Over the past two weeks I've been telling you about how I first started conversations with Harrods about stocking my biscuits and the first time I submitted samples to Harrods. If you missed these post then do go back and read it first. 

​Out of the blue in May, I got an email from a distributor in who was the main vendor for a national garden centre chain. The distributor & garden centre buyers had met and they were interested in stocking my Christmas biscuit range in 100 garden centres across the country. I had no idea I was even on their radar.

This was huge!! The sales forecasts were big, and they would need to take delivery late autumn. But there was no way I’d be able to do it all on my own, and from home.
​
The plan was to move into premises late Summer. This was exactly why I was moving to premises, to do these sorts of projects. But I hadn't planned to do something so big, so soon. The unit I had my eye on was a complete shell. I’d need to find all my equipment, get it all installed, find staff.

I had 4 months. On paper it seemed impossible. But if the figures stacked up it would be a big cash injection into the business just when i needed it. Could I make it happen?

I’d never worked with a distributor, in truth I didn’t really understand exactly what a distributor was. I had lots of questions about how would it work. The first conversations I had with this distributor were around barcodes, margins, pallet deliveries and they sent me a complicated spreadsheet with lots of figures that I needed to fill in.

The distributor wanted a quick response if we were in, because their Christmas catalogue was about to be sent to the printers. I didn’t have much time to decide.

I spent some time working through the financials, because it was only worth doing if the money stacked up. I needed to make money from it, the distributor would want their cut and then we had to think about the garden centre’s mark ups. I remember having a conversation with my accountant about the difference between margins and marks up. I had thought they were the same thing but they are not.

​I was also worried about production. What if I couldn’t get staff in time? How would I cope with getting familiar with the new equipment? The garden centre wanted all 8 products in the range. How would I even go about putting together a production schedule?

Luckily I’d gained some experience of working in a commercial bakery during my time at Peggy Porschen but I still had so many questions. But I wouldn’t be able to get answers to all of these before I said yes. There were some things - like finance, payment terms, product catalogue etc that would be cleared up straight away. But some questions that would only be answered over the course time.

I had many long conversations with the distributor and my accountant. I also had a friend who was really good at spreadsheets and organising and I roped her in to help me think about how I’d do the production side of things, how / when we needed to order supplies, what quantities etc etc.
​
All this against a backdrop of still doing orders to keep the money coming in, and doing all the work on getting the premises set up, sourcing equipment etc.
It seemed to good an opportunity to turn down. And it would give me and my new team (when they arrived) the chance to “learn” while doing “doing”.
So, I decided to go for it.

​Did it all go well? Mostly.

Did I make mistakes? You bet!

Was it worth it? Absolutely.

Some key take aways from today’s blog post:

➡️ Often when one door closes, another opens.

➡️ Sometimes in business (as with life) you have be prepared to take a huge leap of faith and take the first step in the direction of your dreams even though you can’t see the whole path ahead.

➡️ Each level of your business will require a new you. A new set of skills, a new approach. What gets you to a level, won’t always keep you there. So be prepared to upskill yourself, work on your mindset every day so you are open to making changes and seizing opportunities when they come your way.

➡️ If you’re doing the right things to market and promote your business on a regular and consistent basis, opportunities will come your way. Opportunities that you can’t even imagine.

➡️ When you’re faced with a new situation, do the work to figure what you do know and what you don’t know. Then go find someone or some way to get answers to your questions. Don’t let your own lack of experience or knowledge stop you.

➡️ Whatever situation you find yourself in I can guarantee you there will be someone out there who can help you. You just need to find them.

➡️ You can spent a lot of time in your business working on the hypothetics. But you only really learn and gain experience through actually doing.

Next week - finally. How I got listed with Harrods. And as you've probably guessed, this too, didn't quite happen how I'd expected.

Have you been enjoying these blog posts? What have you learned? Let me know your thoughts / comments below.

