I was a courier and became the founder of my own brand with a turnover of 500 million. How I did it

In 2016, I got a job as a courier in an electronics store. I grew to a sales manager, and then a store manager. I gained experience, connections and tried myself. After 2 years, I registered my own TM. Now I have 2 of my own brands: household chemicals, pillows and distribution of electronics from China with a total turnover of 500 million per year.

I started transporting equipment from China in 2019. I had no money, so I took out a loan for 500K. I got the contractors' contacts from my previous job. I have been in the commodity business for more than 5 years, and have reached a turnover of 500 million. The article contains my conclusions on trading on marketplaces.

The material was prepared for the blog MoySklad based on an interview with Vyacheslav Baurdin, founder of the Laber and Uluna brands.

More useful content for entrepreneurs — V tg-channel MyWarehouse.

If you want to go to Yandex.Market, choose a brand that is in demand

I started with a brand that I sold at my previous place of work – Soocas, a sub-brand of Xiaomi. I became the first official distributor.

I found the official website and wrote to the factory directly. They were interested in this. First, I made an agreement with the factory, they sent samples of goods: toothbrushes, razors, irrigators and hair dryers. We submitted them for examination and after 1.5 months received 4 certificates of conformity. Each cost 120,000₽.

I started with Yandex.Market because there is demand for well-known brands there. The market does not have its own product card, like Ozon and Wildberries. One product – one card with reviews for all sellers. No need to spend money on card promotion – the buyer chooses by price and delivery conditions.

At the start, on Yandex.Market it is better to choose a product that is already at the top and set a competitive price. If the price is lower than competitors, they will take it.

If the brand is unknown in Russia, then go to Wildberries and Ozon.

Now we also sell the Soocas brand in Detsky Mir and L'Etoile. This does not bring us big sales. On average, 100-300k per month, but it increases brand recognition.

Reduce the cost price for Ozon and Wildberries

Was

My wife is also involved in business on marketplaces. Previously, she ordered candles from contract manufacturing – expensive compositions and packaging, premium product.

Here she was faced with the fact that the candle in the purchase cost the same as what other sellers sell it for at retail.

When I went on maternity leave, I started making candles at home myself.

It became

I changed my strategy. I ordered candle jars from China — it was 3 times cheaper. I bought wax and essential oils in bulk from the same manufacturers who work with contract manufacturing. The cost price of a candle dropped by 2 times.

Prepare your sleigh in summer

I know the seasonality and buy in advance. We looked at sales dynamics in Google Trends, Mpstats. Sales peaks occur before the New Year.

This means that we start buying for December well in advance and pumping up the product card to take all the juice during the season. This scheme works with all seasonal products.

If you start pumping up the card during the season, you simply won’t have time to get the necessary positions and expected sales.

Drive in white

Our Chinese suppliers sell the goods all over the world. If we set too low a price in Russia, it will ruin the brand's reputation. It is the manufacturer's requirement to transport it legally.

In plain English:

— expensive: $6,000 per 40-foot sea container. + 20% VAT and 5-15% state duty. Converted to kilograms, it comes out to $0.2 per kg. + VAT + state duty.

— you can’t order a small batch.

— you can take consolidated logistics: when, in addition to your goods, goods from different suppliers are transported in a container.

But there is also a “gray” method of delivery. This is recommended in many courses, but not by me.

— cheap: 1.5-3$ per 1kg.

— no need to pay VAT and state duty.

— you can bring a couple of kg for testing, instead of ordering a lot.

You can buy a certificate of conformity together with someone else or use someone else's.

Launch your own brand

In 2022, I wanted to create my own brand, and not just resell. When you resell, you depend on the manufacturer. I wanted to make something of my own and have full control over it.

If you have a budget, create your own brand. Almost everyone on VB and Ozon does this now.

We started with household chemicals: dishwasher tablets, rinse aids.

In 2022, Finish, the most popular seller of dishwasher products, stopped producing goods in the Russian Federation. We analyzed all remaining competitors and understood what people need from dishwasher tablets. The main thing: to wash in hard water and not leave a film on dishes.

1. We calculated the marginality. It came out to 30%. If it is less than 30%, we do not start working with such a product.

2. We found a technologist on Avito and together with him we developed tablets that meet the requirements of buyers and our budget.

3. We ordered a corporate style, logo and naming from the agency. The main criterion by which we chose the name was that it sounds good.

4. We have applied for trademark registration.

5. We checked the documentation for each component: declaration of conformity, quality certificate and test protocol.

6. We found a factory in Russia that will make pills for us.

7. We went to VB and Ozon and started selling.

First, they ordered a batch of 300 pieces and launched a promotion. The product quickly started selling, so they immediately ordered another batch of 1,000 pieces.

We sold 40,000 packs of these pills in a year. This is not much within the marketplace, but to achieve such sales in retail stores we would need more time and connections.

We want to make a quality product and give people emotions.

There are sellers who entered the tablet market before us, but now their sales have dropped.

Why do we hold on?

– a box made of thick cardboard: you can shake and beat it endlessly.

— the goods will still arrive intact.

– bright, beautiful, thought-out to the smallest detail packaging. It is important for the client when they take care of him, for example, they make special valves so that the box can be easily opened and then easily closed. Plus, this is a control of opening: the person is sure that no one has opened the box before him and taken out a couple of pills from there.

We also have special ECO tablets for dishwashers. They are hypoallergenic and suitable for children's dishes.

Guess which pills are selling better? Did you also think that IVF? No, everyone is looking for a killer product and writes angry reviews if the fat is not washed off the frying pan.

