This Business and Moment...

[Judgeneo]

Just turned down an (second) interview for a job with more pay and less responsibility :/ Betting that I can prove I know what I'm doing at my level for a year or two more and then do a better job jump.... Was fairly confident about getting the job, time will tell whether this was the right decision or not.

 

[Steeps]

No personal contact at Amazon, it all goes through ticketing. We were given a contact when Amazon direct were looking at product, another contact for Amazon shipping, another contact for SFP, but no direct contact for controlling the listings. We have the distribution rights for the products in the UK but I don't want to fall foul of some sort of EU directive where I'm blocking the rights of other sellers who are selling direct to consumers as our agreements are for distribution. Finally made some progress with the listing updates, I seem to now have SFP on my account to try even though I don't qualify for it with my RM account or Amazon shipping so I've duplicated a product to risk selling to get the sales and get the badge for Prime, if they flag it then I've not really lost out and they can patch another hole in their broken system which my competitors seem to be allowed to abuse.

 

[Vanquish-Storm]

No personal contact at Amazon, it all goes through ticketing. We were given a contact when Amazon direct were looking at product, another contact for Amazon shipping, another contact for SFP, but no direct contact for controlling the listings. We have the distribution rights for the products in the UK but I don't want to fall foul of some sort of EU directive where I'm blocking the rights of other sellers who are selling direct to consumers as our agreements are for distribution. Finally made some progress with the listing updates, I seem to now have SFP on my account to try even though I don't qualify for it with my RM account or Amazon shipping so I've duplicated a product to risk selling to get the sales and get the badge for Prime, if they flag it then I've not really lost out and they can patch another hole in their broken system which my competitors seem to be allowed to abuse.

Who is your SFP contact they should be able to help.you.

You can have an SFP and none SFP listing on the same ASIN it is allowed.

Obvious one but do not ship any SFP orders through none SFP carriers, you will get blocked completely.

 

[Steeps]

Our SFP rep is a waste of space, he's the one who I argued with as I was trying to tell them we didn't put anywhere near enough through Amazon to qualify for the required Royal Mail free collections account for tracked packages. We'd need to be averaging 21 parcels a day of mixed product to get the value required for the collections, or 13 a day for the paid for collection which I would be able to if I could guarantee a minimum of 6-7 a day with the boss. This won't be an issue once I've consolidated all the dropshippers we currently have and bring it all in house, but that's a 6 month project which might involve a move.

When I told him we couldn't guarantee 6-7 a day for the RM service he then signed us up to Amazon shipping telling us we were best suited to Amazon shipping and could proceed with the Prime trial. Paperwork didn't get emailed for a few days and they kept emailing me insisting I submit labels for approval as my first collection date was soon. Finally got the paperwork for shipping and they wanted a minimum through Amazon of 20-50 a DAY, we only do 100 a month so we were nowhere near. (The rest of the postage is from Ebay and phone orders)

I've only listed one of our slow movers on SFP and already adjusted the RM postage to assign it a Special Delivery label, yes it's £2 more than a tracked24 label but I can drop it off at my local post office 5min walk away instead of a 15 mile drive.

 

[Vanquish-Storm]

Our SFP rep is a waste of space, he's the one who I argued with as I was trying to tell them we didn't put anywhere near enough through Amazon to qualify for the required Royal Mail free collections account for tracked packages. We'd need to be averaging 21 parcels a day of mixed product to get the value required for the collections, or 13 a day for the paid for collection which I would be able to if I could guarantee a minimum of 6-7 a day with the boss. This won't be an issue once I've consolidated all the dropshippers we currently have and bring it all in house, but that's a 6 month project which might involve a move.

When I told him we couldn't guarantee 6-7 a day for the RM service he then signed us up to Amazon shipping telling us we were best suited to Amazon shipping and could proceed with the Prime trial. Paperwork didn't get emailed for a few days and they kept emailing me insisting I submit labels for approval as my first collection date was soon. Finally got the paperwork for shipping and they wanted a minimum through Amazon of 20-50 a DAY, we only do 100 a month so we were nowhere near. (The rest of the postage is from Ebay and phone orders)

I've only listed one of our slow movers on SFP and already adjusted the RM postage to assign it a Special Delivery label, yes it's £2 more than a tracked24 label but I can drop it off at my local post office 5min walk away instead of a 15 mile drive.

Is Special Delivery a valid SFP option?

Trust me your SFP guy's name ill see if I know of him or her.

 

[Prophet]

Last week we celebrated our 2nd anniversary. Since opening the doors, my business partner and I have grown the business to have 50 managed service clients, and 6 team members. We've just won a contract with a FTSE 250 company and continue to grow purely though referrals. We were nominated for the NatWest Small Business Entrepreneur award and made the finals!

We're competing with businesses who are 10 to 20 times our size and regular beating them.

