If you read my May 28 post about Kraft's new item Pit master's Choice Barbecue Sauce you will see what Kraft was doing. It was a big test! This year Kraft has introduced a fill line of flavors in this size with the new formulation that does not use corn syrup. I guess the test must have worked!
I find it very interesting Wal Mart was the test store for this idea. I found out last week that Wal Mart asked a major tea company to make a product for them that no other retailer had. This year that company is presenting this item to all retailers.
I am wondering if the high cost of getting new items in grocery stores and the high failure rate has caused less and less innovative new products being developed and introduced?
If you have anything to add on this topic please make your comments at the bottom. I would love to hear your stories.
Wednesday, March 18, 2015
Wednesday, February 18, 2015
Tax benefits of a home based business
Home based business tax benefits
First let me say I am not a tax expert. I can tell you what
my personal tax experience has been and how things have worked over the years
for me with regards to taxes. I would suggest you get professional help (CPA)
for your taxes if you are going to have business related expenses.
If you have a business that is profitable or unprofitable
there is legal tax benefits associated with that business. This is true even if
the business is part time and operates from your home or apartment. If you have
a regular job you can save taxes by operating a part time business because of
these deductions. If the part time business has a loss, that loss lowers your
taxable income form your regular job (saves you taxes). Your business does not
have to be incorporated for this to happen. In today’s world if you can lower
your tax bill you have made money! It is really nice when you have a
professional prepare your taxes using your home based business expenses and you
get a nice refund check. It’s like getting a raise from your regular job!
How does all this work. Very simple, first get involved with
a good home based business. Click here for my suggestion. Pay for everything
with a check so you know exactly where your money is going. If you use a credit
card keep all the statements so you can
pick out the business related expenses at the end of the year.
When you start making money from the home based business you
may have to pay quarterly estimated taxes (why you need a CPA) to avoid penalties. You will get a 1099 from the company paying
you so all income will have to be reported on your personal 1040 form. That is
why keeping up with the expenses each month is so important.
Almost every new business is unprofitable the fist few
years. This is when these losses will be taken away from your regular job
income. Your goal with the home based business is to “grow” the business to the
point that you no longer need your regular job. One of my life’s biggest
mistakes was working for a company I did not own.
The list below is some examples of expenses you can use in
your home based business.
-
Internet costs
- Education (seminars, ebooks, reports, other info products)
- Advertising (Adwords and any other advertising costs)
- Hosting
- Domain Registration
- Professional services (software development, graphics, coding etc.)
- Child care (daycare)
- Healthcare costs
- Computer and accessories
- Charitable contributions
- Home office furniture
- Office supplies
- Postage
- Car/Truck Mileage for travel related to the business
- Business use of home
- Utilities
- Cell Phone and service
- Financial services (tax preparation etc.)
- Business meals/drinks
- Legal fees including LLC/Inc. formation
- Renter/Homeowner Insurance
- Real Estate/Personal Property tax
- Education (seminars, ebooks, reports, other info products)
- Advertising (Adwords and any other advertising costs)
- Hosting
- Domain Registration
- Professional services (software development, graphics, coding etc.)
- Child care (daycare)
- Healthcare costs
- Computer and accessories
- Charitable contributions
- Home office furniture
- Office supplies
- Postage
- Car/Truck Mileage for travel related to the business
- Business use of home
- Utilities
- Cell Phone and service
- Financial services (tax preparation etc.)
- Business meals/drinks
- Legal fees including LLC/Inc. formation
- Renter/Homeowner Insurance
- Real Estate/Personal Property tax
Go here to learn about the home based business I like. E-mail me here if you have any questions.
Friday, January 2, 2015
Arthur Rock, legendary venture capitalist in Silicon Valley
California, said if you invest in forty start up high tech companies one will
be so successful you will make all your money back and much more. Jordan Adler,
the number one money earner in Send Out Cards, has said if you sponsor forty Marketing Distributors in Send Out
Cards, one will end up building a massive business. To me network marketing is
no different than the venture capital business; both have a high risk of
failure with a huge upside for success (money). The BIG difference is you do
not have to invest millions of dollars in network marketing so the risk is far
less. Less risk is the right direction. Visit http://www.sendoutcards.com/107314
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Learn from smart marketing people
I learn things by watching what smart marketing people do.
Kraft foods has many smart marketing people working for them. They are the
leading food marketer in the US so when I see them do something new I pay
attention. What’s new at Kraft this summer? They introduced a new barbecue
sauce brand name. It is called “The
Pitmaster’s Choice”. Now on first look this is not such a remarkable thing
for Kraft to do but look closer.