If you're a food entrepreneur looking to gain listings with premium retailers like Harrods, Fortnum & Mason and Selfridges, I can help you to hone your pitch, coach you in negotiations and generally be a sounding board to help you to achieve your listing. I can give you much needed insight into the process which will save you time and money, and vastly improve your chances of becoming a supplier. 

Contact me here to arrange a free 20 min call to discuss coaching packages.

​

So I told you last week all about how I first started conversations with Harrods about stocking my biscuits. If you missed last week’s post then do go back and read it first. 


So January 2015 came round and no news from Harrods. The Christmas design brief didn’t materialise. I chased a few times and finally got a reply to say that the brief would be circulated in April. 


Spring arrived, it was a busy time for me, I was running my business from home but this was becoming really difficult. I was regularly turning down large orders of 1,000’s of biscuits. I’d done all the right things to ‘play big’ and it was starting to pay off. But I couldn’t meet demand. So I was planning a move into premises, which in itself was a massive undertaking. I was researching equipment suppliers, thinking about recruiting staff all while still doing the day job of baking & shipping biscuits. 

When the Christmas brief landed in my inbox, I was so excited. There were lots of really interesting designs that were right up my street. I worked up the designs, made up samples and sent them in. 
​

​Harrods loved them. But one of the issues that cropped up was around natural food colouring. Harrods I can  be very strict on only having natural food colouring in its own label products. A lot of the designs they’d put forward had bright christmas themed reds and greens. It was really difficult to achieve these colours with only natural food colours.

I spent about 4 weeks going back and forth between the buyer who was sourcing the biscuits, and the food technologist who knew all the technical stuff to see how we could come up with a solution. 
​

Finally, the reworked samples were ready. To my surprise, the buyer invited me to meet with her to go through the samples in person. On the day, I headed into London with my box of samples, a bit apprehensive and turned up at the store at the allotted time. Only to find that I hadn’t read the address details properly on the email signature and so had turned at the store. The buying team was based as the HQ offices in Hammersmith. 


I rang the buyer to explain and she had a good chuckle and assured me I wasn’t the first person to make that mistake. I hot footed it over to Hammersmith and had the meeting which took place in room full of what looked like a Santa's Grotto filled with cake, biscuit, gingerbread etc samples from the likes of Biscuiteers, Juliet Sears, Fiona Cairns. I felt immediately out of my depth (bet Fiona Cairns didn't end up at the wrong meeting place!), but I held it together and the meeting seemed to go well.

​

I was expecting to get some feedback within a week, but again, a good few weeks passed with no news. When I finally managed to reach the buyer she explained that they were still making decisions. 


One of the things she explained was that first they looked at the individual items to make sure they were of the right quality, design etc. Then the next stage would be to plan the range, so how did all the different products from all the different suppliers fit together into one cohesive Christmas range, offer a great variety to the customer, at the right price points.


Another couple of weeks passed by without any news so I rang the buyer again who explained that they’d made the decisions and although they loved my products, they wouldn’t be listing any this year and to try again next year. 


I was gutted. Was it worth trying again? All that effort & energy, maybe it was not meant to be? Why did I - a newbie baker from Luton - think that I could compete with the likes of Biscuiteers and Fiona Cairns? I was ready to give up on my Harrods dream.

​Some key lessons:


➡️  In the larger stockists, there will sometimes be a split between the buying team who know all about trends and the look, feel and price of the products they want to buy in. And the technical team (in this case food technologists) who know all about the technical specifications. The two sides don’t always have the same approach / requirements so it can take some time to navigate the process.

➡️  Sometimes you can put your heart, soul and energy into something and get a knock back. Many times, on more than one occasion. Only you can decide whether to cut your losses and move onto other things or to stick with it. There’s no right or wrong answer.

➡️  You have to trust the timing of your life. That’s not always evident at the time, you can only join up the dots looking back. That Summer I was negotiating a lease, hiring staff, managing builders. I would not have had time to do all the design, audit, specification stuff & get listed.

➡️  Although it didn’t feel like it at the time, none of the effort, energy & learning was wasted. Each try was a step closer to success and I learnt something new and gained invaluable experience.

