Author: Karen Waksman

Karen Waksman, Founder of Retail MBA, is a Manufacturer’s Rep turned Author, Speaker and Consultant. She has sold millions of consumer products to the world’s largest retailers and now dedicates her time to teaching Entrepreneurs how to market and sell their products to Major Retailers, Online Retailers, Catalogs and Small Retailers, too! Karen Waksman has taught over 10,000+ product entrepreneurs and companies across the globe on the subject of selling to retailers. Her goal is to empower and inspire companies to transform their businesses by providing them all of the necessary information they need in order to become chain store vendors. Most importantly, Karen’s clients have utilized the Retail MBA time-tested sales formula to get their products into retailers such as Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Home Depot, Lowes, Kroger Grocery Stores, Bed Bath and Beyond, BuyBuyBaby, Groupon and much, much more!

Meijer Vendor – How to Sell to Meijer and Become a Meijer Vendor

New training on How to Sell to Meijer and Become a Meijer Vendor

Meijer is an American supercenter chain located mostly in the Midwest. They currently have over 240 stores they’re responsible for. They sell a variety of different products like groceries, clothing, beauty, electronics, and so much more! As a supercenter with immense buying power, Meijer is definitely a retailer to explore.

Meijer also has a lot of room to test new products so it’s definitely worth selling to them. The key is to know what matters to them and what makes them more inclined to buy!

So, if you think you have a great product for Meijer, I suggest watching my latest training video about selling to Meijer. I also share some quick tips and strategies that may just be helpful to you when selling to this supercenter. Just click on the video to watch!

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success.

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

P.S. Want to Get Your Products into Chain Stores in a Fraction of the Time? Check out our Retail MBA System! We walk you through exactly how to approach, pitch and sell to chain stores. No sales experience, patents or buyer relationships required! 

Hey everyone this is Karen Waksman, founder of Retail MBA. Today I want to talk about Meijer. Meijer is a supercenter chain store located throughout the Midwest. And I create these training segments just to give you some quick tips and strategies because half the time I realized my customers and people I work with don’t always know about retailers out there that they could sell to. So just by creating this training I hope that you learn a little bit and also get you inspired about selling to retailers such as Meijer. Or if you are already knowing about them and you want to sell to them, just hopefully you’ll walk away knowing some strategies. 

Anyways, let’s talk about Meijer. So basically, this retailer change in terms of the volume of stores. They currently have over 240 stores they are responsible for. It’s 240 locations mostly in Michigan, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, and Wisconsin. So those people who live in California or wherever you probably didn’t know about them. So that’s something to think about and that’s a lot of buying power. They can buy a lot of products from you. They sell a variety of different products and they’re supercenters. 

So one thing I want to share with you is when someone has stores that are supercenters, it means that they have large locations. And what that ultimately means, is that they have the ability to buy a lot of different types of products and have room to test a lot of products. I love retailers like that. Because the larger the space, the more opportunity to buy things. The smaller the space, the more competition, the harder it gets and so forth. For instance, if you’re trying to sell, I don’t know, to a GameStop or GNC, they have a really small-type location so the competition gets tight because they just can’t put that many products in stores. So something to consider about Meijer is that they’re supercenter large stores and so they can fit more products which means they can sell more products and so forth. 

So that’s the one thing to think about. I love selling to retailers like that because again they’d say no a little bit less because they have more room to test new products. So when I say test it just means that they can try out new products. And because of that, they sell anything from grocery, clothing, footwear, gasoline, sporting clothing, bedding, furniture, jewelry, health and beauty products, toys, sporting equipment, electronics, housewares, pet supplies, you name it. Right? So kind of a big deal especially for those of you who are maybe trying to sell to retailers and you’re getting rejected a lot. But maybe a lot of your competition doesn’t think about Meijer as a retailer to focus on. So again, if I have a consumer electronics product or houseware product, I wouldn’t ignore Meijer. And most people do. 

And so that’s why when you’re getting rejected by a lot of retailers, sometimes regional retailers like that is the superb way. Because even though a lot of your competitors don’t approach them, which is actually a benefit for you, the retailers actually know all about what’s going on in their competitor stores. So all of the supercenters and so forth, trust me they’re all shopping in each other’s stores. So once you start opening a Meijer account as a supplier and so forth, all of sudden the other retailers will start paying attention to you because someone took a risk on your product and so forth. So again, I would never ignore Meijer and so forth in selling to them. And a lot of people do because they don’t think about them as an opportunity. 

Anyways, they have large designs. The thing about them is they were one of the first companies to create hypermarkets which means they combine grocery chains with general merchandise and so forth. So again, I mean, so many different types of products they buy. They’re always looking for diverse suppliers. If you are a woman on business, or a diverse supplier and so forth, they love those types of companies who get certified. And ultimately just wanted to share with you that they exist and definitely explore going after them. They’re also a private company and so they sometimes tend to be a little bit more interesting to work with because they have different ways of purchasing and I will explain that in another training video. 

Anyways, this is Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. I hope that provided value for you. If you want to learn exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell to retailers like Meijer, definitely take a look at my website retailmba.com. That’s retailmba.com. My goal is ultimately to help you expedite the process of making money with your physical product. We have free training. We have advanced training that you can purchase. We have live events. We have all sorts of certification programs and so forth. Basically we teach you step by step proven process on how to make money with physical stores. We’d love to help you with that. Otherwise, please subscribe to this channel and be on the lookout for the next training segment that we provide. Our goal is to ultimately support you in every step of the way in making money. Again, Karen Waksman, Retail MBA, thanks for your time!

How To Wholesale Your Etsy Product To BIG Retailers

New Training on How To Wholesale Your Etsy Product To BIG Retailers!

New Training on How To Wholesale Your Etsy Product To BIG Retailers!

Have you been successfully selling your Etsy product? If so, maybe it’s time to consider selling into retailers as well?

Etsy is definitely a great platform to sell your handmade or vintage items online, but if you want to make more profit, consider wholesaling your Etsy products to big retailers, tool! Whether you’re selling toys, craft supplies, jewelry or clothing, I’m here to tell you that you can get your Etsy product on big retail shelves like Macy’s or in any other department stores or retailer chains. Looking into wholesaling can really help you grow your business sustainably and help build your brand! 

However, there are some new things to think about if you plan on going after stores such as how to mass produce your product, wholesale pricing, packaging and more! 

If you’re interested in learning the answers to these questions, then I suggest checking out my latest training video.  Click on the link to watch!

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success.

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

P.S. Want to Get Your Products into Chain Stores in a Fraction of the Time? Check out our Retail MBA System! We walk you through exactly how to approach, pitch and sell to chain stores. No sales experience, patents or buyer relationships required! 