If you're thinking of starting your own business don't worry about being disruptive or reinventing the wheel. Put your team and customer service as the two main priorities and focus on delivering a great service.

 

[Andybtsn]

Are there any users on here who specialise in employment contract laws or just general solicitors who could offer some advice/opinion on something?

 

[toshj]

Last week we celebrated our 2nd anniversary. Since opening the doors, my business partner and I have grown the business to have 50 managed service clients, and 6 team members. We've just won a contract with a FTSE 250 company and continue to grow purely though referrals. We were nominated for the NatWest Small Business Entrepreneur award and made the finals!

We're competing with businesses who are 10 to 20 times our size and regular beating them.

If you're thinking of starting your own business don't worry about being disruptive or reinventing the wheel. Put your team and customer service as the two main priorities and focus on delivering a great service.

Congratulations! Well done, that's impressive stuff.

 

[randomshenans]

Last week we celebrated our 2nd anniversary. Since opening the doors, my business partner and I have grown the business to have 50 managed service clients, and 6 team members. We've just won a contract with a FTSE 250 company and continue to grow purely though referrals. We were nominated for the NatWest Small Business Entrepreneur award and made the finals!

We're competing with businesses who are 10 to 20 times our size and regular beating them.

If you're thinking of starting your own business don't worry about being disruptive or reinventing the wheel. Put your team and customer service as the two main priorities and focus on delivering a great service.

That's amazing stuff. Well done man!! Properly motivational stuff that.

 

[morbid42]

Last week we celebrated our 2nd anniversary. Since opening the doors, my business partner and I have grown the business to have 50 managed service clients, and 6 team members. We've just won a contract with a FTSE 250 company and continue to grow purely though referrals. We were nominated for the NatWest Small Business Entrepreneur award and made the finals!

We're competing with businesses who are 10 to 20 times our size and regular beating them.

If you're thinking of starting your own business don't worry about being disruptive or reinventing the wheel. Put your team and customer service as the two main priorities and focus on delivering a great service.

Well done - stick to whats made your story a success, dont take on too much too quickly.

 

[Josh]

Well done Prophet!

 

[Rroff]

Had to write off 1000s of £ worth of inventory and equipment due to flood damage today :s and all told including loss of business, etc. gonna probably cost the company not much shy of a million. Due to reasons I can't elaborate on in case of legal action looks like it might not be covered by insurance either.

 

[malachi]

Had to write off 1000s of £ worth of inventory and equipment due to flood damage today :s and all told including loss of business, etc. gonna probably cost the company not much shy of a million. Due to reasons I can't elaborate on in case of legal action looks like it might not be covered by insurance either.

Ouch! Hope it works out for you in the end.

 

[Rroff]

Thanks - hopefully other than the inconvenience/extra work it shouldn't impact me personally, hopefully.

 

[randomshenans]

So I decided to make the jump and do something I have been meaning to do for ages... I started a youtube channel for "business-y" stuff. I have learnt so much stuff along my journey that I wanted to share that. Not all good tbf lol just look at old Akshit above, but they're good stories too.
We have a bucket load of resources available to us today. I was doing a full do-over, each time I do things differently based on things I've learnt. I just want to share that with people.

It'll be a mix of my tips, resources, tales like Akshit and upwork, and random stuff like, I once lived for a week at a conference in Orlando on $10 as that's all I had. I remember when on the first day I realised lunch didn't come with the ticket and you had to buy it. I didn't have the cash to buy a single lunch. I lived the week off food from the coffee breaks and sneaking my way into sponsors "after parties" at the end of each day so yea, it'll be a mix.


https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIhQsQ_KXjLKMpXkq9AXcUA

Feel free to subscribe and stuff.
I just did a video on value proposition/ business model canvas stuff when you have an idea for a business that's uploading... will be up in about 937468735483754 hours if my internet has anything to do with it. Next one is building a business online presence (facebook, twitter, instagram, website inc. domain) in under 1hr - Think that'll be fun.

 

[OspreyO]

Subbed. Looks interesting.

 

[randomshenans]

Thanks man! Appreciate that

I uploaded the vid on business model canvas. It's what I'd recommend to anyone thinking of starting a business or with an idea. Or as I mention, anyone in a business looking to make changes.

This is my first time making videos, or using premiere pro haha it might take a while for me to feel comfortable with it.

 

[Basher]

Great content, but please smile more and seem a bit more excited!

 

[randomshenans]

haha OK, that's a fair comment! I'll definitely work on that one

 

[SideWinder]

Related to the thread i just posted....just having my eyes opened that there is a massive world out there beyond the company i have been at for 9 years.

Realising i have been quite underpaid/not progressing fast enough....and cue at risk of redunancy. The payout will be £10-13k so i am suddenly overwhelmed with the thought of actually spreading my wings....scary. I am sure i'll be posting much more now