Who can I pay to SELL merchandise for me?

4 replies
Okay, I pretty much want to sell shirts (with my own designs), vinyls/graphics, keychains, and pretty much anything else you can brand - with my own brand.

Is there a way for me to automate the sales process so that I don't have to keep a physical inventory of products myself? I understand profits will be much less since I'll only be making a percentage on the sales.

Would it be best to do everything with a cafepress type site, or set up my own ecommerce site and find a way to automate orders with the suppliers?

I'm totally new at this, so I'd appreciate any advice you guys have for me. Thanks.
#merchandise #pay #sell
  • Profile picture of the author AceOfShirts
    I get asked this question all the time.

    It is better, easier and faster to start with CafePress. The best reason for this is you don't have to stock any inventory. Yes, you make a lot less commission, but you also have no risk. Use CafePress to find out what sells, then get a printer/supplier to make the times that sell in bulk.

    You won't find many suppliers that will make items "on demand" at a low enough price for you and them to make a profit at what the customer is willing to pay. Plus you probably want the supplier to take care of all the shipping requirements also. It takes about as much paperwork and time to ship 1 item as it does shipping 24 items, but with 24 you can spread the shipping expense out better.
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  • Profile picture of the author travlinguy
    Originally Posted by tooAlive View Post

    Okay, I pretty much want to sell shirts (with my own designs), vinyls/graphics, keychains, and pretty much anything else you can brand - with my own brand.

    Is there a way for me to automate the sales process so that I don't have to keep a physical inventory of products myself? I understand profits will be much less since I'll only be making a percentage on the sales.

    Would it be best to do everything with a cafepress type site, or set up my own ecommerce site and find a way to automate orders with the suppliers?

    I'm totally new at this, so I'd appreciate any advice you guys have for me. Thanks.
    What you need is an order fulfillment service. This is a company that you'll ship bulk quantities of your products to and when you get an order you contact them and tell them where to ship it.

    This can all be set up online so you don't have to actually contact them for each sale you make. Here are several companies that do this. I have no affiliation with any of them.


    Fulfillment Services | Third Party Logistics | 3rd Party Logistics
    SureSource LLC
    Fulfillment | Fulfillment Services | Fulfillment Warehousing
    Specialty Fulfillment Center - Order Fulfillment
    ABDI Product and Publications Fulfillment - E-commerce - Customer Service
    Product Fulfillment Services | eCommerce Order Fulfillment House | eFulfillment Service, Inc.
    http://www.netsuite.com/portal
    Business.com - Find, Compare, & Research B2B Vendors
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    • Profile picture of the author Bill Farnham
      Fulfillment services can be a blessing or a curse. You need to find a fulfilment house that knows the difference between infrastucture and efficiency.

      Years ago I was being given a guided tour of a fulfillment house and was astonished by how they thought their massive 300,000 sq.ft. warehouse was going to impress me.

      We walked through a door and there sat a bank of almost 100 computer terminals that the young lady said was part of their 1-800 call center and all I thought to myself was "Crap, there isn't a single person manning any of these phones!"

      When we walked out into the warehouse area it was immediiately clear the package volume being shipped, and the workforce employed was nowhere near what was needed to sustain the infrastucture.

      After the tour we went to her office and she gave me the numbers it would take for them to handle the fulfillment end for the product I was asking about. I smiled nicely throughout the presentation thinking to myself, "Are these folks on helium?"

      Needless to say they didn't get the job, and the reason I'm bringing this up is because to a novice it may be easy to be enticed thinking, "Well, these folks are certainly equipped to do the job, they must know what they are talking about, I guess that's the price I'll have to pay."

      Here's a tip...know your numbers going in. This is strictly a math exercise on your part. If you can't find a FH that allows you to make a profit you either haven't looked hard enough, or your margin figures are incorrect, or you've misjudged or misplaced some of the other cost driven factors. Hopefully you at least know what the market will pay for your product.

      Also, there no harm in starting out small and then outsourcing the fulfillment. And as Ace of Shirts pointed out, you can also test the market by using CafePress, et al so you only make the merchandise that sells.

      ~Bill
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  • Profile picture of the author BHeard
    I agree with Bill, untily you become large enough to fulfil - this is not a prudent option
    something like cafe press or one of the others like them does allow you to test he waters on a range of things - selling designs etc without a great deal of expense
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