Bed Linen
I don・t personally know anyone who doesn・t sleep in a bed, and even if someone were choosing to sleep on the floor for back problems or something, I imagine they would still use standard bed linen. We all appreciate having clean, nice looking sheets to climb into and when we decorate we usually change our bed linen to match the new look.
Unfortunately bed linens can be ridiculously expensive and the marketers have done their job with thread counts etc to make us want to pay for the more expensive cottons. There are however, ways to buy bed linen at a fraction of the cost, pass the savings on to your customers and make a profit for yourself.
www.sears.com has Egyptian cotton and 350 thread count sheet sets at more than US$60. www.marksandspencer.com has cotton sheets at close to a hundred dollars with the current exchange rate. I know you can buy similar quality sets in Asia at retail prices of around $20, which means with a good supplier you can probably buy at close to $10 or $15 a set.
Given that this is an item that we all need, and that you can provide at a discount to the big chain stores, how should you go about marketing your sheets, pillow cases etc? First you need to understand your product, flannel sheets are significantly cheaper than cotton and most people for whom cost is a real issue will not pay $30 even for great quality cotton when they can have flannel for closer to $10. The customers you are looking for are those who understand your quality but also recognise the savings that you are giving them.
I would aim to sell using the following channels: -
Ebay
Website
Family, friends, colleagues
Party Planning
Direct Response
Shop
Ebay is the natural place to start with a product like this, you get access to a wide audience and it is targeted in as much as you will get to access the customers who search for bed linen. If you order samples from your supplier you can immediately post them on Ebay, use different style adverts and work out which ones get the best responses. You can also try different price points, or simply auction them and see what they sell for. An advert on Ebay without setting up a store costs about $3 so factor this into your minimum price along with the cost of your samples and shipping. There are only about 47 products listed under Bed Linen on Ebay and the price points are upwards of $50.
Building a website is always the next logical step if you are most comfortable running your business. You can build something for free and use a free shopping cart like the one at www.zen-cart.com or you can spend some money on getting a more professional look. The key however is promoting your site and your products, which will take some work whether you choose to do it online through advertising and SEO techniques, or offline through traditional advertising, and promotions. The best results can be had from a combination of the two approaches but a lot depends on how much time and effort you are willing to put in.
You can start selling to your family, friends and colleagues even before you post that first Ebay advert. They are likely to be very supportive and of course everyone loves a bargain. Don・t be afraid to charge them a margin but let them have a little discount in return for telling their friends an colleagues about your product. They are getting high quality cotton sheets at a fraction of the store bought price, so will naturally talk about you, even if you don・t ask them to.
Party planning takes the natural ability to network a step further. By hosting a gathering at which acquaintances, as opposed to close friends get to network, eat and drink something, and see your new line of products is a great way to get some additional sales. If you are a naturally sociable person and enjoy hosting parties, or just having people over then this will be a great way to expand your business. If you want to get bigger then either train people to run their own events and share the profits with them, or ask to host gatherings for your customers and share the profits with them.
Direct response with these kinds of products is great. I can already imagine the pitch about great quality cotton from China/India/Sri Lanka etc. some nice photos and the killer call to action, buy now before we put our prices up. It doesn・t matter whether you do this by posting leaflets door to door, or advertising in periodicals; read as much as you can about writing good copy and start testing different adverts to see which ones draw the best response.
If you are happy with your suppliers and have sufficient funds then there is probably room in your town/city for a shop specialising in bed clothes. If there are already independent operators then you may want to talk to them first and see whether you can beat their current costs (in which case you both get to make money) and if not then try looking for some cheaper suppliers.
You can source from any developing country, try www.alibaba.com or www.globalsourcing.com or simply search on Google for bed linen and the country you are interested in buying from, try Vietnam, Sri Lanka, China, and India and see where you can get the best bargains.
This is a product that everyone needs at some point, many of your customers are likely to come back to you when they need replacements and word of mouth will be a great help.
Read our pages on dealing with suppliers at www.ideas2earn.com/findingSuppliers.html before you order any samples.