About a month ago my girlfriend and I decided to put some products together for her school's craft fair. We came up with a list of 8 products to formulate, researched recipes online and checked competing products. We dropped 1 along the way since it didn't look like we'd be able to sell it profitably.
From there I did my best given limited time (and that postal strike) to source our raw ingredients. Some I definitely overpaid for since we had to go local retail. With our ingredients collected, we proceeded to make test batches to iterate on before making the larger batches of 1-2 dozen units. Each product type ended up with a few different scent combos to try appealing to a wider range of people. We also figured it would help determine what's more popular in general.
Packaging and labeling were pushed towards to the end. With the low unit count and each product having a different package, we used what we could from a craft store, dollar store, and canning jars. At roughly $0.50 to $1.25 per container, that seems like too big a chunk of the total. Labeling was just a couple different sticker labels that I made a template for and printed it all out at home. Unfortunately the low quality meant the stickers didn't entirely stick (tape and glue to the rescue!)
The day before the craft sale began, we made a logo, email account and Facebook page (basically empty but at least it's there), and printed out product sheets and price sheets. We almost looked like a real business!
Our first sales were quite exciting. All that work getting validated. Lots of positive comments and feedback, even a couple repeat customers! We made some pricing adjustments, added package deals, and improved our signage as the days went by. Sales were slow but steady, but by the end we had just exceeded the total expenses... aka we made a profit! Plus we're still left with about 30% of our inventory.
Neither of us have ever done something like this, so it's been a great learning experience. The next step is deciding whether to continue on and scale up, or move on to something else. We did have some very positive feedback, but it was also a very closed environment with only a handful of the outside public stopping by, so I'm not sure how strong of validation it counts for.
I was thinking of putting a site together to list our products for sale, to help sell what remains and gauge larger scale demand. We'll also have to get on Instagram, and finish our Facebook page. My biggest concerns are that it's a very crowded space so we'd likely need to spend a lot on advertising, and while we used quality ingredients I don't feel our products stand out very much from what's already available.
From there I did my best given limited time (and that postal strike) to source our raw ingredients. Some I definitely overpaid for since we had to go local retail. With our ingredients collected, we proceeded to make test batches to iterate on before making the larger batches of 1-2 dozen units. Each product type ended up with a few different scent combos to try appealing to a wider range of people. We also figured it would help determine what's more popular in general.
Packaging and labeling were pushed towards to the end. With the low unit count and each product having a different package, we used what we could from a craft store, dollar store, and canning jars. At roughly $0.50 to $1.25 per container, that seems like too big a chunk of the total. Labeling was just a couple different sticker labels that I made a template for and printed it all out at home. Unfortunately the low quality meant the stickers didn't entirely stick (tape and glue to the rescue!)
The day before the craft sale began, we made a logo, email account and Facebook page (basically empty but at least it's there), and printed out product sheets and price sheets. We almost looked like a real business!
Our first sales were quite exciting. All that work getting validated. Lots of positive comments and feedback, even a couple repeat customers! We made some pricing adjustments, added package deals, and improved our signage as the days went by. Sales were slow but steady, but by the end we had just exceeded the total expenses... aka we made a profit! Plus we're still left with about 30% of our inventory.
Neither of us have ever done something like this, so it's been a great learning experience. The next step is deciding whether to continue on and scale up, or move on to something else. We did have some very positive feedback, but it was also a very closed environment with only a handful of the outside public stopping by, so I'm not sure how strong of validation it counts for.
I was thinking of putting a site together to list our products for sale, to help sell what remains and gauge larger scale demand. We'll also have to get on Instagram, and finish our Facebook page. My biggest concerns are that it's a very crowded space so we'd likely need to spend a lot on advertising, and while we used quality ingredients I don't feel our products stand out very much from what's already available.
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