Struggling to find a distributor.

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Me and a colleague have gone into partnership selling sports clothing. It is combat sports clothing and we have found an awesome supplier who also manufacture for our competition. Our items are basically the same but with a few tweaks to prevent any copyright infringement. All the items are high quality and of the same exacting standards that many top athletes wear.

However, we've come to abit of a crossroads. We can't grow the company unless we have big contracts to service.

We have approached leading sports outlets but had absolutely zero response. Am I correct in approaching the CEO's or do I have to look further down the chain of command?

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jonamv8 said:

Does your product have enough of a usp???

Yes, the name itself is a very very strong selling point. We have some contracts with councils and schools but servicing these alone will not result in our growth expectations.

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IATM said:

With all due respect it looks like you have badically found a supplier that supplies a product to another business and you have decided to copy it 99% and only changed maybe the label or tweeked it enough so you don't get into trouble for it.

Distributors are not daft or silly and probably can see this a mile off and if item A is already on the market from your "competitor" then unless yours is very different/better or significantly cheaper then why would they bother.

The majority of our product lines (70%) are not with any major sports wear network. Only 'specialist' suppliers are selling them and making 800-900% margins.

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KFC said:

Schermerhorn said:

Yes, the name itself is a very very strong selling point.

How did you come to that conclusion?

Because we've been approached by competition who tried to buy the rights to the name from us. It's a unique name and strong selling point and sums up our brand in three words.

However, all laughing aside, I still need to know how to approach a distributor!

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KFC said:

Schermerhorn said:

Because we've been approached by competition who tried to buy the rights to the name from us. It's a unique name and strong selling point and sums up our brand in three words.

However, all laughing aside, I still need to know how to approach a distributor!

A 3 word brand name with nothing else behind it isn't a USP.

I am not saying it is. I am saying it is a good name, we have been approached for the rights and we have a good product. We need to amalgamate all that together and try and create something viable.

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allergictocheese said:

KFC said:

Someone asked "Does your product have enough of a usp???" and you said yes, the name.

I'm oot.

In the outdoor/active market name and brand can be the only tangible USP where product specification is similar across an industry.

Indeed.

We have just got another 2 contracts yesterday so we are slowly growing but a truly big deal still eludes us.

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andy-xr said:

Schermerhorn said:

Am I correct in approaching the CEO's or do I have to look further down the chain of command?

There's 2 schools of thought in approaching a prospect, top down or bottom up. It often depends on the company size, smaller companies will still have loads of offers daily, but the bosses will be the ones dealing with it. Larger companies, the CEO or MD wont be arsed what new possible product comes to them. You need Supplier Relations, Buyers, Finance and then C level if they have to autograph something interesting.

Disties can be picked up easy enough if what you've got represents an opportunity. Channels on the whole are lazy though, they'll sell what they know earns them regular money, so even if you go in with 800% markup, if it's cost plus 800 of £3/week, it's not interesting enough. They need to be dragged into something, then you'll get focus once they can see the money. By and large, a distie is a credit line and insurance if things go tits up with an end customer, and they tend to come into their own when you want to sell bigger and more often. You'll have to take this out to market initially to show sales focus, traction and have a decent plan to scale to show anyone who's already selling something along these lines how they can make money quickly and often

Thanks. Great reply.

This week all I have done is focus on is chasing customers. I have 14 schools, a sports centre and some council leaders interested. Its only locally bases but we're also planning to sponsor some athletes too in the not too distance future which will givs us some more broader exposure.

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All awesome stuff guys. Please keep it coming. You can never learn enough.