The product is only one flavor and one size – 28oz. They put the product on a pre-built display
that is marked “Limit Edition” and put a value retail price on it -$2.00. The other thing that caught my eye is the
formulation. First ingredient is sugar not high fructose corn syrup. No water
is on the ingredient statement. This formulation is much more expensive than their
regular barbecue sauce or even their premium brand Bulls Eye.
I have only seen this product in Wal Mart. If this item is exclusive to Wal Mart that
would be another fact to take notice of. Wal Mart for several years has
merchandised the larger sizes of barbecue sauce off the bottom shelf. This was done
to get consumers to trade up thus bringing Wal Mart a higher dollar sale and
maximizing the categories profits. I have always thought this to be a good
merchandising idea and have often wondered why more retailers did not copy this
strategy. Could this new Kraft item be
part of that strategy? I had a Wal Mart buyer that would share his thoughts
about the category and how to increase sales and profits. His idea was if the consumer has a larger amount of barbecue sauce they will use more sauce each meal and
use it for more meals. In other words if you got it you will use it. I think
this is the idea behind 2 liter soft drinks (or larger sizes).
Ok, so Kraft sales person knows the category strategy for
barbecue sauces at Wal Mart. This is how he/she introduces this new item to the Wal Mart buyer; How would you like a Kraft barbecue
sauce in an economy size, most popular flavor, premium formulation, and value
priced? How would you like an exclusive
on this product? All you got to do is buy my pre-built wing pallet display three times
in 2014 and we can make that happen for Wal Mart.
Why would the buyer make this deal? It has all the elements
to make a huge category increase in sales and profits for Wal Mart. Not to
mention there is most likely a media program that will include coupons and
radio advertising. This product is pointed right at the serious barbecue sauce
user (heck they named it Pistmaster’s choice) as well as the person reading
product labels and all the negatives about high fructose corn syrup. Large
size, value price, and on a labor reducing pre-built display. How could they say
“no”?
One more point; The pallet display holds 150 bottles. Based
on a $2 retail I estimate the unit cost to be $1.60 so the delivered cost on
this display is $240.00. If Wal Mart puts this display in 4,233 stores three
times in 2014 that would be a total sales of $3,047,760.00. That would make Kraft Pitmaster’s Choice the number 1
barbecue sauce skew in the US! Not bad
for one point of distribution!
This is more sales than I was doing with Big Show Foods my
best year of a ten year run. My single best marketing tool at Big Show Foods
was a pre-built display holding a combination of three flavors and a total of
600 bottles. Guess who purchased all the displays? Yep, Wal Mart!
One last thing to think about; what is the consumer
psychology of putting “Limited Edition”
on the pallet display SIX different
times? You think it creates a sub-conscience desire with customers? I could
write a book on this subject.
I value your questions and comments.
Are you planning a large size pallet display for your
brand? If “yes” call me at 919 349 7874 or e-mail me at tom.price@earthlink.net for some
cost information.
Wednesday, March 19, 2014
Up Date on Uncle Yammy's barbecue sauce marketing plan
Scroll down a few post to read about how I am helping Uncle Yammy's brand.We just received sales results for Food Lion. After four weeks of TV advertising sales are UP over 550% vs. same weeks last year! Keep in mind this was done in the winter when people were not cooking outside. We have attracted around 1500 new customers to the Uncle Yammy's brand. Stores are experiencing out of stock conditions after four weeks. The only other area Uncle Yammy has store out of stocks is a market he has been in twelve years. Effective marketing built the Uncle Yammy's brand to a level in four weeks that took twelve years to accomplish in another market.
Guess what? The lift in sales has paid for the marketing plan! We will continue to invest marketing dollars in this market until we reach our goal of having 12,000 new customers. This number of customers should buy between 1,000 and 1,200 cases of product per month. What would happen to your business if you had a lift in sales like this?
E-mail me at tom.price@earthlink.com if you have questions or call me at 919 349 7874.
I value your comments so please tell me what you think about my blog posts. My goal is to help people market their brand by sharing things that work.
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
How do I get started?
I get asked
this question a lot; I have a great barbecue sauce. All my friends like it. I
make small batches and sell. What do I do next?
If having a
food business is your dream you are in very good company. Believe it or not
most of the great food companies in America were started by an entrepreneur
making small beatches and selling to their friends and neighbors. Look at the company
history of Campbell’s Soup, General Foods, H.J. Heinz, and most every product
in the frozen food case. They were all started by people with a dream and the
drive and determination to make it happen.
Can it
happen today?