Tell me, what would you have done? How do you think you would have handled the situation? Let me know in the comments below.

My Harrods story didn't end here.  An even bigger opportunity was about to hit my inbox. Tune in next week for the next instalment.
​
If you're a food entrepreneur looking to gain listings with premium retailers like Harrods, Fortnum & Mason and Selfridges, I can help you to hone your pitch, coach you in negotiations and generally be a sounding board to help you to achieve your listing. I can give you much needed insight into the process which will save you time and money, and vastly improve your chances of becoming a supplier. 

Contact me here to arrange a free 20 min call to discuss coaching packages

Getting a listing with Harrods was my dream. A goal that I’d set myself very early on when setting up my food business. In this series of blog posts I’m going to tell you all about my journey with Harrods. 

Over the next few weeks, I hope to show you, through my experience, how there are very few overnight successes when it comes to business. But how, with commitment and determination, you can achieve amazing things in your food start up journey. So, find a comfy chair, grab a cuppa & let’s get started.
​​

Then it went really quiet. No replies to my messages.

A few weeks later I got a message from the buyer, to say that they’d loved my designs but as the quantities they were looking to order were so small, they didn’t think it was worth putting me through the onerous Harrods supplier audit. But that I should submit samples for Christmas and they’d be in touch in the following January. And, by the way, she was leaving so was handing me over to her replacement.

I was devastated to have come so close and to have missed out. At the time it didn't feel like it, but in hindsight I can see that I learned some valuable lessons from this experience:


➡️ Sometimes you do the work, you jump through the hoops but it doesn’t lead to anything. It’s goes with the territory. You have to be in it to win it. It's always worth giving it a go.


➡️ In the beginning its okay to feel nervous or uncomfortable with approaching buyers. But don’t let this stop you. Maybe you can get someone else to make some calls for you. It’s always easier when you’re less emotionally attached to an outcome. 

➡️ You are absolutely the best person to sell your brand. Buyers will always want to get to know the founder/creator of the business. At some point you need to get comfortable with stepping into this ‘sales’ role, otherwise you’ll never move forward.


➡️ Buyers move on. You get to know a buyer, take time to build up a rapport, get them behind your brand. And then they leave. And you have start all over again with the new buyer.


➡️ Sometimes things don’t always go to plan. Try to be prepared - have spare samples, send important deliveries with tracking, make your samples stand out. Often, its not what happens but how you deal with it (and how quickly and professionally you respond to any issues) that matters.

Luckily, my Harrods journey didn’t end there. 


Would you like to hear what happened next? Click here for the next instalment. 
​
If you're a food entrepreneur looking to gain listings with premium retailers like Harrods, Fortnum & Mason and Selfridges, I can help you to hone your pitch, coach you in negotiations and generally be a sounding board to help you to achieve your listing. I can give you much needed insight into the process which will save you time and money, and vastly improve your chances of becoming a supplier. 

Contact me here to arrange a free 20 min call to discuss coaching packages.
​

When you first launch your baking business or go from being a hobby baker to a business baker, it can be hard to work out your prices. I remember when I took redundancy and started my iced biscuit business all of a sudden it became really important that I got my prices spot on, that I covered all the costs because I needed to make sure that my business was profitable in order to earn a living.

If I hadn’t taken these important steps, I’m not sure my business would have survived the first couple of years. It would have been easy to keep my prices low to keep the orders books full. But ultimately I wouldn’t have made any proper money. It’s not a nice feeling when you get to the end of the year and do your tax return and find you’ve been working hard all year for pennies.

If you’re not a baker, but have a creative business where you make handmade products, then the principles below will count for you too.

It is possible to charge fair prices and run a profitable business by following these 5  key principles:


1. Define your business model.

The first step to working out your pricing takes you right back to the basics of your business. What sort of baking business do you want to have?

As you’ll see in the slide above, you can sell 3 cakes per week for £100 per cake and turnover £300 or you can sell 30 cakes per week for £10 per cake and turnover £300 per week.

