Repeat Wine Bag Order

It's always gratifying to get a second (or more) order from a customer.  Had one yesterday from my friend Curt at Matter of Factors in Savannah.  I contacted him about our holiday designs; he wasn't interested in those but he did order another dozen of the custom bags we created together last May.

It's back-to-school season

I'm pretty much wrapping up the wine bag business for the time being, although I still have a few outstanding prospects to either close or put on hold.  Will take it up again in October for the holiday gift-giving season.

For back-to-school (BTS, for those in the biz), I have 2 products now:  the old laptop sleeves, and now the reusable sandwich bags.  Still knocking hard on WFM's door so I don't miss their buying season altogether.  Today I discovered yet another layer as the **** continues to roll downhill.  Maybe she'll have the answer to the missing vendor...?

In addition, I've got samples/applications going to Sevananda, Earth Fare, and United Natural Foods, and I've already been in touch with Return to Eden.  Hopefully one or more will be interested.

And I've started recontacting my friends at the Georgia university bookstores, not to mention Michael and Joshua in Washington, Walt in Ohio, Rinaldo in NY, and various contacts in California.  I hope the new and improved (read:  lower) price of the streamlined sleeves will appeal to them.  My wholesale sales goal for the month is 10; I'm 10% of the way there (thanks, Krista), but it's going to take a lot of calls to make it.  Fortunately, there are a whole lot of schools out there and I've become the queen of cold calling.

Big Goof

Oh man.  I'm so annoyed with myself.  Having sent my wine bag photos to a store in NC, I had a nice email back from them asking for a sample, which I sent right away.  Following up, the contact was noticeably cooler; she was not at all happy with the bag:  handle too short, stitching not secure enough.  I didn't argue although I did tell her that we hadn't had any problems with security.  Later that day, I got the bag back.  Well, I had sent her a sample whose handle, for some reason, had not been triple-stitched.  No wonder she thought it wasn't secure.  As for the length of the handle, I had already learned that it was too short for some bottles and had changed it for my Vino 100 order.  Unfortunately, I had sent her sample before realizing that.

All I could do was call her today and apologize, which I did.  Profusely; and asked for a second chance to make a first impression.  She warmed up considerably and was happy to have me stay in touch.  However, they'd decided not to bring in anything now, it being the slow season, but to get back in touch in August.  Of course, I will.

While it's not something I'd do on purpose, sometimes making a mistake isn't so bad if you can recover by overwhelming the customer with better-than-great service, eating humble pie, or whatever it takes to get back on track.  I believe she accepted my explanation, and I'm sure she'll remember the encounter better than if everything had gone smoothly.  It was a bad 24 hours for me, though.

Moving on...to sandwich bags and laptopwraps

Not that I'm giving up entirely the wine store chase, but I'm quickly approaching back-to-school buying time and I don't want to miss it.  Although I'm pleased with the results of my wine bag campaign, it's clear that the big season for them is around the holidays, i.e., October.  So I'm going to wrap up the calls I've already started, then put wine stores on the back burner for awhile.

Have already started marketing the sandwich bags today, with several calls/emails to local health food stores including Sevananda and the Savannah Food Co-op.  And in breaking news, WFM finally responded to my sixth email - not that I have any news but at least JP's boss and boss's boss are requesting an update from him.  Be nice to see some movement there so I can re-contact the Atlanta stores and branch out to the rest of the region.

Marketing Plan

I think I'm finally understanding how to use the marketing plan I got from the Get Clients Now workshop I attended several months ago.  Although there are peripheral marketing activities that I can and should engage in - networking, for example - the number one thing I need to do is make phone calls.  It's paying off beautifully for my wine bottle bags and there's no reason to think it won't work as well for the other products.

So now my first 3 marketing activities are all around calling - first, follow up all outstanding calls; second, make 10 new cold calls; and third, research new stores to call the following day.  Since they're on a list, it's pretty certain I'll do them.

Of course, I really need to up my cold calls.  I started with 5/day, then 6, now 10.  But I just did 10 calls and it only took 13 minutes, not really enough time.  It's getting toward noon now which tends to be busy for wine stores, but I need to make a bunch of afternoon follow up calls so I'll tack on another 10 cold calls at that time.

