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So after pursuing/investigating one of my previous ideas(the one I was working on when I introduced myself here), I found a saturated market with little need for the business model I was offering. The product is widely used, known to everyone in a developed nation, for hygienic purposes(recurring), and has a fairly large mark-up. I was trying to offer this product in a new fashion, marketing it as being a more convenient and private way to obtain a potentially embarrassing product to buy. BUT, I found myself unable to validate the NEED in the market for my specific offering, and without a large investment wouldn’t have been able to test further. SO, here we are....
My wife works for a small company that produces a packaged food good and is currently expanding into other niche areas. She works directly alongside the founder and co-founder, has been given experience in each separate department (distribution, sales, production, etc). So she has a grasp on what the industry needs and wants, experience in the specific industry into which we’re venturing, and a great mentor. Which leads us to the idea:
Produce a gourmet good that fits neatly into several separate “specialty†food micro-industries, all of which have an INCREDIBLY loyal customer base. The product we offer exists, but is almost unheard of in the fashion we’re presenting it. Branding and presentation is going to be one of our most important focuses throughout this process, as I believe the right message will sell our product for us.
Need: Incredibly popular product that isn’t offered to a huge portion of the population
Entry: Probably our weakest commandment. It requires enough investment/skill/effort/time required to break even that most people are unable get everything together, but theoretically anybody could do it, hopefully just not as well as us.
Control: We own and produce our own product, brand it ourselves, price it ourselves, and (somewhat) control our own distribution lines or at least choose which ones we operate through. Expansion will give us more options and control.
Scalability: Production and distribution of a tangible good is almost always scalable. Economy of scale allows exponential growth. Our product has the potential to go international, and in fact may do better overseas than in the states.
Time: Hiring others to operate a fairly simple but unique system lets us walk away at almost any point after establishing our market share.
Where we stand:
We just got hit pretty hard on our forward progress; our investors backed out, causing our partner(who brought very little to the table to begin with) to re-evaluate the situation and their place in it, and we were ultimately unable to come to an agreement, leaving the wife and myself somewhat starting over. Discouraging to say the least.
We currently have our product idea(needs to be further tested/improved), legal/insurance/health taken care of, a list of all products needed to fully produce, package, and distribute the product, and the start of a distribution line. Just no funds to get our supplies to start producing...
We’re starting off in farmer’s markets for several reasons. We get our product out there, meaning minimal delays in starting our company which will prevent us from backing out or missing out. We’ll also be able to more quickly increase production and branding efforts if we’re beginning a track record of sales and earning enough to fuel growth. It’s a great venue to reach our general customer base and test our ideas, refining them and redirecting the company as necessary, based on the market rather than ourselves. Right now we’ve already locked in 4 markets out of the potential 6 per week we can handle with a single booth setup and our estimated production capability. I understand this probably isn’t the most fastlane way to go about this, but without the financial backing we thought we had its become difficult to figure out whether we can start at all, even this minimally/conservatively.
The plan:
As it stands, we’d like to get our single booth setup and minimum production capabilities going. Currently pooling our funds and working on some possible investment contacts to get supplies ordered and in place. Being that this is a somewhat seasonal product/sales venue, we don’t want to miss out on the current season and would like to be more established to adjust and test other seasons’ specific ideas when the time comes. So we’re trying to figure out how much we can currently get, how little we can get by with, and how to bridge the gap. I’m thinking we should start a kickstarter/indie gogo campaign, but haven’t seen many products in our industry succeed.
We also need to redesign our logo, choose our package labeling, research sources for bulk ingredients for after our initial purchase of smaller test quantities at local stores, and set up a website.
Slightly longer term, we plan to reinvest everything we earn to get a second setup asap and increase production capabilities before summer is in full swing. When we get our second setup and reach the busy season, we’ll be looking at hiring an employee for the second market, and someone to produce the goods. Our projection is to have three setups and be in 18 markets per week by end of summer. This will provide enough income and put us at a place of needing to size up our production capabilities, which we believe is the time we should start to focus on selling our product in stores as a packaged good. Again I know this isnt very fastlane, but until a couple days ago we thought we were going in with enough investment to establish all of this from the start and expand from there. But it looks now as though we’ll be bootstrapping this ourselves. No worries though, we’ve endured much worse defeat and hardship, and we’re excited to be in this venture together. PMA, right?