So let’s talk about how to wholesale your Etsy product to big retailers. So if you have a great product that you think should be on the shelves of retail chains and you’ve been selling your Etsy product, you’re probably curious about how to make money with it and so forth. So I decided to create this little training segment to support you in helping you figure out Etsy and how to sell them to large retail chains like Macy’s or any other department stores or whatever supports you and your product based on you know, if you have a children’s product then to sell to Buy Buy Baby and so forth. So whatever it is for you, this little training will walk you through how to sell large retail chains if you’re an Etsy company. 

First of all, in order to sell to big retailers, you need to find a way to develop your product for a massive audience. Meaning that the buyer needs to be able to buy your products in quantity. And so you have to figure out how you’re going to mass produce that. So some of you are making stuff by hand and you’re literally going to have to figure out how to make more than a hundred pieces of your product. Big retailers need you to be able to make 10,000 units of your product in a single order or more and in one sitting. So can you do it? Do you have someone who can develop it for you? These are the things that you have to kind of figure out in advance. It will help you with bigger retail chains.

If you’re really serious about those retailers, doesn’t mean that you’re going to get 10,000 units ordered on day one. It just means that they’re eventually going to have to buy your product on a larger scale if your product sells in their store. So they’ll start small by small quantities just for their top 20 or 50 stores. Test out your product and then from there, they’ll buy larger quantities. So you’ll just definitely want to make sure that when that happens, you have the ability to be able to have them buy your product on the spot in larger quantities. So the assumption is that you are working on that currently if you are exploring wholesale for larger retailers. Many of you already know that but just wanted to be clarified. They just can’t buy your handmade product, you know, 10 pieces of your product. That doesn’t make sense. If somebody has 500 stores they’re responsible for, they have to put at least 2 to 5 to 10 pieces of your product per store. I mean that in itself. And then there’s reorders—consistently. So you know, again, you just got to set that up properly. 

So things to consider in terms of wholesaling to big retailers, you got to figure out your packaging situation. With retailers, it depends on what it is. Like jewelries are a little bit different than say a toy product or whatever it is you are creating. But what you got to look at is how are the retailers packaging similar products to yours because they actually care about packaging at retail chains. They do care about how it’s presented. So when you’re selling to boutiques and stuff it’s not as important. You can have a little display and so forth. With retailers, they’re very big sticklers on how much room your product takes and so forth. 

So what you want to do is you want to walk floors and take a look at the retailers that could buy your product. And I try to have people look at as many retailers as possible before they choose their strategy, meaning which retailers you are going to focus on. So you just walk a bunch of stores and you kind of make assessments and see what’s going on, and figure out the pricing and all these different things. Then you kind of put together your plan. Then you approach retailers. This is only a few minutes of training, but you know, that’s the essence of what I teach people. You got to do some prep work before you actually pitch to these guys to make sure you sound smart before you go after them.

But really, packaging is going to show up because they care about what the package is going to look like because we’re speaking up the packaging, not the product itself in a lot of cases. Obviously, jewelry is a little bit different but still there’s some sort of packaging even if it’s a hang tag or some sort of something clipped on to the product. That’s still considered packaging and still does matter to retail. So when you’re walking stores, take a look at similar products to yours. Look at the top 3 competitors similar to your product and you want to copy their packaging exactly. And really, what that will do for you is that it’ll have you approach the buyer appropriately because the buyer’s basically telling you what kind of packaging they want. They’ve already approved the similar products in stores so you just want to copy what’s going on in the stores and just make it look better, more interesting, put some brighter colors. Do whatever you got to do.

But if there is a box on your competitor’s product, then you want to create a box for your product. If they are putting all the similar products on hang tag cards and they have certain designs, you want to do the same. So that’s the other thing to think about. And the final thing I’ll mention today…by the way, packaging—essential to your success with retailers. Walk stores first. Make sure that your packaging matches what’s already in stores. They’re already telling you what they want. So I hope you got that. 

So the final thing I want to say about wholesaling products to big retail chains if you’re an Etsy company is that they definitely are looking for products that are priced accordingly. So, because you’re a smaller company, you’re definitely going to have struggles with manufacturers, the manufacturers that tend to give price breaks to people who are selling products on a larger scale. And if you’re new and you’re not selling that many products and so forth, it does tend to get tricky because your cost per unit costs more than somebody who is already established and so forth. That’s okay. Retailers understand that. The thing that’s working for you is the fact that you have probably more new, interesting, innovative stuff. And the buyers do care about new, interesting, and innovative. So don’t ignore large retailers because you’re worried about cost so much. But you definitely want to find solutions, right?

And the one way you can control your cost is if you consider private labeling your product to retailers. Private label basically means that if you walk into a store and on the packaging, it says the name of the retailer, not your product. It’s their branding, not yours—that’s private label. The retailers actually buying your product like a manufacturer’s product or a wholesaler’s product and they’re making you put their packaging on your product. If you don’t care if your branding is all over it, that is private label and people make many millions of dollars private labeling their products just one retailer. 

So what that essentially means for you is that if you’re trying to wholesale your product to retailers, one thing you might want to consider is private labeling your product to retail chains meaning approaching the private label buyer with your product and being willing to change branding on that. And I explain private label on another video training. But really, the essence is that the reason you’d want to do that is because if they do private label your product, they will buy massive quantities of your product because it’s under their brand name. And they tend to buy a lot of quantities of products under their brand name because there’s an audience that purchases products similar to that. 

And so ultimately what that means for you is that you can get your price down to your manufacturer if you are private labeling your product because when you sell your product in bulk, the manufacturer will suddenly start giving you price breaks. So some people abhor the concept of selling to retail chains and not having their branding on it. But some people are willing to maybe explore that possibility and what that does for you is enables the manufacturer to get a lot of volume. They in turn start giving you price breaks based on that volume. You can turn that into a really successful business because from there you can get your price down and then you could start being competitive. All these big branded companies, they all on some level have to do things that maybe help increase revenue. And private label is very important to their business a lot of times. Not all products make sense for that but a lot of Etsy wholesale products like jewelry. A lot of times it would have to be under the branded name of the retailers. You don’t have the choice with the private label stuff. And then there’s other retailers where literally you can choose whether or not you want to put on their brand name. You know what I mean? And that’s a possibility. 

Not all private label products are accessible to every product type, but a lot of times. So when you’re walking stores, you’re trying to see what’s possible for you and your product, which retail will buy your product. Take a look whether or not a company is selling to that retailer under their branded name or under the retail branded name. That means there’s a private label opportunity there for you. And again, what that does is reduces the cost for you. And by the way, you can sell to one retailer under a private label situation and sell to another retailer with your brand product. So I know a lot of companies who actually sell one product on a massive scale through a private label and then go to another retailer and sell on under their branded name. And it seems to work out really well for them because that private label opportunity actually reduces cost, helps them succeed and so forth. I used to sell millions of units of jewelry and so forth, and accessories, fashion accessories to retailers. I know those very well. There’s a lot of opportunity with private label.