Right now, however, I need to fill my order from Mac's Beer & Wine, received yesterday.  I think that makes 7 stores now!

Two Wholesale Orders in One Day!

I hope there's a time when I look back on this post and laugh.  Two orders?  How about 200?  But for now, I'm pretty jazzed about it and it is absolutely a first.  Thanks very much to my friends Hunter and Curt, in Cumming and Savannah, respectively.

If only I could now turn these orders over to my "people" who would then make the bags, tag them, pack them, and ship them.  The problem with the wine bags is that they're easy but tedious.  At least Curt's is a custom order, so it's a little bit unusual.

I'm proud of myself for following up immediately on 2 leads that Hunter gave me in nearby towns.  My instinct was simply to drive home and call, sometime, from there.  The ecologist in me, however, was somewhat stunned by driving 1-1/2 hours (roundtrip) for a 10 minute meeting, so I called the leads on the off-chance that I could schedule meetings with them while I was in the area.

The one in Cumming was interested but not until closer to holiday time - I get a lot of that.  But the one in Dawsonville agreed to see me.  He didn't seem entirely thrilled so I'm not feeling very confident of a sale, but at least I made the contact.  And who knows?  I've certainly been wrong about who my potential customers are before.

Giving Away the Store

Delivered my first 2 wine bag wholesale orders yesterday and already there are issues.  Had a call from one store that the buyer hadn't realized that the plain and embroidered bags were NOT the same price, so she was returning 5 of the 12 bags she ordered.

I decided not to tell her that ordering less than the minimum put her at the retail price for all the bags, although that was the case.  And I decided not to let my pride accept the return.  Instead, I let her have all 12 bags at the same price.

Why?  For one thing, a quick calculation indicated that 5x4.50 was almost certainly more than 0x7.50.  But that's not really the reason.  Mainly it's because I want to get my bags into stores; and I believed she made a mistake,i.e., wasn't just trying to get something for nothing.

Again, it comes down to what kind of business I want to have.  Not one where I give away the store; but there has to be some give and take, especially now when I'm still refining the construction process and experimenting with pricing.  And it's also fun to be able to make a customer-pleasing decision that will hopefully prove to be a win-win.

Now the question is, do I give my other customer the same deal?

2 for 2

Got my second wholesale order today, this time from D'Vine in Dunwoody.  Yeah, he was throwing me a bone because I'm local but hey, I'll take it!

Also sent off my vendor application to WineStyles in Florida; will hear back from them in 3 weeks (or less).

Still no word from Tatjana although I sent her my UPC label yesterday.  I know she's busy but it's frustrating.

First Wine Bag Wholesale Order!

Batting 1 for 1 - yoohoo!  Thanks, Cori!

Wine Store Results So Far

Whew!  Made it through my whole list of 37 stores and here's the tally:

2 appointments
2 corporate applications (covering 4 stores on the list)
1 is a beer place (!)
3 are closed
9 don't carry accessories
4 found the price too high
13 require more follow-up

So, of the original 37 stores only 19 can be considered prospects for cold-calling.  Getting 2 appointments (so far) represents an 11% success rate.  I'm not sure but I don't think that's too bad a hit rate.  Of course, 13 are still possibilities so hopefully that rate will go up.  And the bottom line is how many actually purchase.

Next week - on to Athens, Savannah, and Augusta.

World's Nicest Rejection Letter

Received from Todd at Pearson's today, this email made me feel good even though it was a rejection!  Or rather, a temporary delay.  What a nice, nice person.

Janet,

Thank you for sending me the catalogue of your BEAUTIFUL product.  My mom is a seamstress and I grew up watching her create amazing clothes and accessories.  I’m thrilled that I got to see yours. 

Unfortunately, now is not the time for our particular business and items like yours.  I will, however, be taking another look before the holiday season.  Please, if you have new or holiday items let me know.  Our accessory business is growing, hopefully we’ll be able to work together in the future.

Thanks again,

Todd