Sunday, September 23, 2007
Posted by branddaze at 8:47 pm

We've had a few people emailing us recently wondering what they need to make full use of branddaze and how they should get started. This blog post then, is your guide to using branddaze to make a living!

What Do I Need to Join branddaze?
You don't need that much to join branddaze. The most important things are:

Somewhere to sell the merchandise you buy from branddaze¡¯s suppliers
This could be a website of your own, an eBay account, Yahoo auctions, Amazon auctions, Ubid, your own store, Craig's List, a local flea market, classified ads in a newspaper or trade magazine¡­there are plenty of different ways, online or off. You don¡¯t have to choose where you are going to sell your merchandise before you join, but it helps to get it sorted as soon as you can. It's important to know the market you are selling in because this will alter what sort of products are in demand and how much you can expect to get for them.

But don't feel you have to limit yourself to just one selling forum--many of our members use more than one, maybe even three or four.

Some money to spend on your wholesale lot.
This doesn't have to be much, in fact $50 is plenty to get you started. However, recognize that the more money you are able to invest, the better prices you will be able to get and therefore, the greater your profit margins. For that reason, being able to spend $500-$2,000+ is ideal, but you can take your time working towards this.

If you don't have much money to spend, then that's okay. What you need to do instead is put as much time as you can into your business. If you can replace money with time, you'll do just as well in the end. Problems start though when new members don't have either time or money. It's not an uncommon conundrum! The world being the way it is, it's hard to find much time in a busy schedule. Yet, even so, we encourage you to try your very hardest to squeeze as much time as you can into your business. Start off with just half an hour a day and try to increase that amount as soon as you can. Remember: If you are really determined to make a success of this, you will. And we are here to help!

How Do I Get Started?
Once you have joined  branddaze, follow these simple steps to getting started:

Decide what to sell: This involves getting to know your market. If you are going to be selling on eBay for instance, sign up and start selling a few thing s from around the house to get a feel for how things work and what's in demand. Make a list of possible things to sell based on your interests, trends and things that you've noticed there is a demand for during your time selling bric-a-brac. Narrow this down a bit, perhaps by getting a small wholesale lot (5-10 pieces) from eBay and selling that to test the waters. eBay is an excellent place to find merchandise to sell, particularly if you¡¯re on a small budget.
Search the Salehoo database for suppliers: Search by supplier type, country or by a brand name.
Compare suppliers for prices, brands and ability to keep up with your business as it expands. Don¡¯t forget that you can get better prices by emailing the supplier and mentioning that you have been referred from Salehoo, rather than simply buying from the website.
Order a sample: Some suppliers will send you to this free, others will require you pay for postage, and others will ask you to pay for the cost of the item and postage--it depends on the supplier and the value of the product you wish to sample. A sample gives you a change to test the supplier's service and the product's quality.
Work out your costs: These include the cost of the wholesale merchandise, any storage costs, auction listing fees or website maintenance costs, auction success fees, Paypal fees and shipping costs. This is a critical step in order to work out whether you can really profit from a particular item. You'll also now be able to decide what you need to sell the item for in order to cover your costs, be competitive and make a profit.
Place your order with the supplier.
Store the inventory using an organized storage system when it arrives. It's a good idea to give each piece of inventory a number as it arrives to help keep track of everything. You'd be surprised how easily items can go missing!
Sell your merchandise--whether that be on eBay or at your local flea market. Be sure to invest the profits back into your business to ensure that you can keep increasing the size of your wholesale purchase!