Value Added Helps Volume, Margins, and Commissions
Our company is privileged to have the best head of customer service of any supplier in the country. Many who read this know Peggy and would probably agree. (You can send her a love note by hitting the comment button below.) She's not only good at making sure your orders get done right and on time, she has a good marketing head as well.
At the SAAC show the other day we had a brief pause in the action. Peggy said: "We need to start pushing our value added items more." Do you ever have one of those moments when you hit yourself in the head, because you're not taking care of a core principle.
We make the very best basic bottles in the World and more of them than anybody. But there's plenty of competition for those. That drives down prices and margins and profits. Then we have a giant list of bottles where we stand completely alone. Not one competitor. Solar color change bottles, lenticular bottles, baby bottles, 9 oz bottles, custom molded bottles, PVC Bike bottles. The list is long. That's just the beginning. In most cases they cost more, which increases volume. In most cases they have more margin, which increases profit. Any salesperson selling them, whether they are paid commission on sales volume or profit margin would be better off to sell those.
To make it even more interesting, in the Promotional Products business, everyone is always looking for something unique. So, if you look down the right margin on this page, you'll see that I have a picture of our transport bottle (only we make it), and our solar color change bottles (ditto.)
Doesn't this make sense in many of the lines you sell. I'm sure there are some factories who are selling items that your competitors wouldn't even think to show. We talked in an earlier post about making a totally custom product with a custom mold. That completely shuts out the competition.
So, Peggy. Thanks for the tip. And now your tip might be spreading joy in the future paychecks of all of us.
At the SAAC show the other day we had a brief pause in the action. Peggy said: "We need to start pushing our value added items more." Do you ever have one of those moments when you hit yourself in the head, because you're not taking care of a core principle.
We make the very best basic bottles in the World and more of them than anybody. But there's plenty of competition for those. That drives down prices and margins and profits. Then we have a giant list of bottles where we stand completely alone. Not one competitor. Solar color change bottles, lenticular bottles, baby bottles, 9 oz bottles, custom molded bottles, PVC Bike bottles. The list is long. That's just the beginning. In most cases they cost more, which increases volume. In most cases they have more margin, which increases profit. Any salesperson selling them, whether they are paid commission on sales volume or profit margin would be better off to sell those.
To make it even more interesting, in the Promotional Products business, everyone is always looking for something unique. So, if you look down the right margin on this page, you'll see that I have a picture of our transport bottle (only we make it), and our solar color change bottles (ditto.)
Doesn't this make sense in many of the lines you sell. I'm sure there are some factories who are selling items that your competitors wouldn't even think to show. We talked in an earlier post about making a totally custom product with a custom mold. That completely shuts out the competition.
So, Peggy. Thanks for the tip. And now your tip might be spreading joy in the future paychecks of all of us.
posted by Randy W. Kirk at 7:28 AM
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