Anyways, I hope that provided value for you. I have other trainings on what private label is and how to explore that and so forth. So definitely take a look at that. Otherwise, be on the lookout for the next training that I create. This is Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. If you want to learn exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell to retailers whether it’s a private label situation or not, whether it’s a high ticket product or not, definitely take a look at Retail MBA and my training systems. We have coaching and training environment for we support people on actually how to get to stores in a fraction of time with minimal cost and so forth. So definitely take a look at retailmba.com. We’re here to help you. Otherwise, please subscribe to this channel and be on the lookout for additional contents that I create. Again, Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. Thanks so much!

Staples Vendor – How to Sell to Staples and Become a Staples Vendor

New Training on How to Sell to Staples and Become a Staples Vendor

Staples is an American office retail company that primarily sells office supplies and related products. But over the years, they have expanded into selling various items such as snacks, health and beauty products, furniture and so much more. With over 1500 stores they are currently responsible for, Staples offers tremendous opportunities to their suppliers! 

Therefore in this training segment I discuss some of the ways you can sell to Staples beyond what most people think about.

So, if you want to learn more about how you can get your products into a retail store like Staples, definitely watch my new training video on  How to Sell to Staples and Become a Staples Vendor!

Just go ahead and click on the video!

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success.

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

P.S. Want to Get Your Products into Chain Stores in a Fraction of the Time? Check out our Retail MBA System! We walk you through exactly how to approach, pitch and sell to chain stores. No sales experience, patents or buyer relationships required! 

Transcript For Video Listed Here…

Hey everyone this Karen Waksman, Founder of Retail MBA. And today I want to talk about selling your products to Staples. So if you have a great physical product and you’re trying to sell to retailers and Staples is on your mind, this whole training segment will just give you some tips and strategies on what to think about in regards to going after them. So with that said, let’s talk about Staples.

They have over 1500 stores they’re responsible for. That is tremendous buying power. One chain store order from Staples can mean millions of dollars to your business and your bottom line. Just think about it. If they buy, say, 30 units of your products per store and they have 1500 stores or so. Again the number of stores vary based on the time you hear this. But ultimately, to say 1500 stores, and they have 30 units for product, I mean that can conceivably be a tremendous amount of opportunity. And I mean, if that’s around 45,000 units of your product, I’m not saying that they’ll buy for all of their stores. But think about how many units that is—45,000 units per sale for these stores. And then what if they reorder the product over and over and over again?

I have clients who have sold to retailers for 10 to 15 years straight. And again, it varies per retailer and so forth. But once the product sells and it converts in their stores, they tend to reorder it and so that could be tremendous business to you. The other thing to think about Staples is they don’t just buy office supplies. They buy consumer electronics. They buy janitorial supplies. They buy furniture. They buy school supplies. They buy food. I mean, they buy so many snacks and all these different things, health and beauty products. I mean stuff you would never think to sell to an office supply store. So my recommendation is to go and to walk their stores and see what stuff is in their stores today.

Retailers have changed. They’re not the way they used to be. Before, it used to be very cut and dried. They would buy the only very specific things that matter to that particular retailer like office supplies and so forth. But not anymore. Now they’re filling up stores with a variety of different things hoping that the customer will not only just buy whatever they typically buy from them but add all sorts of different things. The other thing to think about with Staples is the buyer at Staples is different from the buyer at staples.com.

Those are two different buyers and that happens with most retail chains like Walmart and walmart.com. Those are different buyers. The online buyers are typically different from the physical store buyer. And the way that you sell to them is a little bit different. The reason I mentioned that is because, you know, if you get rejected by Staples you can go after the staples.com buyer. And a lot of people don’t know that. And so you know, the thing to think about, again there’s so many different ways to sell to Staples.

Another thing to think about if you want to sell to Staples is you can sell to them through their corporate buyer which buys products for all their stores. You could sell to their online buyer which buys for their online store. Or maybe you have a private label product that you can put under their brand name. Most retail chains have a private label buyer or a company-owned buyer. And basically what that means, is that it has the Staples name on it but they typically buy from someone like you. So they buy products from a manufacturer and then they just have you package it under their name. And so every retailer has kind of a privately-owned product. And they actually have buyers specifically who buy stuff like that.

So if you’re trying to sell to Staples and they’re not purchasing from you, one thing to think about is do I care whether or not my brand is on the packaging. And if so, maybe I can reach out to a privately-owned buyer, corporate-owned buyer and so forth and see if I could put my product under their brand name. And again, people make millions of dollars with Staples but a lot of times, the private label buyer can really just buy a large volume of your product because again it’s under their brand name. So just something to think about. There’s so many different ways to sell to Staples.

If you want to learn more, definitely take a look at my website retailmba.com. That’s retailmba.com. I walk you through exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell retailers like Staples. If you’re a beginner, if you’re an advanced seller and any other retailer and so forth, we have a very comprehensive program. We have free training, advanced training that you could purchase, live events. We partner with retailers and so forth. Love to support you. Or just subscribe to this channel. 

Be on the lookout for the free content that we create. We’re always here to help. And please comment below if you like this training and or if you want us to answer any question for you. We’re always here to help. This is Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. And we wish you luck. Thanks so much.

How To Get Your Product/Invention Past Idea Stage & Into Retail Stores

New Training on How To Get Your Product/Invention Past Idea Stage & Into Retail Stores!

Do you have a product idea that is smart and innovative? Are you an inventor with great ideas? Are you trying to figure out how to get past idea stage and into retail stores? If so, watch this short training on this topic!

Most inventors are stuck in the idea phase. They have brilliant ideas but don’t go anywhere with them. If you need to get this product into the market, you have to choose how you are going to get started. 

Some things to think about are…will you start a company and launch your new product yourself by investing and creating and launching and selling your product on your own? Or are you going to rent your idea to another company to have them do it? 

There are various options available to you! And you need to assess which option makes most sense to you before you launch this product out into the world and into retail chains. 

In this new training video, I discussed some tips and strategies on what you should do, what steps to take next and which of the options makes the most sense based on your personality and where you are today. So if you want to learn more, you should definitely check out the video!

Wishing you so much happiness and success,

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

Transcript For Video Listed Here…

So let’s talk about how to get your product or invention past idea stage and into retail stores. There are a few ways to get your products in the stores if you are in the idea phase. You kind of have to choose what you want to do. Option number one is you decide to rent your idea to a manufacturer or someone who will make the product for you, create the product and will sell it. And then you get say a few percentage points of every unit sold. So you don’t get to keep the company. It’s not your company. It’s not your brand. It’s not anything. Someone else is going to develop that product for you. And every time they sell a unit, you get a certain percentage. Usually, you know, a very small percentage. 1 to 5 percent I would say typically for a product that you license. And that’s called licensing. 

So the reason why you want to license your product is maybe you don’t have any money to build out a business or brand. You’re not a manufacturer. You don’t have the time to start a business or whatever. And so licensing or renting your idea to a company can be a great option. The problem with licensing is that manufacturers may not pick up your product for various reasons. And if you get a licensing deal, then you need a lawyer, you need to set stuff up appropriately. You need to make sure that you know, they are doing things reliably. And you have no control. A lot of the times what they do with the product is either change it or tweak it some way. Inventors really love their ideas. Start freaking out over the fact that they literally like created a worst product than they have imagined. And so you definitely want stipulations in there on the quality and all sorts of things. 

