How to Start a Kitchen Knives Supplies business online?
Starting your own business can be daunting. With so much competition online in any industry, sometimes it seems like the risks involved make success impossible – but this couldn’t be further from the truth. Drop-shipping kitchen knives supplies is an easy, low-cost, low-risk business idea. In this guide, we’ll go over everything from finding a wholesale site to drop-ship your inventory to marketing your products on social media – everything you need to start a business from the comfort of your home.
Why start selling kitchen knives supplies online?
The kitchen and cookware industry has seen an uptick in the last five years with a 2.6% increase in annual growth and more that $15 billion in revenue. Competition is high in this industry – but luckily that gives an adantage to smaller businesses that can sucessfully target niche audiences.
Sure, the kitchen knives supplies industry has some big players like William-Sonoma, Pier 1, and Bed Bath & Beyond – but don’t be intimidated. Larger kitchen supply stores tend to be after the same demographic; older customers with more disposable income. Drop-shipping costs are generally very low with kitchen supplies. You can purchase bowls, utensils, tableware, cutting boards and more at reduced costs from drop-shipping companies like Alibaba. Since you can keep drop-shipping costs low with something like kitchen supplies, this puts you at an advantage over larger stores if you go after a more niche audience that’s less willing to spend in high-end retail stores.
When you’re verifying a potential supplier you are essentially looking at these two aspects:
- Does the supplier have the ability to produce the products you want to buy?
- Is the company a legitimate business with good reputation and not a scam or business on the verge of bankruptcy?
Using social media to build a kitchen supply brand
When selling kitchen supplies – it’s best to use a social media platform with a lot of users and a slightly old-leaning audience. Generally people purchasing kitchen supplies are doing so after they’ve moved out of their parents house – so unless there’s a specific younger niche you’re going after (for example – college students) it’s best to stick with a social media platform like Facebook.
When it comes to building a kitchen brand online – your social media success will be dependent on your ability to connect with audiences of a particular niche and deliver them something that they can’t get from major kitchen supplies stores. This means creating interesting social media content and delivering it to your selected niche through Facebook ads and posts.
In the initial stages of your business – you want to worry less about making sales and more about building a social media presence online. It’s going to be important to get your audience talking about your products and sharing your content to their social media feeds. In the initial stages – focus on content that relates to your products but that doesn’t aggressively sell too early. A great example of this is the Will It Blend? campaign from Blendtec. Blentec’s viral marketing strategy involved creating a video series testing if certain household objects could be blended by the Blendtec blender. The campaign was a huge success: the content was interesting, the videos didn’t try to sell anything too aggressively and users were introduced to the Blendtec brand in a fun and interesting way that didn’t feel too much like they were being sold to.
Business model
Drop-shipping kitchen knives is a low-cost and low-risk business venture. Since you’re only purchasing stock for sales that you’ve already made, the cost of goods sold will always be lower that your profits. Prices for kitchen knives can vary a lot, but since you’re likely going after people who don’t want to purchase from larger stores – it’s good to keep the costs low. The idea is to offer Williams-Sonoma quality and design at Wal-Mart prices. You strength in drop-shipping is the ability to offer customers unique products at low prices.
Kitchen knives are varied and so their prices tend to be as well. However, on Alibaba you can find a ton kitchen supply products for less than $5. Equivalent products on Williams-Sonoma’s website can retail for up to $100 – so this gives a lot of room with cooking supplies to play around with the price. This is a huge advantage for smaller companies, because you can offer customers unique products at a fraction of the price of big box stores and still have room for discounts.
Start your kitchen Knives supplies store today!
With low-cost options for drop-shipping, it’s never been easier to start a kitchen supplies business. Start selling online today!