Hi everyone!
I hope it’s okay to talk about this on this forum, as it’s not about selling via Folksy…
It might be that nothing comes from this, but someone has approached me about possibly stocking some of my jewellery in their boutique shop. She is my husband’s best friend’s mum, so she may have contacted me out of courtesy and it may be that nothing comes from it… but I have no idea what to expect as have never sold via any other means but Folksy before.
Does anyone else out there sell to shops? If you do, do you give them stock for them to sell and take commission or do they buy your products at a reduced price and sell on themselves with no further contact with your shops? I’m wondering about the costing too- what commission would they take/ what kind of discount (if any) would you give to these kinds of buyers?
Any advice/ comments would be greatly appreciated. Like I say, it may all come down to nothing, but in case something happens I have no idea what is normal and what’s not!
Thanks 
Jennie
1 Like
I used to sell through a gift shop and we agreed on a sale or return basis and I got 50% of the agreed price. So the items that I would normally sell for £10 here were sold for £10 there but I only got £5.
You would need to have the discussion with the shop about whether it would be a sale or return basis (ie if it doesn’t sell you get the stock back) and how much the commission is or a whole sale basis (ie they buy the stock from you). Whole sale pricing is normally less than half the retail price (the usual multiplier to get from whole sale to retail pricing is x2.4 so if you normally sell an item for £10 (RRP) then the whole sale price would be £4.17) so you need to look at your pricing structure and what of your stock has sufficient profit margins to do that on.
This might help you and make more sense than me. http://blog.folksy.com/2014/03/18/cats-how-to-price-your-work
Sasha
2 Likes
Different shops have different ways of going about this.
Most of the ones I’ve sold through have been on a sale or return basis, with the shop taking varying amounts of commission - For me this has ranged from the shop taking between 35% and 50%. I found the 50% one was ok when I first started out but became frustrating as I built up sales in other places.
I’ve only had one shop where they have bought my work outright to sell on, which is great as you get a decent amount of money coming in in one go.
If you go for sale or return you should discuss details such as record keeping, expectations about restocking, displays, pricing & security of your items. And of course get the best percentage for yourself that you can.
There are additional benefits, in that you get your business seen and promoted throughout the time that the shop is open. Try to make sure that there is a ready supply of your business cars for people to take away and hopefully then look at your Folksy shop.
Good luck!
If this is through a friend of your husband you must make sure the agreement is one you are both happy with it put it in writing and possibly run it for a trial period say 3 or 4 months. Make sure your dealings are professional that they don’t spill over into personal relationship if there are problems it can be more difficult to resolve if friendship is involved. Hope that makes sense.
Hazel