So the bottom line is that it can be tricky when you rent your idea to a third party. But that is one way to get the word out about your product. And it’s a licensing, basically renting the idea to a third party, you can handle that. Another way to do it is to build out your brand. And that actually means you selling your product to retailers yourself. And what that means is you will have to start your own company and take it seriously. And you can actually go and create your logo, find a manufacturer, invest some money or get some friends or people to help you invest, get some prototypes done, get some samples and so forth. And then approach retail as yourself or hire somebody to help you with that. It does require a little bit more effort. And some of you, your personality would be you would never rent your idea and that you actually want to start a company and that sounds perfect for you. 

The good news is that if you are an inventor and you’ve decided to develop your product and do the work yourself, I have a training system that explains exactly how to do that. I’ve worked with a lot of inventors. So you are never stuck or alone. Someone can actually explain to you how to package your product, how to price your product, how to actually talk to a buyer if you don’t know how. All sorts of things. So there are resources out there available to you today if you want to develop your product and bring it to life. There’s no wrong way to get your products into the stores whether licensing or building out your product and getting it in your way. The trick here though is that you have to take action. For many years, I’ve been teaching tens of thousands of product companies across the globe on how to make money with their physical product. And for the last 10 years I’ve been teaching with this stuff. And for the first 5 years I’ve only been working with inventors and so forth. 

The hard part with inventors is that a lot don’t take action. They have ideas. They come up with brilliant stuff but the actual moving forward is very complicated for them. They need accountability or something. Something’s doing where they don’t take the action to get their products out to the world. And it’s very, very common in the inventor space which is why there are all these Inventor Help companies out in the world who are willing to take your money to go and try and pitch your product in your behalf and so forth which doesn’t always get you anywhere. It doesn’t mean it’s a bad thing. It’s just another way to go. But generally speaking, accountability and taking action is the number one thing I see why people and inventors, product companies are not getting past idea stage and into retail stores. 

If you’re going to come up with this idea, stick to it. Don’t quit. If you decide to start with licensing and you got rejected by everyone all across the board and you learn how to do it. And or you got someone to help you. Don’t quit. Just keep going until somebody says yes to you. Or switch it over to starting a company, building out yourself until that product gets out into the world. By the way, you can develop a product, start a company, build it out and eventually you can actually license that product to companies after. So there is no one way to do it. You don’t have to be just in the idea phase to get your product licensed. You can actually sell the product, get in on to retailers and then license it afterwards. People do that. You actually make way more money as a person who licensed his product. If you actually show proof of concept and you’re out in the world marketing your product and so forth, they actually give you more money for the licensing deal if you do it that way. 

So there’s no wrong way to do it. But the trick is don’t quit .Keep trying different things until you get the job done and that’s the one thing that I had a lot of struggle with. A lot of inventors I worked with so many years and I love them so much. But they really weren’t taking action. They came up with ideas but they didn’t do anything about it. Don’t be one of those guys. And so if you’re willing to learn how to either of these things, we have training systems for all options for licensing and or for selling your products to retailers. And if you want to learn more about that, you can go to retailmba.com. And again we have training systems on how to license and or how to sell to big companies and so forth and retailers and such. So all of that is listed in retailmba.com if you’re actually ready to get on and take action. 

Otherwise, good luck with your product and invention. And I hope that you please don’t quit and don’t let anybody’s rejection keep you away from making money with your ideas. Somebody brought that idea to life. A lot of people have done that and they’ve made many, many millions of dollars and you deserve the same. So just don’t quit. Again, this is Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. Hope that provided value for you. If you want to learn the exact strategies on how to approach, pitch, and sell to retailers yourself, take a look at retailmba.com. Otherwise, subscribe to this channel. Keep in touch with us. We’d love to hear from you or be on the lookout for the next training we create. Again Karen Waksman, Retail MBA, and hope this helps. Thank you!

Menards Supplier – How to Sell to Menards and Become a Menards Supplier

New Training on How to Sell to Menards and Become a Menards Supplier!

If you have a product that is perfect for retail chains, then you should definitely consider selling to Menards, a home improvement retail chain! With over 300 stores currently, they’re located in the MidWestern United States. Their stores can be found across 14 states: Ohio, Michigan, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Nebraska, Kansas, South Dakota, North Dakota, Wyoming, and Kentucky. Menards is also known to be the third largest home improvement chain in the country.

The reason I mention these facts is because this means that Menards has massive buying power! And can be a great retail chain to go after! Also, they are not just limited to selling home improvement products. If you go inside their store, you can find a lot of variety of different products such as grocery items, automotive products, and a whole lot of other random items.

So, if you want to learn more tips about how to sell to Menards and become one of their suppliers, check out my new training video!

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success,

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

Transcript For Video Listed Here…

Hey everyone! This is Karen Waksman, founder of Retail MBA. And today I want to talk about selling your products to Menards. So the reason that I decided to create this particular segment is because I’ve taught tens of thousands of product companies across the globe on how to make money with your physical products and I create training around different retailers because sometimes you’ve never even heard of them. And or sometimes you just need some quick tips and strategies on how to make money with them. So that’s what this training is about.

So let’s talk about Menards. They’re unique in that there are 300 stores that they are responsible for. And they’re mostly located in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Minnesota and basically retailers kind of in the Midwest area. So if you don’t live in those areas, you may or may have not heard of them. So one thing to think about is they’re a home improvement store and a lot of people have not heard of them because they live in different areas of the country. But I’m here to tell you that there’s tremendous opportunities in the world that people don’t even know about.

So yeah, they’re basically located in 14 states currently. And you know, the amount of stores varies obviously as their retail space changes. But they are the third largest home improvement chain store in the United States behind Home Depot and Lowes. Definitely something to explore. So what can I tell you about Menards? They have massive stores, their space location and so forth. And the reason I share that with you is because they have the ability to buy and test out a lot of different products. Some stores are small. They don’t have a lot of room like say GNC or something like that. Very, very tiny stores.

With Menards, they have this huge warehouse spaces which means that they can really bring in a lot of new products and I love those type of retailers. Because although they buy home improvement stuff, they also buy all sorts of random stuff like grocery products and automotive products and stuff you would never think about—electrical products. So my recommendation is to walk their stores anyhow to see what they have going on there ‘coz there stores are typically almost 700,000 square feet. I mean that is insane. That is a tremendous opportunity there. So they test a lot of stuff. They put products in stores. And they buy a variety of different products. So something to think about is that they could be tremendous for your business.

Again, one of the things that is unique about them is that they’re starting to sell stuff like milk and eggs and all sorts of different things in their stores, pet supplies, even mattresses. I mean they’re getting a little bit rogue on the things that they purchase. And so again, if you’ve never thought about selling to them and something to consider, they do change this around, but something to consider.  