Turn off the circuit and insure the warehouses

At first, we worked with our own warehouse and sent everything to clients from there. Delivery to the regions took a long time. Now we work with the VB warehouse: we label and pack the goods in our warehouse, and then transfer them to the marketplace, and it delivers to the client. This works better because it makes it possible to distribute the goods among warehouses in the regions and the goods reach the person faster. You get more sales due to the fact that the goods are displayed higher in search results, compared to competitors who sell from their warehouse. VB and Ozon force suppliers to deliver goods to different warehouses. If the goods are in a warehouse in Moscow, and they are ordered in Vladivostok, then the cost of logistics will be very high. Therefore, delivering goods to warehouses is simply cheaper for us, even taking into account additional logistics costs.

In 2022, our warehouse caught fire: an employee forgot to unplug a hair dryer and left. At night, the hair dryer turned on, started blowing hot air on the boxes, and they caught fire. It was also our fault: the sockets were energized at night. The firefighters arrived quickly, but goods worth 500 thousand rubles burned. Some of this goods were defective.

After that, we insured the warehouse and leave only the CCTV cameras on at night. And we turn off the entire electrical circuit of the sockets.

Regarding the burnt goods on Wildberries. Yes, there were 2 million rubles of our goods there. Everyone says that Wildberries sent a letter to suppliers asking them to forgive what burned. I received one too. But not by force. It is possible to leave a request and get all your money back. I think that the warehouse was insured, and they will get money back for all the goods that burned. WB does not know the cost price of the goods and returns to sellers at the average selling price. That is, sellers will also make money from this.

Automate your business

Install simple, understandable software. I installed it MyWarehouse.

— we ship to the counterparty, specify the contract and give the goods on commission. When the marketplaces have sold the goods, a report comes. We enter the data from the report into MyWarehouse and see the profit.

— Ozon and Wildberries can be integrated into one window in MySklad. This is convenient for sellers using the FBS system.

— all technological processes are described. We enter each stage of production and evaluate it in order to calculate the employee's salary.

First, optimize your product card for SEO, and then take on paid advertising

I allocate 5% of turnover for marketing.

SEO

The first thing you need to do when creating a new product card is SEO optimization. This is the inclusion of key queries in the description and name of the product. This way you will be found by the maximum number of queries.

If your product is well optimized, then in the first 2 weeks it gets a boost from the marketplace itself. Really good sales start when there are a lot of reviews. We allow 3 months for the launch of a new product for organic sales.

Internal advertising of the marketplace

We launch internal advertising only when the card is already optimized for SEO and has good graphics and many reviews. If this is not the case, then paid advertising is a waste of the budget.

On VB there is such a system: the higher you are in organic search results, the less you will pay for advertising. If you have no reviews on your card, there is no point in paying for advertising. You will spend a lot of money, and they will buy from someone with more reviews.

Outdoor advertising

From external advertising, we only use work with bloggers – paid and by barter. We do not consider it as the main source of sales, because most often it is about increasing coverage and forecasting for the future. A person can see an advertisement, add a product to the basket, and buy it a month later.

It is difficult to track such promotion, but we continue to invest money in it, because at some point it will start bringing in sales. Usually we take small bloggers, whose advertising costs 20-30K.

Let's take a logic test

At first, I did everything myself: product cards, infographics, financial accounting, advertising.

My team currently includes: 4 warehouse employees, 4 marketplace managers, 2 marketers, an advertising manager, an accountant, a financial manager, a buyer, and a product manager.

I need more managers, but it's hard to hire them. 90% of responses to the vacancy are thrown into the fire because the training the person has received is outdated. The marketplace market is constantly changing, that's the reality.

But there are several criteria that help us choose the right person:

1. Before the test task, we ask the candidate questions: what work experience do you have, what achievements did you have at your previous place of work? Here, by achievements I mean not just the phrase “did SEO optimization”, but “optimized the product card, which subsequently brought a 20% increase in profits”.

Test.– questions on logic, we will help with knowledge in the process; – tasks that the person will solve with us in the future – this way the candidate will understand how suitable the job is for him; – a short test, maximum 30 minutes – I respect the candidate's time.

3. Personal interview. We clarify the remaining points, asking how the person would act in a given situation.

We ask several of the same questions from the test. We already had an experience when we hired a person, and then it turned out that someone else did the test for her.

4. Probationary period 3 days

5. Internship 3 months. We give narrow tasks to understand how a person copes. This could be: distribution of goods to regional warehouses, responses to reviews, pricing.

We currently have a person working for us who we hired without experience and trained in all the issues ourselves. Not the worst option. We even thought about making our own course and offering our best students an offer to work for us.

Then this employee will solve, for example, such tasks:

– how much new product to order for this warehouse;

— whether to write off positions.

To conclusions

1. Yandex.Market sells well for a well-known brand. If the brand is new, go to VB and OZON.

2. On VB and Ozon, the cheaper the better. Premium goods are not sold at all. Reduce the cost of components by wholesale, China, changing suppliers.

3. Don't take on selling seasonal goods at the start. You need to know how to work with them. If you take on the task, buy or produce them in advance, start and promote a card before the season.

4. It is cheap to transport illegally. You can order goods for testing and see how it goes. In the long run – only legally.

5. To start your own brand you need a budget, a trademark and production.

If the product is good, but the packaging and card design are bad, they won’t buy it.

7. Insure your warehouses – they may burn down along with your goods. Turn off the sockets at night.

8. First, optimize your product card for SEO, and then take on paid advertising.

9. Select managers carefully: look at resumes, give them a logic test, check their answers during the interview.

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