I/we are here to learn, share, hold ourselves accountable, and hopefully help or encourage others through this thread. I look forward to updating it and welcome any and all advice, criticism, questions, etc. Thanks for reading!!
My wife works for a small company that produces a packaged food good and is currently expanding into other niche areas. She works directly alongside the founder and co-founder, has been given experience in each separate department (distribution, sales, production, etc). So she has a grasp on what the industry needs and wants, experience in the specific industry into which we’re venturing, and a great mentor. Which leads us to the idea:
Produce a gourmet good that fits neatly into several separate “specialty†food micro-industries, all of which have an INCREDIBLY loyal customer base. The product we offer exists, but is almost unheard of in the fashion we’re presenting it. Branding and presentation is going to be one of our most important focuses throughout this process, as I believe the right message will sell our product for us.
Need: Incredibly popular product that isn’t offered to a huge portion of the population
Entry: Probably our weakest commandment. It requires enough investment/skill/effort/time required to break even that most people are unable get everything together, but theoretically anybody could do it, hopefully just not as well as us.
Control: We own and produce our own product, brand it ourselves, price it ourselves, and (somewhat) control our own distribution lines or at least choose which ones we operate through. Expansion will give us more options and control.
Scalability: Production and distribution of a tangible good is almost always scalable. Economy of scale allows exponential growth. Our product has the potential to go international, and in fact may do better overseas than in the states.
Time: Hiring others to operate a fairly simple but unique system lets us walk away at almost any point after establishing our market share.
Where we stand:
We just got hit pretty hard on our forward progress; our investors backed out, causing our partner(who brought very little to the table to begin with) to re-evaluate the situation and their place in it, and we were ultimately unable to come to an agreement, leaving the wife and myself somewhat starting over. Discouraging to say the least.
We currently have our product idea(needs to be further tested/improved), legal/insurance/health taken care of, a list of all products needed to fully produce, package, and distribute the product, and the start of a distribution line. Just no funds to get our supplies to start producing...
We’re starting off in farmer’s markets for several reasons. We get our product out there, meaning minimal delays in starting our company which will prevent us from backing out or missing out. We’ll also be able to more quickly increase production and branding efforts if we’re beginning a track record of sales and earning enough to fuel growth. It’s a great venue to reach our general customer base and test our ideas, refining them and redirecting the company as necessary, based on the market rather than ourselves. Right now we’ve already locked in 4 markets out of the potential 6 per week we can handle with a single booth setup and our estimated production capability. I understand this probably isn’t the most fastlane way to go about this, but without the financial backing we thought we had its become difficult to figure out whether we can start at all, even this minimally/conservatively.
The plan:
As it stands, we’d like to get our single booth setup and minimum production capabilities going. Currently pooling our funds and working on some possible investment contacts to get supplies ordered and in place. Being that this is a somewhat seasonal product/sales venue, we don’t want to miss out on the current season and would like to be more established to adjust and test other seasons’ specific ideas when the time comes. So we’re trying to figure out how much we can currently get, how little we can get by with, and how to bridge the gap. I’m thinking we should start a kickstarter/indie gogo campaign, but haven’t seen many products in our industry succeed.
We also need to redesign our logo, choose our package labeling, research sources for bulk ingredients for after our initial purchase of smaller test quantities at local stores, and set up a website.
Slightly longer term, we plan to reinvest everything we earn to get a second setup asap and increase production capabilities before summer is in full swing. When we get our second setup and reach the busy season, we’ll be looking at hiring an employee for the second market, and someone to produce the goods. Our projection is to have three setups and be in 18 markets per week by end of summer. This will provide enough income and put us at a place of needing to size up our production capabilities, which we believe is the time we should start to focus on selling our product in stores as a packaged good. Again I know this isnt very fastlane, but until a couple days ago we thought we were going in with enough investment to establish all of this from the start and expand from there. But it looks now as though we’ll be bootstrapping this ourselves. No worries though, we’ve endured much worse defeat and hardship, and we’re excited to be in this venture together. PMA, right?
I/we are here to learn, share, hold ourselves accountable, and hopefully help or encourage others through this thread. I look forward to updating it and welcome any and all advice, criticism, questions, etc. Thanks for reading!!
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