Another thing about them is that they definitely buy products by seasons as well. So if your product is great for winter months, or summer months, they actually have buyers for winter and summer and so forth typically for seasons. It’s typically a seasonal buyer. And so that could be one retail buyer that you could reach out to beyond the appropriate buyer for your product type. So seasonal products always have holiday buyers and so forth for certain times of the year.

They usually have buyers for the front of the store and so they have different buyers who buy products much more than just the appropriate buyer for say, you know, your typical hardware product and so forth. So if your product is great for the summer or the winter, definitely see if they have the appropriate buyer for your product type. Again, for holidays as well. The front counter area, they have different buyers. There’s a lot of room and opportunity there.

The other thing is that the Menards store buyer is typically different than the menards.com buyer. The buyers are typically different meaning the stores—the buyers are responsible for the products in-stores. And the online buyer is different. They buy for their website and so forth. And so a lot of times they go test out products on their website to see if your product converts. And then if it does well then they, you know, put it in their stores and so forth. So definitely take a look at menards.com on their website and to see what’s going on there and whether or not you want to sell your products to them because the online buyer definitely has a different budget from the physical store buyer. And so if you can’t get your products into physical stores, maybe you want to consider selling to the online buyer and so forth. So again, they sell so many different products. Go to their website and take a look at what they are doing.

If you want to learn exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell to Menards, definitely take a look at our website retailmba.com. That’s retailmba.com. We basically teach you exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell to retailers. We have free content and we have advanced training and so forth. We have live events, we have certification programs. Basically anything to do related to making money with your physical products. So definitely take a look at retailmba.com. Or subscribe to this channel and keep in touch with us as we have all new content consistently. And we’d love to help you and please comment below if this helps. And or let us know what other information you’d like us to create training about. Again, Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. We’re just here to help. Thanks so much!

Amazon FBA to Retail MBA: How To Scale Your eCommerce Business into a BIG Business

New Training on Amazon FBA to Retail MBA: How To Scale Your eCommerce Business into a BIG Business!

Amazon is a great platform in helping you to grow your business. But if you really want to bring in bigger opportunities for your business, then you should definitely consider looking into scaling your ecommerce business into bigger retail chains!

I’ve had successful clients who have been selling on Amazon.com for years and many of them  now diversify their efforts. They don’t just stick to one platform. Instead, they sell to retail chains like Walmart and Best Buy AND Amazon. Ultimately this is a great strategy in generating more revenue for their company. They know that the key to growing into a bigger business is to expand through retail channels.

So, if you haven’t considered expanding your business beyond Amazon yet, then check out my training video above to learn more. 

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success.

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

Transcript For Video Listed Here…

Let’s talk about Amazon FBA to Retail MBA: How to Scale Your eCommmerce Business into a BIG Business. So many of you are selling on Amazon and you really want to scale your Ecom business. You want to scale it and make lots and lots of money and grow and probably eventually sell and or leave this as a legacy business and so forth for your kids. Or whatever the reason is for you, you’re trying to grow your business out. And I’m here to tell you that almost all of the top Amazon sellers are looking at different distribution strategies to generate more revenue for their company beyond Amazon. 

So the people who are just getting started on Amazon they typically stand Amazon for a while, try to grow their business and so forth and they just get hyper focus on one strategy. The top sellers don’t do that. They’re actually looking for diversification. Why are they doing that? Because they know that one day they’ll probably want to sell their company or do something with their company. And they need to sell more and bring in more volume and dollars. And they know that they cannot rely on one resource to generate all of their revenue which would be Amazon. 

So what they’re doing is that they’re actually looking at strategies like selling to Walmart or Macy’s or Kroger Grocery Store or Bed Bath and Beyond, or Best Buy. And they’re looking to figure out how to do that. And so if you really want to scale your Ecom business, you need to figure out how to get your product into other distribution strategies. And retail, big retail, is the number one way I’ve seen that people can go from having a small to mid-sized business to have it go to a massive business. I have customers who literally have been selling to one retail chain for 14 years straight. They get reorders every single month and they do so consistently. I have other clients who literally just started and suddenly get a chains order and it does so well that they just make millions upon millions of dollars with just one retail chain. This happens all the time. And the question for you is why are you not considering expanding beyond Amazon?

Retail is an amazing way to generate revenue, grow your business, scale your business, and take you to the next level. And trust me, as soon as you start getting into retail chains and people start seeing your products on the store shelves, very cool things happen. I’ve had clients who get their products to retail chains, suddenly they got asked to be on Shark Tank and other TV shows. Or they are asked to work with other retail chains, suddenly call them and ask for orders and purchase orders without having them to do anything. Or suddenly, you know, they get on TV and start selling to HSN and QVC and make millions of dollars there. Or something happens with the catalyst of change that occurs because they went bigger than what they were currently doing and retail chain is a huge catalyst. Millions upon millions of people will take a look at your product and these were all new customers as well. 

So I’m obviously a big proponent on selling products to retail chains. My name is Karen Waksman again. Founder of Retail MBA. And so if you want to learn the strategies on exactly how to do them and how to prepare your product to chains stores, how to get buyers to pay attention to your product, how to grow your business from Amazon to retail, take a look at our website retailmba.com. That’s retailmba.com. We have free content and we also have coaching and training and all sorts of amazing events that we do. We partner with retail chains. And we’d love to help you out so definitely take a look at retailmba.com. Sign up for some of our free stuff and keep in touch with us. When you’re ready to get into retail, I assure you that you won’t be disappointed. It can be the most amazing thing for your business and your bottom line. Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. Check us out. 

Turn Your Shopify Store Into a MAGNET For Retail Companies

New Training on How to Turn Your Shopify Store Into a MAGNET For Retail Companies!

New Training on How to Turn Your Shopify Store Into a MAGNET For Retail Companies!

Are you a Shopify store owner? Do you want to grow your business beyond this online platform? If yes, then you’ve come to the right place to learn how to get retail chains to notice your product if you are using a platform such as Shopify. In this new training video I created, I shared some tips and strategies on how you can expand your business from e-Commerce to retail. 

Shopify is a great online platform for selling products. But if you’re exploring the possibility of turning your online store into a magnet for retail companies, then you need to make sure that you know what to do.

That’s why I discuss some important things that you should take note of so that you can get the attention of a retail buyer faster! Capturing chain store buyer interest with your online store is essential if you want to sell to scale into retail chains. 

So, if you want to learn more information, watch the training video!

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success.

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

Transcript For Video Listed Here…

So let’s talk about turning your Shopify Store into a magnet for retail chains. So if you have a great product and you’re selling on Shopify and you’re now exploring the possibility of, you know, selling beyond just online. You want to sell them to physical stores. This little training segment will walk you through some things to think about in regards to supporting yourself. Because the ultimate goal is to get retailers to pay attention to your product and to buy your product. And you definitely want to have an online presence that is interesting to them.

