The Wholesale Forums

[Daz]

Hello everyone.

I am looking into opening up a small stall in my local shopping centre. Can anyone give me any good ideas on products to sell? The stall will be located in the middle of a shopping centre and will have thousands of people passing everyday. what products can attract there attention? what products will sell? Any ideas, any help is appreciated. Please note - I am in no way competition to anyone on this forum. Any stock I buy will only be sold on my stall within my shopping centre to help me ( a 17 year old boy) a decent weekly wage. Thank you

[Beneddie1112]

First of all, have you checked the price?

[Daz]

The price of what? Opening up the stall? I am in the process of doing so. I have been told estimated figures, but i have a rough figure in my head. I believe i would need sales of around 500.00minimum profit per week from sales, for it to be worthwhile after i pay for rent.

[PT]

Look around your local area and get an idea of whats already going on, you don't want to jump right in and be selling the same products as every other trader. You could also visit some near by towns and see what others are selling (merely for inspiration ).

Nobody's going to hand you a list of products and say, buy from here and sell for this much - it doesn't work like that. However, there are endless products.

There are many items which will only do well at certain times in the year. For example, 2008 calendars should fly out right now, they can be sourced for 60p each, if not lower (retail them at £3, or two for £5). After the school holidays, they'll be people racing around for books, pens, paper, and so on. All of which can be picked up for pennies and sold on for a few quid. At Christmas, people want decorations, wrapping paper, and greetings cards. If you can get some good deals and make passers by aware of them.

Do you want to be a jack of all' trades or specialist in one area (something like tools, light bulbs, batteries, etc.). That's the big question, which would be profitable for a stall? - I couldn't tell you. Trial and error, I suppose'.

I wish you the best of luck anyway mate.

[Daz]

Originally Posted by PT Games

Look around your local area and get an idea of whats already going on, you don't want to jump right in and be selling the same products as every other trader. You could also visit some near by towns and see what others are selling (merely for inspiration ).

Nobody's going to hand you a list of products and say, buy from here and sell for this much - it doesn't work like that. However, there are endless products.

There are many items which will only do well at certain times in the year. For example, 2008 calendars should fly out right now, they can be sourced for 60p each, if not lower (retail them at £3, or two for £5). After the school holidays, they'll be people racing around for books, pens, paper, and so on. All of which can be picked up for pennies and sold on for a few quid. At Christmas, people want decorations, wrapping paper, and greetings cards. If you can get some good deals and make passers by aware of them.

Do you want to be a jack of all' trades or specialist in one area (something like tools, light bulbs, batteries, etc.). That's the big question, which would be profitable for a stall? - I couldn't tell you. Trial and error, I suppose'.

I wish you the best of luck anyway mate.

Thanks for the info, i will take it all on board. I do have some ideas, i do have some experience from selling on ebay. I did that for about 2years and made a good income. I am not doing it so much, as even although i was earning a good wage, my parents didnt want me in the house day after day after day, so i had to go out and get what they would call a real job. I can see where they were coming from, but its sales i am interested in and i see this as a starting spot for me. My ideas at the moment are, Bloomingdales little brown bags, these are sold on ebay for around 20quid i think. How much do they retail at? I have never saw them in any uk stores? i think these would go down a treat, as i think they would generate alot of interest from a lot of teenage girls. I was told they can be bought for 8dollars in the usa? I also had ideas of items such as gloves hats scarves. suitable for the winter, or even all year!! in scotland.I also have a few other ideas, me and my dad have recently set up our own website. So i am hoping for that to develop. Its a holidaypubguide. Basicly its a website with numerous different holiday locations, you can go on and post a review of a pub you have been to on holiday. We sometimes have competitions for the best review, someone recently won a new digitial camera. We intend to eventually have pubs all over the world to sign up with us and they can advertise there pubs on our website. It will take time, but i think it could be a good 1. The website is www.holidaypubguide.com if you want to post a review. Eventually we hope it to be a very popular for holiday makers to visit to get the best pubs to go to when on holiday.

[PT]

Keep the eBay business going, having two incomes is better than one.

Ideally, you want products which will be profitable both on eBay and on your stall. Having two venues to sell at will help you allot, I'm sure there will be many days where you will go through slow patches.

Remember, you should put a lot of thought into what your going to sell, as well as research. Get it wrong and you'll spend endless days without any sales. It can also be a costly exercise, so extensive market research is a must.

How about mobile phone and console accessories? Get them direct from the source in China. You should catch the attention of all the young'uns, if your located near a school/ college then their ideal. You could offer an unlocking service too (read up on the legalities before hand though). There's many products you need to address a product/ market your local community is in need of.

[Daz]

Originally Posted by PT Games

Keep the eBay business going, having two incomes is better than one.

Ideally, you want products which will be profitable both on eBay and on your stall. Having two venues to sell at will help you allot, I'm sure there will be many days where you will go through slow patches.

Remember, you should put a lot of thought into what your going to sell, as well as research. Get it wrong and you'll spend endless days without any sales. It can also be a costly exercise, so extensive market research is a must.

How about mobile phone and console accessories? Get them direct from the source in China. You should catch the attention of all the young'uns, if your located near a school/ college then their ideal. You could offer an unlocking service too (read up on the legalities before hand though). There's many products you need to address a product/ market your local community is in need of.

Thanks again for the info. I will take it all on board. it is very much appreciated. I am actually located near to secondary high schools. The mobile phone and console accessories is a possibility, i would have to look into it as i dont know much about that sort of thing. any other help will be appreciated. thank you

[Beneddie1112]

Some of them cost hardly anything to source wholesale from China. The unlocking is easy, all you need is a laptop.

[redsky]

Originally Posted by Daz

The price of what? Opening up the stall? I am in the process of doing so. I have been told estimated figures, but i have a rough figure in my head. I believe i would need sales of around 500.00minimum profit per week from sales, for it to be worthwhile after i pay for rent.

You need to research and decide what you will be selling.Some centre's may not allow you to sell certain lines if they clash with what a long term established shop in their centre sells.Will your product be exausted after 3/4 weeks in the same centre?You have to think about working one centre or "touring"centre's.I believe the figure you have in your head is not high enough unless you have included all your over overheads insurance,travel etc.If you have a good niche line there is plenty of money to be made in the shopping centre's.Good luck.

[Pete]

I operated a kiosk in a large regional indoor mall for a number of years. Did quite well at it until the doubled the rent and while it was still profitable, the return was not worth the time and effort.

By far my most profitable items were fragrance related. I sold fragrance oils and the burners to use them in and incense. Also electrical mist fountains, where the fragrance oils could be added to the water to spread the aroma through the entire home.

I also sold the oils as body oils, to be worn in place of colognes or perfume. Had copies of all the designer fragrances.

Profit in the 80% range. I bought in 16 and 32 oz sizes and sold in 1/2, 2, 4 and 8 oz sizes.

The beauty of it was the people would keep coming back, week after week. Stopping by was just part of their budget, had to have their aroma fix.

Another product I did very well with was birdhouses. Cheap ones from China and Thailand. Buy for $ 3 or $ 4 sell for $ 15 to $ 20. They sold well all year round and I'm in an area that gets some snow in the winter.

In that mall there were at least 8 kiosks selling cell phone, all chains, no chance for an independent. Same with games, a couple of national chains. For that matter, the same with calendars. Chain come in for November, December and January then left.

You might find you will need permission for specific products. Get it in advance. I bought one line I thought would fit right in, but they judged it competition for another seller and that was final.

There can be some money made at it. There was one lady doing heat transfer tee shirts who had been there 17 years, another lady selling garden flags who has been there 8, etc.

Good luck to you!
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