So you want to wholesale your product? A word of advice. BE...



So you want to wholesale your product? A word of advice. BE PREPARED! 

So often I find myself listening to other artisans who are eager to get their beautiful product/s into the hands of the “happy retailer”  to gain more sales and a larger customer base. Sadly, they tend to overlook the obvious- RETAILERS LIKE QUANTITY! (in laymen’s terms…..MORE THAN ONE) and of course at a very discounted price so they can make a profit. 

Many years ago, I found out that wholesaling was not as easy as one would think, especially since I was not a huge corporation or owned a manufacturing plant in my back yard. Yikes! The only thing in my yard are palm trees. Hey, I live in Florida! Not even a brew of cheerful little elves living in the hollow of a tree trunk making duplicates of all my beautiful products could be found to save me. Just me. 

I decided to delve into the fun world of selling my beautiful butterfly art designs to stores, boutiques and museum gift shops whose primary theme was that of butterflies! Easy enough. I had butterfly products. I loved painting, crafting, designing anything “butterfly related.” I  called on stores and sent them beautiful pictures, quoted them fair wholesale prices, guaranteed quality and quick delivery/ I was so excited to get my first few customers who thought my hand painted butterflies were perfect for their gift shops and stores that I almost forgot…… they wanted QUANTITY! Retailers do not want to buy (1) item to resell - they want multiples! Ahhhhhhhhh! I had become “a factory.” I promised and delivered, but I realized wholesaling is more than taking an order and cashing the check. One has to be ready to deliver the same of (1) item OVER AND OVER AND OVER!. I never painted so many butterflies in my life. Hundreds! 

I recall an artist friend who made some very unique hand made earrings. Her work was gorgeous. She expressed with excitement to me one day that a cruise ship gift store was considering her product. I wanted to warn her, but thought, maybe she had a tree hollow in her back yard with little elves who would come out to help her make all those earrings. I sure hoped so!

Yes, wholesaling can be fun and rewarding but BE PREPARED to deliver QUANTITY! 

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