Smarter Not Harder

Our grand shipment arrived today, in an expectedly clunky fashion. The picture I received from my teammate told the presumed story of a slightly modified product not quite like the one we ordered. The logos did not look quite as crisp as the image we sent them, and are quite a bit larger than that in the example image they regurgitated to us before purchase. But after we checked for quality of the insignia, so far so good, and ran some water through one to check for leaks and for any foul taste, all turned up milhouse. That’s one nightmare averted. Now on to the next, much more daunting, task of actually getting the product into customer’s hands and getting customer’s money into our pockets.

With a proven and able product at the ready, we have only our marketing and salesmanship skills in the way of achieving our goal.  Although some of our group members do still want to do a public table where just anybody can come up and buy one, several factors lead me to believe that while it could sell a few, it would ultimately not be worth our time. These factors include that this approach would be akin to mass marketing, which will be less effective because our product is not one that the masses are in dire need of. Also that most students don’t carry cash on them during school, and even fewer would be willing to buy a product like ours in passing. Using the table could have some success, but I am be far a bigger fan of working smarter rather than harder, but maybe that’s just the Senioritis speaking.

We could actually have a pretty simple way to achieve success lying right in our lap. Two of our group members are on sports teams that don’t make cuts when taking on new athletes. This not only gives us insight into our target niche, but it also gives us contacts with in two of the largest sports teams in school. This week we set up a plan that would attract teams en mass. We have created a special offer that allows a unit to be sold at $5 if the entire team buys one. This is half the price, and would be very attractive and convenient for athletes. Not only are they getting functioning water bottles, if the whole team has them, they become a symbol of unity. We wouldn’t even have to do any mass marketing. If we start by getting a few sports teams to buy them for the whole squad, we would not only make our money back and then some, but also have the exposure needed for other sports teams to pick up on the trend and make us a lot of profit.