Starting and scaling a candy/sweet brand

[CandyCrafters]

I have a couple of years of experience selling themed candy in the US under my own brand. I found a niche and expanded into it, and so far it has gone well. My main channel there is Amazon. I want to bring that concept to the UK, creating a new candy brand. Based on my research, Amazon is not the right place in the UK for selling food and making money from it.
I have solid branding, suppliers, etc. My plan is to set up a tiktok shop and launch new products there, posting some content myself and then using affiliates to push sales. Once I have proof of sales I want to take that to small shops/distributors, and slowly scale from there. I also want to try and get my sports/football themed sweets into the stadium concession stand space.
Based on my research, retailers will want an approximately 50% gross margin before VAT, whilst distributors will want 25 - 35%. Is that correct? What kind of introductory offers/launch incentives should I offer them to make it a no-brainer to stock my product?
Is this plan at all realistic?
Thanks for any and all advice.

 

[Paul Kelly ICHYB]

Welcome.

Based on my research, Amazon is not the right place in the UK for selling food and making money from it.

What research is that?

The thoughts (not a plan) are possible (almost anything is!), but it will take a lot of work and investment.

 

[lattod]

I have a couple of years of experience selling themed candy in the US under my own brand. I found a niche and expanded into it, and so far it has gone well. My main channel there is Amazon. I want to bring that concept to the UK, creating a new candy brand. Based on my research, Amazon is not the right place in the UK for selling food and making money from it.
I have solid branding, suppliers, etc. My plan is to set up a tiktok shop and launch new products there, posting some content myself and then using affiliates to push sales. Once I have proof of sales I want to take that to small shops/distributors, and slowly scale from there. I also want to try and get my sports/football themed sweets into the stadium concession stand space.
Based on my research, retailers will want an approximately 50% gross margin before VAT, whilst distributors will want 25 - 35%. Is that correct? What kind of introductory offers/launch incentives should I offer them to make it a no-brainer to stock my product?
Is this plan at all realistic?
Thanks for any and all advice.

Loads of people selling on TikTok lives, so that's a quick easy way to get some early wins.

Also - social media is free, so livestreams will help - you could even use restream.io to livestream in multiple places all at once.

Your margins are about right too, retailers want 40 to 50% before VAT and distributors 25 to 30%, and remember sweets are 20% VAT in the UK.

Sale or return on the first order is the big unlock for indie shops, and a free counter display beats a price drop every time.


On stadiums, the big grounds have catering locked up with Levy, Delaware North and Sodexo so it's a tough cold approach. Start lower, Sunday league and grassroots clubs, get some proof on the sidelines first and work your way up.

Also worth flagging UK labelling rules are strict so your US packaging won't work as is.

Hope that's useful

Dan - Digital Marketing Agency Owner

 

[CandyCrafters]

Welcome.


What research is that?

Extensive research on Amazon UK, on search volumes, pricing, margins, sales, fees, etc. It's just not worth it for me.

I know it will need a lot of work and I'm not scared of that, but before I put in all that work and money, I want to be as sure as possible that I have my numbers and ideas right, and that the premises I have regarding margins and plans to break in make sense.

 

[CandyCrafters]

Sale or return on the first order is the big unlock for indie shops, and a free counter display beats a price drop every time.

Thanks! Sale or return and a free counter display are enough? I was thinking more in terms of rebates linked to better shelf placement, and if the product is still available for sale after 30/60 days.

 

[Data Swami]

I have a couple of years of experience selling themed candy in the US under my own brand. I found a niche and expanded into it, and so far it has gone well. My main channel there is Amazon. I want to bring that concept to the UK, creating a new candy brand. Based on my research, Amazon is not the right place in the UK for selling food and making money from it.
I have solid branding, suppliers, etc. My plan is to set up a tiktok shop and launch new products there, posting some content myself and then using affiliates to push sales. Once I have proof of sales I want to take that to small shops/distributors, and slowly scale from there. I also want to try and get my sports/football themed sweets into the stadium concession stand space.
Based on my research, retailers will want an approximately 50% gross margin before VAT, whilst distributors will want 25 - 35%. Is that correct? What kind of introductory offers/launch incentives should I offer them to make it a no-brainer to stock my product?
Is this plan at all realistic?
Thanks for any and all advice.

Tiktok seems to be a big hit for alot of Sweet brands they do live boxings etc

 

[fisicx]

Thanks! Sale or return and a free counter display are enough? I was thinking more in terms of rebates linked to better shelf placement, and if the product is still available for sale after 30/60 days.

You want better shelf placement you pay them. Even sale or return will be hard unless they get your product from the same wholesaler they get all the rest of their stock.

I know one business that travels the country hand delivering their products to garden centres. They fill the shelves themselves - almost like a franchise within the store. They have to do this as they can’t get the wholesalers to do the distribution for then.