Would you like a premium baking business, where you make fewer hand made cakes, but at a higher value? You will need fewer customers, but they will be making a more considered purchase so you will really need to show the value of what you offer.

Or

Would you like a volume based baking business where you need more customers buying at a lower price. This is likely to be a more impulse based buying decision, based on cost more than anything. So an easier purchase.

There’s no right or wrong answer here, it’s just a personal decision. Both businesses make the same amount of money, but are very different in the way they offer their goods and services and different in the way they price their products.


2. Get comfortable with charging your worth
​

Common things I hear food entrepreneurs say:

-I don’t include a salary for myself as that would make my products too expensive.

-I could never charge that much, no one will buy my products.

-I feel uncomfortable charging those prices. I personally would never pay that much!

-I know that’s what I should be charging but I usually charge less to make sure I get the sale.

It’s not unusual as an entrepreneur to feel uncomfortable with the idea of charging what your worth. But to move forward in your baking business, you have to, at a basic level accept that your products are worth a fair price.

​Related: 25 Great Places to Sell Your Food Products

It’s tempting to keep your prices low, which keeps the orders coming in and makes you feel like you’re growing and making money. But ultimately, this is not profitable and not sustainable.

If your baking business is to grow and flourish, you have to get comfortable with charging a fair price, where all the costs have been factored in. It is possible to charge a fair price and grow your sales, as long as your customers understand the VALUE of buying from you. To do this, you need to continually communicate & deliver VALUE to your customers.
​

3. Use the Pricing Formula: Overheads + Hourly Rate + Raw Materials + Value = Profitable Price
​

To give a fair price for your products, you need to include a cost to cover your time (HOURLY RATE).

You also need to cover any costs like website, electricity, telephone, premises costs, insurance etc etc. Some of these would be apportioned for the amount of time you actually use them for the business (OVERHEADS).

Then the costs related to actually making your products (RAW MATERIALS).

Lastly, you need include an additional amount (normally called a mark up, but here we’ll call it VALUE). This does a few things, firstly it gives you a buffer in case of price rises, or if there are any costs you haven’t include elsewhere. If you have a ‘hand made’ business then this mark up will be important and will allow you to offer the ‘add ons’, personalisation, high level of customer service, giving your customers an exclusive buying experience. I find that it helps to list everything out and then allocate costs to each of the headers and upload them into a spreadsheet.


4. Do a reality check

Once you’ve got the costings drafted in your spreadsheet, its time to do a REALITY CHECK

How do the prices look? How do they compare with the industry average, or prices in your local area, or against your competitors prices?

Do they seem too low? Have you properly costed in your time? If you had to produce 10 of your products in certain timeframe, how long would it take? Would it feel like a fair reward for your time and effort once you’d covered all your costs?

Do they seem too high? How and why does the price differ from the industry average, from competitors prices? Can you justify this? How will you clearly communicate this to your customers?

Have you allowed enough of a buffer in case of price rises for example?

What about corporation tax, VAT (if applicable), and postage – how will you incorporate these costs? Make any adjustments needed in your spreadsheet.


5. Time to ditch the hobby baker mindset.
​

It’s really important that you adopt the right mindset. Because you’re running a business. Yes, to be able to do something you love & put your gifts out into the world. But if you’re serious about running a profitable business, then you need to make the shift and adopt a business mindset.

And get clear and comfortable with the financials, with costings, and the idea of working to make a PROFIT.

Sometimes this may mean that you need to make tough decisions about what’s working and what’s not. What you keep and what you discard. What makes money and what does not.

This is not always easy because we are human, emotionally tied to our work, to our craft, to our skill and our products.

But remember, by ditching the stuff that doesn’t stack up financially, this leaves you free to concentrate on creating products that are profitable.

So be brave, be flexible and most importantly – take action.

Once you've sorted your pricing, you'll be keen to start finding customers and ramping up the all important sales. 

Have you downloaded a copy of my 25 Great Places to Sell Your Food Products Checklist? Get your copy here.