An awesome idea but no idea what's next

[bluelightning2k]

Hey guys.

I've been playing around with an idea for a while now, and I'm now pretty convinced that it really is an awesome idea. Basically, I believe I've found somewhere where customers are available and possibly even willing to pay slightly more than usual.

The products would be gifts - anything you might buy to give to somebody, retailed online.

The problem is... supplying this service. It's actually harder than you might expect. I've had no luck finding an economical and attractive set of offerings through any dropshipper or any other arrangement. Reach certainly has to include America/Canida, and definitely the more countries the better.


Any advice on getting this set up? It's pretty annoying -as I really do believe I could actually sell the stuff. Also - while you're here, if anyone can reccomend good low price gifts (token presents, thankyou gifts, and some more expensive stuff) to stock, that would also help.

 

[SillyJokes]

Hmm, finding this hard to understand. You have a market who are happy to pay too much for something?

How long is that likely to last do you think?

 

[cjd]

The problem is... supplying this service. It's actually harder than you might expect.

I seriously doubt that.

The idea bit is trivially easy. For some reason it's been put about that ideas are important and all you need. I suppose it's what people want to believe.

It's true that without the idea nothing else happens, but turning it into a successful business is 99.9% of the difficulty - it takes money, time, determination and effort and, mostly, luck.

 

[bluelightning2k]

Well, even for a second if we assume that I do actually have a surefire way to sell this stuff even at convenience store or higher prices (not that I'm assuming this!) how would I go about setting this up?


To Sillyjokes - I think I may have found an interesting sales channel for these products. It's only a concept though at this stage.


To CJD - I agree and disagree. It depends how you define an idea. Let's take Larry Page for example, an 'idea' could have been simply to set up a better search engine, and I'd agree that from there you've made almost no progress. However, when the idea includes a method, (pagerank) you're onto something there. No?

Anyway I'm getting pretty distracted from the point here.

 

[JamieM]

It's a pretty tough one to advise on when we don't know what it is.

What are you looking for? Dropshippers? You are just going to have to keep persisting with suppliers but maybe you need to fill them in on the plan. If it's as good as you say I'm sure they'll be happy to help.

Alternative.........is holding stock not an option?

 

[cjd]

Sorry I don't mean to be so negative but if you're finding it hard to find dropshippers for gifts, you're just scatching the surface of how hard it is to create a business from an idea.

If you can say what exactly it is you're looking for maybe someone here can help you with it.

 

[bluelightning2k]

Well I'm a bit unsure of the order to do things in, scrambling around, and the fact that I have no capital hardly helps!

I've found some good products at good prices from a wholesaler. The problem is I'd really need some dispatch facility in the U.S, as sending goods to here and then from here would be absurdly non-economic.

I don't know if I should start looking for an average-Joe U.S citizen who can help with this aspect, find somebody who's already selling these things and make a deal, or what. Anyone have any experience of a similar situation?


The problem with this whole thing is the complexity. There's the retail side, the backstage tech side (massively hard), then there's the need for a storefront as well, built from scratch probably as out of the box just won't fit this particular spec.

So if anyone's had any advice getting a semi-ambitious project off the ground I'd love to hear from you, and anyone who's sold goods in the U.S whilst being a U.K resident.

 

[cjd]

And you still don't think the idea was the easy bit?

The first rule of international trade is 'do it at home first.' It's difficult enough setting up a domestic business (with or without capital and experience) let alone doing it remotely from another country.