So the first that I’ve noticed that people do when they’re creating an e-commerce store or whatever it is that they’re doing, and one of the things that they do to deter retailers in paying attention to them is that they don’t have a product video that clearly depicts what the product is and does in 5 seconds or less and then moves on. It could be a 30-second video, minute-long video, whatever. But you know, really, really, quickly in the first few seconds to get the buyer to pay attention to the fact that they understand what the product is and does.

Some products you have to kind of explain a little bit further I understand. It’s not so easy to do. But generally speaking, a product video is essential to your success. And really you touching the product, looking at the product, summary like discussing it some way explaining why that product is so superb for their audiences so forth. That will really, really help you. Buyers really like looking at videos and they’ll absolutely take a look at that. 

The other thing is that buyers are always looking at reviews online and so forth. So if you can kind of control some of that, maybe if you have great reviews on different platforms and so forth, you want to kind of place that on your Shopify store. Buyers love that. So yesterday I was talking to Bed Bath and Beyond because I do events and I partner with retail chains. And Bed Bath and Beyond was reviewing different products and so forth. And so one of the things that she was saying was, “Yes, I like this product” or “No, I don’t like this product.” But this product, you know, they have really horrible reviews and so she’s aware of that. You know what I mean? And so my point in sharing that is that if you do have these great reviews, you definitely want to include it in to your site and so forth because that really, really helps the buyers know what people are talking about. 

I actually have had customers who have gone to buyer meetings and presented all their fabulous reviews to the buyer. Just kind of show them how many amazing reviews there are and the buyers actually purchased the product because of the reviews. So these are really, really nice if you have good ones. Not much I can do for you if you have terrible reviews but you know, let’s just assume that you pluck the ones that are great and you put them on your site. The buyers are actually caring whether your customers like your product or not. 

Another thing to think about is that when you are developing a Shopify store, you definitely want to put the video above the folds, I mean the one the first thing the buyers are looking at. So don’t make the buyer dig around or figure out what your product is and does. Just have it on top and have it in autoplay. That actually really helps the buyer a lot. And then underneath, it does help. You don’t have to do it this way but even all of the as seen on TV sites, they tend to put all the video and stuff above the folds and a very clear explanation of what’s going on there. 

Another thing that a lot of people don’t mention in their websites is they don’t put testimonial videos anywhere. And the buyers love that. They love testimonial videos beyond just reviews but like any sort of video or content related to people loving your product that’s really, really helpful. Buyers at retail chains absolutely love it when you sell your product to other retail chains. It’s the one industry where the buyers are actually happy when you’re selling to their competitors. The reason for that it’s because they think you’re less of a risk. So, at the end of the day means that means that, you know, if a buyer sees that Macy’s or Kroger Grocery Store or whatever is buying your product they believe the product will probably sell and will be more inclined to put it on their stores. 

They don’t like products they’re not sure that’s going to convert. So one hand, they like new interesting innovation and all that stuff but then they also like that you’re selling to other places. Doesn’t mean you can’t tell the retailers if you haven’t sold anywhere else but just be aware of that. So the bottom line is, buyers really like it if you kind of mention that you’ve been selling to other retailers. It makes them kind of happy even if it’s boutiques or whatever is it you’re doing. Mentioning successes is actually a good thing. 

So those are some things to think about. There are add-ons and stuff but…oh! One more thing I would say is that I mean, I’ve seen so many clients of mine who will show me their website, and their pictures are blurry because maybe they didn’t want to spend the money to get fancier photos. Please don’t do that. If you’re going to take your business seriously, like do the job, spend the money or don’t put the product up. Blurry pictures, not magical photos, not so wonderful copy, really make a difference if someone is looking at your site. And all the retailers are looking at people’s websites before they purchase anything because they want to see what’s going and what the world thinks of your product, which is pretty logical. 

So, you know, take the time. Put the effort. Don’t put up anything just to put up something. Care about what you are doing and ultimately I would really, really help you generate revenue with your product at retail chains. Anyways, I hope that provided value for you. Again this is Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. If you want to learn all the strategies. I mean, every single one. I actually know how to approach, pitch, and sell to retail chains. What to say to buyers to get them to buy even if you have zero sales experience or buyer relationship. Definitely take a look at what we’re up to retailmba.com, that’s retailmba.com. We help people with zero sales up to advance sellers get into retailers in a fraction of time. So definitely take a look at retailmba.com to learn more. Otherwise, please subscribe to this channel. Provide feedback. Hopefully you like what we’re talking about and or be on the lookout for the next training that we create. Again, Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. Thanks for your time.

Macy’s Vendor – How to Sell to Macy’s and Become a Macy’s Vendor

New Training on How to Sell to Macy’s and Become a Macy’s Vendor!

Macy’s Vendor- How to Sell to Macy’s and Become a Macy’s Vendor!

Macy’s is one of the oldest and biggest department store chains in the U.S. And despite being a department store, they actually sell more than just clothing!  They sell accessories, jewelry, furniture, gifts and even food! So many products you wouldn’t even think of. I mention this because many entrepreneurs overlook Macy’s because they are a department store.

So, if you think you have a product that could sell in Macy’s, then check out my latest training video about this retailer. In this video, I shared the top 5 reasons why you should definitely think about selling to Macy’s. I also mentioned some few tips and strategies on how you can become a Macy’s vendor today!

To learn more, you will just have to watch my training video on “How to Sell to Macy’s and Become a Macy’s Vendor.”

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success.

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

Transcript For Video Listed Here…

Hey everyone this is Karen Waksman, founder of Retail MBA. Today I want to talk about the top 5 reasons you want to sell to Macy’s. And the only reason I decided to make this particular segment is because I’ve taught tens of thousands of product companies across the globe on how to get their products in retailers and Macy’s comes up a lot. So I want to give you some reasons to sell to them and some quick tips and strategies on how to get started today.

So let’s talk about Macy’s. Well, first of all they have almost 650 or more stores that they’re responsible for currently. That is tremendous buying power. So one reason you want to sell to Macy’s is because one order from them can make millions of dollars to your business and your bottom line it can mean 10x or 100x in your business simply by getting an order from them and being consistent with them.

Another reason you want to sell to Macy’s is because it makes you become the cool kid on the block, right. So once you get your product to Macy’s, everyone else seems to start wanting to pay attention to you because it’s not the easiest thing in the world to sell to Macy’s. And so, all the best distributors and the best reps will start paying attention to your products because you are selling to Macy’s and so forth. And so all of the sudden you start getting calls from other retailers and other distributors. I see this happen all the time. Once you get open one chain store account or one department store account, all of sudden everybody starts knowing about you and the phone calls will start coming. And I’ve seen a lot of my clients actually get phone calls from retailers once they open one or two accounts like that. So definitely want to explore just because you’re growing your business in general.