The short answer is “yes”, but there are some major things that
have changed that make it a lot harder to get a food company off the launch pad
today. The first thing that is different today is the grocery store business. One
Hundred years ago there was only one chain grocery store. The rest were small “mom
and pop” type locally owned grocery stores. There were not as many products and
the new products generally were innovative and stayed on the shelf long enough
for “word of mouth” advertising to build the brand. Not as true today with most
new products being line extensions to existing products or just “me too” type
products with little or no real point of difference. That is not to say all
products introduced today are not innovative—yes some are but not many.
When I
started in the grocery business working for a major national manufacturer way
back in 1976 the business had started a major change in direction. All
the power in the grocery business was in the hands of the major manufacturers.
Companies like Proctor and Gamble, referred to as Proctor and God in those days,
told the retailers what to do. All the P&G sales reps looked, dressed, talked,
and acted the same. P&G had the best training program in the business. They
could change a person’s personality through their training. Most if not all
grocery buyers hated them because they told the buyers what to do. Why? Because
P&G controlled consumer behavior through their TV advertising. If P&G
ran a TV ad the grocery store “HAD” to have the product on the shelf. There were
only three TV stations in most markets and TV advertising was very powerful
especially when skillfully done. My favorite story about P&G was when Lever
Brothers came out with Surf Laundry detergent. All the grocery buyers were
singing a little jingle that said “Surf’s in Tide’s out” because they thought
Surf laundry detergent was going to knock a big hole in Tide laundry detergents
market share and they were going to do everything they could to help. See if
you can find Surf detergent today.
P&G was
not the only company that used the power of TV. The corporation I worked for
took a simple aspirin pill and turned it into a mercurial pain reliever called Anacin.
They took a high grade soap and turned it into “dry cleaning” in a bottle –Woolite.
They solved a very distasteful problem
with a product named Preparation H. It was all done using TV advertising and a
lot of money was made in the process. My company was named American Home
Products but Wall Street called it American Home Profits.
The shift in
power from brands (manufacturers) to stores (chain stores) was helped because
of cable TV. Remember when cable TV came out? People said why pay for something
that I get for free now? Now if you do
not have cable with over one hundred channels you are living in the dark ages.
At the same time grocery stores turned into be big chains that built stores as
fast as they could lay brick. Result? Manufactures no longer had the control
over consumer behavior due to the many channel options and chain grocery stores
started springing up like weeds.
I remember
the day I called on a buyer to present a new item (Woolite Upholstery Cleaner)
and he said “Tom, you got a great product BUT to get it in my 126 stores you
are going to have to give me 1 free case per store”. I was shocked! He wanted
me to “Pay” to get on his shelf??? Fast forward thirty years…….. The going rate
for distribution in the barbecue sauce category (in the South) in a medium size
grocery chain is $10,000 per item IF the buyer likes the rest of the marketing
plan. That marketing plan better have a lot of ways designed to get the
consumer to try your new product or $10,000 will not buy you six inches of
shelf space (on the bottom shelf).
Can a new
consumer products company get started today? I like to say to make a small
fortune in the food business today start
with a large one! Stay tuned for some things I have learned that will not cost
you a dime.
Please make
comments. Comments help me understand if I am helping people and they also help
me understand what people need help with.
Sunday, March 9, 2014
Marketing will
result in increasing brand awareness and sales
What is marketing?
Marketing is the process of communicating the value of a
product or service to customers for the purpose of selling that product or
service.
Three key words in
this definition; Communicating, Customers, and selling.
In my view the word “communicating”
is the most important part of Marketing. All communication done to build a
brand should result in positive behavior
by the customers. The most positive behavior is the purchase of the product.
Small food
manufactures have the problem of not having enough margin to allow them the luxury
of investing in effective Marketing or
communicating.
But wait! What
happens if you can do this effective communicating for FREE? Yes FREE! Would
you not want to do this? But How?
You as a small food entrepreneur
must master (learn) to use the free marketing tools available today. They are
ranked in order of importance;
Web page
Facebook page
Blog
Youtube
Twitter
These five FREE
marketing tools can take your company up the ladder of brand awareness and get
your sales to a level of profitability without you spending a dime!
What could
you spend your time on more productive than learning to master these tools?
IF YOU ARE
MANUFACTURING YOUR OWN PRODUCT STOP NOW.
Find someone to do that for you and spend the time you were spending on
manufacturing learning these marketing tools. If you need help finding a
manufacturer for your product call me at 919 349 7874 or e-mail me at tom.price@earthlink.net and I will help
you find a co-packer and show you how to use the aforementioned marketing
tools.
I welcome your
comments and they are greatly appreciated. Visit my web page at www.cardmarketingplan.com to see
how I personally use these marketing tools.
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