There are 2 important things I’ve learned about this business that I would like to share with you today. These aren’t necessarily brand new revelations, but I thought I’d blog about them since they seem to be recurring themes:
1) Always remember that the number one goal for sales people is to make sales. Especially in this economy, sales people will try to get you to buy stuff even if it’s not what you are looking for. For example. many of the leather sales people I had encountered claimed that the vegetable-tanned leather they had in stock would work for my bags. It wasn’t until I tested the leather by rubbing it and throwing water on it did I see that some of the leather they were pushing me to buy weren’t good enough for my bags. These salesmen were desperate to sell me goods, even if it meant that down the road I’d be a very unsatisfied customer.
2) Most suppliers and manufacturers in this industry are not trained to be conceptual people. As such you should always try to show vendors or sewing contractors a finished product sample to help them understand your needs. Sketches and “works-in-progress” are usually too ambiguous for them and should not be used. This is the hardest lesson I’ve learned so far. Finding a great prototype or sample maker is hard, but when you do find someone good and they produce something tangible that you can show people, it makes a world of difference. Today I went to the plastics vendor and showed them my purse organizer. As I mentioned before, they didn’t have the part I needed, but today they were able to see the prototype construction and assess what materials could be substituted. The sales rep seemed to really understand what I needed and was very eager to help me once he saw the product in-person. He said he could get me the sample materials in a week. I hope this works out!
Thanks for reading and following me through my journey. See you tomorrow!