As a business owner and reseller, I like to stay up-to-date with current events, especially when it comes to business and consumer trends (More on that HERE and HERE). This information allows me to make better business decisions and to create a more successful business strategy. Today, I thought that it would helpful to share with you how I utilize current events in my reselling strategy. Hopefully, this information will help you in your reselling businesses too!
Creating a Strategy
In order to ensure the long-term success of my business, I have been actively building a business strategy. This strategy factors in many different components such as pricing, platform knowledge, item selection, and business knowledge. Each of these items are important to my strategy and affect my business decisions in different ways. When it comes to the reselling community, I feel as though there is a lot of emphasis placed on pricing, platform knowledge, and item selection, but not as much emphasis on business knowledge. In my opinion, the business knowledge component is the most overlooked yet is the most important.
When I was a new reseller, I was never taught the importance of business knowledge; it wasn’t until later on that I realized how important it actually is. The business side involves topics such as taxes, current events, consumer/industry trends, and basic business operations (just to name a few). Today, I want to dive into the topic of current events and discuss how I use current events in my reselling strategy.
Current Event: The Supply Chain Crisis of 2021
The easiest me for way to explain my strategy to you is through an example using a current event. I’m sure that at this point, many of you are familiar with the supply chain crisis of 2021. However, if you are unfamiliar with this issue, in simple terms, the shut down of businesses and plants at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted the global supply chain which is creating a shortage of items worldwide. This supply chain crisis has many parts to it and I want to break each of them down and explain how I use this information to make business decisions as a reseller.
Overview: The Supply Chain Crisis & The Problems It Creates
Let’s go back in time to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Within a very short period of time, the world as we knew it drastically changed. Businesses began shutting down and many workers were displaced from their jobs. Working from home soon became the norm and children transitioned from attending school daily to homeschooling. During this time, there was low consumer demand and little to no industrial activity. However, as restrictions were slowly lifted and people began to add some normalcy to their lives, the consumer demand for many items started to increase. The problem, however, is that businesses are unable to produce or supply items like they could pre-pandemic due to worker shortages and a lack of raw materials. Thus, creating a product shortage.
So what does that mean for me as a reseller?
Great question! Personally, I interpret this to mean a few different things. First and foremost, the holiday season is quickly approaching. This is important to note as the demand for items is going to increase significantly over the next few months. With that being said, increased consumer demand mixed with product shortages are going to drive up prices and decrease the number of retail discounts over the holiday season. There will be a limited selection of inventory in retailers and as a result, people will be shopping alternative methods (i.e. shopping local and secondhand sites) to find gifts.
As a reseller, this is a great opportunity to stock your closet with giftable items. People will be exploring non-traditional gifting routes this year so this is a great opportunity for you to take advantage of.
Issue: Delay of Goods from China
Another issue to discuss as we are approaching the holiday season is that any items that are not currently on their way to the United States from China, will not be here in time for Christmas. This is going to bring about many problems the closer it gets to holidays. What is more than likely going to happen is available inventory is going to become more and more scarce the closer we get to the holidays. As a result, people will be shopping much earlier than normal this year (which will create a shortage as we approach Christmas) and turning to alternative shopping methods (i.e. shopping local and secondhand sites) as they are unable to find the items they are looking for at retailers.
Personally, I am going to ensure that my closet is properly stocked through Christmas. I have already began sourcing for giftable items now and will continue to do so until the holiday season has concluded.
Issue: Nationwide Cardboard Shortage
This is an issue that all resellers should be aware of and that is the nationwide cardboard shortage. At the moment, there is a major shortage in cardboard and packaging supplies. This is making it harder for businesses to ship out online orders in a timely manner. As resellers, we know the importance of sending out out items in proper packaging and if we are not proactively staying ahead of this, we could run out of supplies right in the middle of our busiest time of year.
In order to be proactive, I have already ordered enough polymailers from Amazon and cardboard boxes from USPS to hopefully last me through the end of 2021. If you haven’t already, I would strongly suggest ordering your FREE shipping supplies from USPS HERE before they are no longer available.
The Takeaway
As a reseller, I find it very important to stay up-to-date with business and consumer news. This information helps me to make informative business decisions and plan ahead. This year, I purposefully tried to plan for Q4 (Quarter 4= October through December) well in advance knowing that it was not going to be a “normal” business year. Running a successful reselling business is more than just listing items on a platform. In my opinion, it requires some strategy and knowledge regarding what you can proactively do as a reseller to maximize your success. Staying up-to-date with current events is a great way to educate yourself as a business owner and plan ahead to ensure your success as a reseller.
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