Tips and hints on selling Polish Christmas ornaments wholesale and retail.
If you choose high quality, unique ornaments, you can have a year round business. Selling common Christmas ornaments is seasonal and the business is denominated by the large retailers. But high quality ornaments sell all year round and the business is dominated by small businesses. Big businesses can’t afford to even try to compete in the high end Christmas ornament market. So for a small business, choosing to sell these products is a wise choice.
You can sell ornaments a couple ways. The first is as a wholesaler and the second as a retailer. The wholesale business opportunity is covered in a second page on distribution. Information about that is immediately below this paragraph.
Christmas Ornament Distribution
There is a definite need for small distribution points. If you are looking for a niche to fill, this is one to consider. Get more information at Distribute Polish Christmas Ornaments
Below we get into detail as to how you should approach this business. It can be lucrative if you do it right. One of the better things to do is to open a showroom and sell both wholesale and retail.
Basics
Selling Christmas ornaments is made easier if you keep a few things in mind:
People buy with their eyes. They buy on emotional impulse. When they see something unique they light up and find an excuse to buy it.
People buy what they see. They buy what they hold in their hands.
2/3 of the people search the internet for a product and then buy it off line.
Up scale, hand painted, hand blown Christmas ornaments are impulse buy items. It is easier to sell high quality ornaments for gifts than low priced pieces.
People are always looking for “something different” for a gift. People buy them for gifts for others. They are too expensive to buy for themselves, but less expensive that many other common gifts.
The Opportunity
You can sell Polish Christmas ornaments all year round.
Major buyers and retailers start placing orders with Polish factories in January. Many of the orders are placed at trade shows. Those who do not attend the trade shows place orders with jobbers who did attend the shows.
Christmas shops and gift shops sell Christmas ornaments year round. They buy ornaments the same way. And they typically order for the fall in later spring or very early summer.
Special made corporate gifts and custom ornaments for fund raisers are specialty markets that generate a lot of business.
In the spaces below, we discuss some of the markets and how you can approach them.
About The Ornaments And Prices
Polish Christmas ornaments sell based on quality and not price. That applies when you sell them as well as when you buy them. For more on this and information about buying directly from the factories, go to this link called About Buying Christmas Ornaments .
Forms
The most popular Polish Christmas Ornaments are the forms. They come in many shapes and sizes.
The larger forms generally have more detail and attract a lot of attention. They sell very well and you can command significant markups on them.
The small forms sell very well to people with children and grandparents who want to give a gift. The children actually drive the sales on the small forms. Children get in front of a display and chatter about every form that they see.
Here are some links to forms. Form Collection One Form Collection Two Form Collection Three
Balls
Hand painted balls are beautiful and tourists in Warsaw buy large numbers of them. Many times they want more but are limited by what they can pack in their suitcases.
You can sell them if you have them, But shipping balls as compared to forms is expensive. Relatively speaking, balls occupy a lot of volume. To hold their cost down, you have to order at least a pallet and ship that pallet by sea freight. Because many people are unwilling to do this, if you order a pallet load you will find that you have something not widely offered and have a competitive edge. Here is a link to some balls that are very interesting. Mazovian Silver Balls
Balls pay, however, when you have custom balls made for fund raisers, tourist lodges, corporate gifts, gift shops. For example, the 3 Cats Gallery has constant demand for hand painted balls carrying the words Warsaw, of Poland. Some gift shops have ordered balls with the names of tourist resort towns. Information about Custom Balls is here. Custom Christmas Ornaments
Specialty Ornaments
Faberge Eggs are also good movers. A few factories in Poland make them and the amount of detail on the eggs varies with the companies. The price varies with the detail. In our showroom the sales are generally split between the lower priced and higher priced pieces. Here is a link to a high priced collection. If you are going to sell, offer the high priced pieces first. Set your standard and then show the lower priced products. Both are high quality, but some just have more intricate designs and detail.
High priced ornaments sell very well. Specially made pieces often retail over $500 each. And they sell. For an example, look here.
Market Segments
There are many ways that you can approach sales. Here are some tips and hints on how to approach each.
Wholesale To Gift And Christmas Shops
People are always looking for something different to buy. And these shops are always looking for something new to sell. In high traffic tourist areas, Christmas shops do very well. These ornaments are a natural for them.
Many of these shops are small and do not import ornaments because it does not make economic sense for them. But if you have on hand a small stock of ornaments that you can show them as samples, you can take an order from them and combine it with others so that it pays you to resell to the shop.
Be sure to show some large balls as well as the forms.
Be sure to watch the video on Small Business Distribution
And read the information on Christmas Ornament Distribution
Retail In Gift And Christmas Shops
Set up a display of forms and Faberge eggs that people can touch. Do not hide them in the boxes. And have enough so that they can take their time. Children often drive the sales so attach the ornaments firmly.
Here is a very effective but simple display that is used at the 3 Cats Gallery in Warsaw.
Click on the image to see a larger view and note that there is a simple pergola just inside the door. It is strung with chains of Christmas ornaments.
People come in the door and start their visit by looking at everything on the chains. And if they have children with them, it sells the children. Then there are boxes and boxes and more boxes of ornaments on shelves and on cabinet tops.
Click on the image to the left to see a better picture of the ornaments on chains of ornaments that are on the pergola.
They also hang a few balls on stands. People buy the stands as well as the balls.
Hang some Faberge eggs on the chains but display most of them on stands. The more patterns you have, the more you sell.
Selling To Churches And Fund raising Organizations
Have a picture of your choice, such as a church, put on a ball and have the church sell it as a fund raiser. Custom Christmas Ornaments
Military Sales
Have a ball decorated especially for a military unit. Sell it as a fund raiser or for gifts. Custom Christmas Ornaments
Home Parties
Add a selection of Christmas ornaments to your offering and you will find someone who will want them for gifts, someone who will tell their boss and someone who will want them for a fund raiser.
Shows And Markets
A stand filled with ornaments sold as Christmas gifts does very well.
Companies Needing Employee And Customer Gifts
This is a never ending problem for companies. Christmas ornaments provide a simple, long lasting solution. Corporate Gifts
Web Site Sales
In our experience, the most successful people have limited offerings of a few pieces that are included in a large number of other gift items. It is best to focus on a few items for best results.
How To Start
Some people say that they want samples to check the market and their markup. Over 6 million dollars per year, factory prices, of Polish Christmas ornaments are sold in the US. They are sold on the TV sales networks. The market is there.
Your markup depends on you. Typical markups for retail sales are two to four times the factory cost adjusted for importing costs. Wholesale markups vary with the wholesaler, his customer and the amount being sold. Sometimes it is 5% and sometimes 100%.
For catalogs and prices of ornaments, please go to Polish Product Information Center Include information telling us that you would like to be a distributor.