Another reason you want to sell to Macy’s is because they sell a lot more products beyond just clothing. They sell footwear, accessories, bedding, furniture, jewelry, beauty products, and houseware products. They even sell food. I had one client who got his chocolate product into Macy’s. I mean that is so random, right? But if you walk around their stores, you’ll see that they’re selling random different products and you can get your products in there. So one reason you want to explore selling to them, is because a lot of your competitors, like for instance the chocolate guy, I got his product into Macy’s because none of his competitors were thinking about selling there. So that’s a really really big deal.

Another reason you want to sell to Macy’s is because if you are a woman or minority-owned company, they love working with minority or woman-owned businesses. And if you get certified as a woman-owned business or minority-owned company and so forth, and you can show them that certification they have a major department for diverse suppliers. They actually have full on training and they’re always constantly looking for diverse suppliers because their customers are diverse.

And they know that and so they’re looking for diverse suppliers to match that. So they definitely are exploring people like you if you are a woman, minority-owned company even better in companies and so forth. But really at the end of the day, they are looking for diversity because their customers are diverse as well and so if you can get certified and then reach out to the diversity divisions and or just be a supplier that is diverse, that would be really really huge for you.

The final thing is that their corporation is in New York, right? So they have this one massive Macy’s in 34th street and so forth in New York. And so they actually have the ability to let you stand near your product. They allow it at that major Macy’s, sometimes they test products just in that individual store. I’ve had clients who actually reached out to me after they reviewed information for me on how to sell to Macy’s and got Macy’s to do a test order with them and they literally were able to get the Macy’s buyer to let them sell their product at that store. And you know, have people walk by and just kind of pull them in to buy products and so forth to help them along with selling their products. Meaning that if you can join that buyer in that retailer at that corporate store not only where you get your product in the coolest store in the United States, one of them. But you can also support yourself because they allow things like having you stand by your product while you’re selling it and so forth. Not saying they’re going to do that for every product but a lot of time you’ll have people demonstrating their product to the stores.

And So Macy’s is very aware how fun that store is so they definitely allow you to do some creative stuff. I’ve had people actually tell me that they got like window displays setup and so forth because again that particular Macy’s of the corporate office location, that area in New York, really is kind of magical and they allow you to test and do really interesting things there. So those are the five reasons I think you should go after Macy’s.

If you want to learn exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell to them, I hope to have you take a look at retailmba.com. That’s my website, retailmba.com. We explain exactly how to do that and how to get started today. I’ve taught tens of thousands of companies on how to get your products to the stores. And so we’re here to support you. Or please subscribe to our channel and or be on the lookout for additional training that we create.

We are here to expedite the process of making money with your physical products and that’s what we’re all about. We can help you more retailmba.com. Sign up to one of our free pieces of contents or take a look at our advanced training, live events, certification programs and so much more. Karen Waksman, Retail MBA, I hope this provided value. Thanks so much! 

Rite Aid Vendor – How to Sell to Rite Aid and Become a Rite Aid Vendor

New Training on How to Sell to Rite Aid and Become a Rite Aid Vendor!

Rite Aid is one of the largest drugstore chains in the United States. That is the reason why so many entrepreneurs are interested in selling to them! So, if you have a product that you think will be perfect for this massive drugstore chain, then you should definitely check out this new training video I created on How to Sell to Rite Aid and Become a Rite Aid Vendor! 

In this video, I talk about some tips and strategies on how to sell your product to Rite Aid. I also cover some of the things that you should think about before approaching them. With the sheer volume of stores they’re currently responsible for, just think of their tremendous buying power and how massive this opportunity will be for you if you approach them with your product!

And the best thing is that Rite Aid is not just limited to drug and health products. They sell a variety of different products in so many different product categories. Do you want to learn more? You’ll just have to watch the video!

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success.

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

Transcript For Video Listed Here…

Hey everyone, this is Karen Waksman, founder of Retail MBA. Today I want to talk about Rite Aid. So if you want to sell to drug stores like Rite Aid, I wanted to create a quick training segment to give you some tips and strategies and things to think about. In every video create, I try to create some variety and new things about selling to retailers and so we’ll talk about Rite Aid and give you some strategies to get started today.

Please know I’ve taught tens of thousands of product companies on how to sell to stores. And so this information just comes from my training segments and also from clients and so forth, all people who got into stores because of my content. So let’s talk about Rite Aid and if I would want to give you some things to think about, it would be the fact that they have over 2,500 stores that they’re responsible for currently. This changes a little bit but 2,500 stores in 19 states that means they have tremendous buying power. They have 51,000 employees currently. I mean that is a huge business. One chain store order can 10x or 100x your business and definitely Rite Aid can do that.

So people always ask me, “Karen, how much do they buy? What kind of quantity? What kind of volume does it look like to work with a retailer?” So I want to give Rite Aid as an example. So I have client who recently got orders from certain drug chains, and so basically what that looks like is they say buy around 30 units of your product for one individual store. And if they decide to work with you, they typically buy, you know, for maybe a hundred of their stores or maybe 15 or tops stores and so forth. And if the product sells, then what they’ll do is that they’ll reorder the product for all of their stores eventually, right. The product sells, they’ll eventually keep buying and hopefully they’ll buy for all of their stores. Obviously, it does depend on the product type and if it makes sense for all their stores and so forth, but a lot of times, if the product does well and does convert one to ten stores, they tend to buy more and they consistently buy. So the initial test order would be something like 30 units on average and for, I don’t know, 50 to 100, 150 stores, sometimes more depending if they believe in your product.

So let’s just do the math on that. So what happens if you put your products in the stores and the test goes well, meaning that they just buy x number units of your product, what will happen is that if they buy say 30 units of your products for 2500 of their stores, I mean, that’s you know, a huge amount of money for your business and in your bottom line. I mean, if for 30 units, 10 to 2500 stores, we’re talking 75,000 units of your products. I mean again, that is tremendous and that’s just one retail chain.

So the goal for this little segment is just to give some you a food for thought and the kind of opportunity and volume and so forth. The other thing to think about is with Rite Aid, they buy a lot of other products besides drug products, and health and beauty and cosmetic products. They buy electronics. They buy shoes, they buy even hair accessories. They buy all sorts of different things, and so definitely walk in their stores to see what they put in there.

They also have seasonal buyers, people who buy for the seasons, stuff for the winter, and stuff for the summer and so forth. So if you’ll see in their stores like where I live, I live in the beach town, and so basically I’ll always see fun things like you know, beach gears, and stuff for the summer months. And then like if I’m in different areas they’ll have more winter stuff and so forth. And so the concept here is there are seasonal buyers who buys according to the season.

Another thing to think about is beyond the fact that they sell massive product and your product could fit in the seasonal section of the stores and so forth. And in that case, you don’t need to sell the all 2500 stores. You could probably sell to the regional buyer who buys for certain sections and certain times of the years and certain locations. So the regional buyers can buy for the North East regions, Southwest regions and so forth. The cool thing about Rite Aid is that beyond their corporate buyers buying products for all of their stores, they do have regional buyers and so forth. And they deal with seasonal and so forth.

