean the list up, and focus in on a small radius area. For me, its the tri-county area. Go to each store's website and see what their product offerings, store, and clientele look like. You want to pick stores that will be a good match for you. For example, stores that are super hippie, sell essential oils, and have a strict non-GMO policy got cut from my list.

Step 2: Build a sales packet
Put together a nice folder to mail to these stores. I went to Vistaprint and made customer 9"x12" presentation folders with my logo on them. Include an order form, a cover letter telling your story, any sell sheets you have. Lots of color, lots of pictures.

Mail these to each store. Important. These will get looked at and then thrown in the trash.

Step 3: Call the stores
Estimate 2-3 days after the envelope should have arrived and call each of the stores you sent a mailer to. Ask for the manager/owner/decision maker. Tell them you're from XYZ company. "Oh yeah, I've heard of you" This is now a warm contact, not a cold contact. Keep it short, simple. Your goal is to schedule an appointment to come into the store to present your products. Let them know their time is valuable.

Step 4: Go to the store, close the sale
Bring a copy of that same sales packet they probably threw away. Bring samples of your products. Sell your brand and ask for the business. This one I can't coach you threw, this is up to you. If your brand is something with high velocity, sell them an auto replenish order. i.e. We will deliver 2 cases the second Friday of every month. If your product is a little slower like mine, sell however many cases in the first sale, and keep in contact for reorders.

I am sending out my first round today, I will update in a week or so to let y'all know the conversion rate.
 

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There might also be opportunities in those Amazon businesses that are being sold on the broker sites. Buy them for the small multiples, add the wholesale channel, profit for a year and flip it... or hold it and grow. It could take out a lot of the guess-work and market testing of the process, if you have the funds.

Excellent point - following this thread.
 

Scot

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Nice, I am in the same boat. I am just trying to figure out if I should build more of a brand website seperate from Ecom site that sells my product.

Have you had any kick back about selling online in your website?

Are you hoping that a brand website will sell your product wholesale? Because it won’t. The only thing that sells wholesale is picking up the phone.

And selling on your website should always be viewed as a positive. It’s oroof of sales and brand loyalty.
 

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