Who Tells You What To Sell?

Aug 25 2008

Published by Dany at 11:35 am under Marketing

What's for Sale?

Let me tell you a story…

Niche Store or Hole In The Wall?

For a decade, I owned an organic gardening (bricks and mortar) specialty store. We were niche before niche was cool. Back then, we were what the other stores called “small.” From the outside, we looked like a semi-derelict hole in the wall.

We wanted to rep a particular line of seeds. Now we already had an organic seed company and a gourmet seed company on board. But we also wanted a well-known and very popular regional brand. Unfortunately, for two years, that brand wouldn’t give us the time of day. They had territories they didn’t want to carve up. They had an image they didn’t want to dilute. They had all sorts of excuses – but what it came down to was – they didn’t want to take a chance on us.

You’ll understand his situation better if you know something about the traditional model of seed selling. A seed company sells a rack, pre-stocked with popular varieties. The retailer buys the inventory at the beginning of the season, and then returns the unsold seeds at the end of the year for full credit towards the next season. The retailer risks very little. A small seed company, however, can be badly hurt by a large volume of returns.

Our erstwhile seed seller had dropped by one night, after we had closed, and peered in our windows. We did not look like Smith & Hawken. We did not look a nursery. We looked like what we were – a store with just 1,000 square feet of indoor retail space and a bunch of dusty bags all over the floor. What our friend the distributor could not see – because we were closed – was our clientele. What he also missed was the Felco pruners and hand forged English spades and forks tucked in among the bloodmeal and diatomaceous earth - we sold some very expensive stuff.

Remember – we were niche before niche was cool. We were selling to the long tail before Amazon existed. Our customers were not just gardeners. They were passionate about a particular type of gardening. And they spent money.

Who Makes The Decisions?

So we investigated and we cajoled and we expanded our seed selection to include the regional brand’s competitors.

If the stupid seed seller thought we’d return their seeds unsold, we were willing to buy outright and agree to no-return terms. We were willing to demonstrate our ability to sell in volume by opening our books (at least the relevant portion – i.e., other seed orders). We were willing to do whatever they asked. What we were not willing to do was take “No” for an answer.

We knew what our customers wanted and we were determined to get it for them.

Eventually, persistence met up with luck when the sales rep for another large concern wondered why we didn’t carry XYZ Seeds. They turned us down again this season, we said. This rep realized that our clientele was the ideal market for those seeds. He knew that if we could sell his products in the volume we did, we could certainly meet the minimum requirements of the seed company.

And best of all, he knew the guy who owned the seed company.

“Let’s give him a call, right now,” we said, “OK?”

And so we did. And so we sold gazillions of those seeds and everybody made a boat load of money. Hooray! A happy ending for all.

Are You The Boss Or Not?

Many, many brands – especially popular ones and high end ones – have rules, policies, or preferences detailing who can sell their products or where their products can be sold. For instance, perhaps you want to sell a particular line of cosmetics. You know that as far as they are concerned

Saks 5th Avenue = Good
K-Mart = When Hell Freezes Over

The chances are good that you, as an online retailer, are neither Saks nor K-Mart. The old rules don’t apply to you. If you are endlessly and fruitlessly banging your head against a brick wall – maybe it’s time to try tunneling under or climbing over the wall.

It’s your business. Who is telling what to sell – your customers or your distributors?

Photo by Thomas Hawk under Creative Commons License

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