Anyways, I hope that provided value for you. If you want to learn exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell to retail chains such as Rite Aid, take a look at our website retailmba.com. That’s retailmba.com. We explain exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell to them. We have free training. We have advanced training that you could purchase, live events, all sorts of cool stuff related to making money.

Otherwise, please subscribe to our channel. Be on the lookout for the next training that we create. And we’d love your feedback if you have any request for additional training you’d like us to create, please mention that in the comments below. We’re always here to give you nuggets of gold and help you make money with retailers. Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. I hope that provided value. Thanks so much!

Inventor Vs Entrepreneur (…And How to be Both!)

New training on Inventor Vs Entrepreneur (…And How to be Both!)

New training on Inventor Vs Entrepreneur (…And How to be Both!)

Are you an inventor or an entrepreneur? What’s the difference between the two? Well, from what I’ve noticed, the difference is that inventors tend to be typically more focused on the product or invention functionality while entrepreneurs look more into the business opportunities of the product or invention they created. I mention this because I meet so many inventors who do not know how to generate revenue once they actually create the product. They spend a small fortune on their idea but then they go nowhere with it. 

The one thing in common between an entrepreneur and inventor though is that both come up with new ideas. Both are capable of putting a product out there for the world to see, which means you can be an entrepreneur and an inventor at the same time! 

That’s why I created this new training on “Inventor Vs. Entrepreneur (…And How to be Both)!”

I created this training because I don’t want you to be one of those inventors who doesn’t ever sell their product. I’m here to help you become an inventor and an entrepreneur at the same time. Go ahead and check out my video to learn more!

(For those of you who prefer to read this content, transcription is included as well below!)

Wishing you so much happiness and success.

Karen Waksman, Retail MBA

Transcript For Video Listed Here…

A lot of inventors have brilliant ideas. They’re probably the smartest people in the world, I think. I love them, I enjoy them. The first five years of my business I only worked with inventors so I understand you really really well.

A lot of inventors come up with ideas, maybe you don’t have a lot of money but you’re very creative and you’re trying to bring your product to the world. And that’s fantastic! Unfortunately, in order for you to make money out of that product, you got to actually desire making money and really committing to making money and let me explain that. So the inventor who has ideas and tries to hand over that idea to a third party like Invent Help or whatever it is, tend to get their business stuck in a way that I’ve never seen. They spend ten grand, 20 grand, supporting up a third party that go help them get their product out to the world and hoping that someone else will take care of their business and so forth.

But the problem with that inventor who’s handing over their business to somebody else is that they’re not taking responsibility for the product itself and they tend to be less than 1% successful typically, not to bad mouth any invent company. They do, on occasion, support. But just the stats in the world alone regards to product, most inventions and most physical products don’t make any money and or very few do. And you know, it’s less than 5% that are actually crushing it with their product and so forth. And so I want you to be in that small percentage. And don’t count me on that 5%. It’s some small version of that are making real real money with their products, many many millions of dollars with their products and I want that to be you.

So what I’d say to you is that if you’re going to go and try to hand off your business to a third party, you’re going to have a very difficult time because what matters with physical products is that you put the energy behind it in order for it to succeed. So let me explain. I work with so many people across the globe. I’ve been doing this for so long. The people who sit with their product, stare at their product, commit to their product, choose to sell their product even though they hate selling, choose to figure what they’re going to do to tweak the product if the product doesn’t sell, choose to not give up until that product converts into making money is the person who is going to make money. The person who is looking at the product and says “Oh I have a great idea. I’m just going to hand it over to somebody else to go manage it” very barely actually converts into a lot of money. I barely, like I’ve been doing this for so long, I don’t see that very often.

Yes, there’s exceptions to rules but most of the time they’re literally stuck in their kind of dreamland with their invention and actually converting it to anything else. You have to care more than anybody else that your products going to get out to the world. You have this idea and it deserves to be in the world and only you can take it to the next level. It doesn’t mean that you’re always going to be a sales rep. It means that you’re going to be the one who sees it through whatever it takes. You’re going to take classes, you’re going to learn in trainings, you’re going to commit to it. You’re going to say “I will not stop until I convert into making money.” And that’s the person who’s going to become the entrepreneur.

So question number one: Are you willing to do that? Are you willing to be the person who’s actually going to just be like everybody else who comes up with ideas that die out in the world or you can actually take something with what you are doing and create a world where they know about your product. And I hope that you become the entrepreneur. Now, if you are willing to take the action, my recommendation is to study. And the reason I say that is because I meet people all the time and they’re coming up with ideas but they don’t their opportunities and so they lose out on a lot of opportunities.

For instance, some people just say well I just want to license my idea or write my idea to a company and have them go produce it. But maybe they don’t understand what that looks like and they lose a lot of opportunity and revenue. When you write your idea to a third-party company, on the one hand you get a percentage of every unit they sell of your product. On the other hand, you know if they’re actually building out your product, they’re not doing a very good job at it, your product could go nowhere. So you really have to commit to understanding who you’re partnering with beyond just making a quick buck. You have to really understand the company and what they’re actually going to do to ensure success with your product and so forth. And a lot of times, inventors get signed up to work with third-party licensing their product and then the product goes nowhere. And they don’t make any money and they lose that out on that product for ten years because they didn’t know what they didn’t know.

Not to scare you and that’s not my tactics. But just what you know will make the biggest return of investment. Other inventors who are willing to do little bit more work and understand who can maybe possibly get some money together and not spend the 20 grand and hire somebody out to go license their idea could take that money and start a small company and spend a portion of that figuring out how to actually sell that product to retailers and or wholesalers and or distributors and or sell it on TV, HS and QBC, and sell it to websites like Groupon and sell it to corporations like bookstores, museum stores, and so forth and are willing to invest a little time and effort can make a bundle of money and if they’re willing to put their back into it and actually learn how to do that they can make a fortune and so forth.

So at the end of the day, the difference of an inventor and entrepreneur is someone who is not going to quit and don’t hand away all your business right away upfront. Learn what you’re about to do. See where all the different revenue opportunities are for your business, then make wise choices and hire the appropriate people. Otherwise, you might be the type of person who hires a rep who takes a year to get a product out in the world and doesn’t do anything for you and so forth just because you didn’t know what you didn’t know. So that’s why I do what I do. I walk people through exactly how to approach, pitch, and sell to retail chains and I have many other strategies on how to make money with physical product beyond retail because not every product makes sense for retail.

So if you want to learn more, you can take a look at what we’re up to retailmba.com or subscribe to this channel. We’re constantly giving away free content and helping you support yourself generating revenue with your product, the things to think about and so forth. But I hope you become an entrepreneur, the committed one, the one that takes actions, the one that doesn’t quit, the one that does the work, the one that learns and studies and educates themselves and you know, don’t have off your business, do the work initially and see the biggest return of investment there. Again, Karen Waksman, Retail MBA. Hope this help. Thanks so much!