Vietnam, Take Two

New Developments In Vietnam

Todd Discovering New Finishes

The first time I developed product in Vietnam, I came to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), primarily looking for ceramics and candle related items.  I had already met one ceramic factory at Ambiente in Frankfurt and decided that this would be my entry point.  This particular factory was very well suited for developing new product.  While they did not have a lot of specific looks already developed that I felt would work for Pomeroy, they were very open to new ideas and pushing themselves in new directions; which means spending time and money trying new samples.  Take my word for it when I say that this is a quality not shared around the world.  

Let’s face it; if you are a factory with a well-developed business why would you want to bother with a lot of drama and expense trying to develop something you don’t really understand for a customer who may or may not use the new development in the end.  It is a quality I deeply admire in a factory’s character, which makes me fiercely loyal, and makes it very difficult to even look at a competing factory.  I’m sure this sounds a bit old fashioned but such are the relationships I endeavor to build. 

After the first set of designs that we created together were introduced, I became distracted as I often do, and began focusing on other urgencies, and categories. A principal challenge faced by all companies when starting business in a new country is not only creating enough interesting product to fill the first container but continuing the process for re-orders and future containers. 

While we kept buying the product we had developed, the business dwindled because I had not continued to develop new product.  Time marched on, as did my creative interests, and Vietnam began to slip further and further into the background until it all but disappeared.  I met another factory recently which peaked my interest again in Vietnam.  It was also a ceramics factory, but with a totally different product range. It is a very rustic look which, for Pomeroy, who was born of “rustic” parents, would integrate beautifully into our growing garden collection.  

While other countries have long combined raw materials into finished products; Vietnam has yet to develop this vocabulary on a grand scale.  Combining raw materials is a technique which I developed for Pomeroy some twenty years ago while we were still producing in Mexico, and continues to be a primary focus for me to this day.   For this particular collection of product, when visiting this new  factory the first time, I noticed that they had some glass cylinders which they were using on some other items for a European customer. This was an exciting discovery for me.   I integrated these into some lighting designs for pilar candle holders which I had drawn; only to be told that after they had made the mold, that this clay had too much shrinkage and there would be no way to control the fit of the glass.  My fall- back position was pilar holders with no glass.  Well, on this latest trip, I realized that we were having a communication problem and that we could indeed include glass on these pilar holders, as long as I was willing to have some tolerance in terms of the fit.  Problem solved. 

As I have mentioned in the past; the holy grail for a designer is to reach a new look, finish, or design which has not been shown in the market before.  A graduate school teacher of mine in Switzerland told me once that a student cannot do something he hasn’t already seen.  I would have to agree; which makes it all the more imperative for designers to continually search out creative , and open factories like those I have been fortunate enough to work with in Vietnam. Factories who are willing to push into new directions, which will allow us (designers) to keep changing and driving new product to market; and if we are lucky, create a few things along the way which have not yet been done.  

The Rise and Fall of a Category

Ashton Candle Garden

For over twenty years Pomeroy has explored every type of candle garden imaginable;  a category which was originally developed by Pomeroy and which dominated the market for over two decades. The concept I started with was a simple premise;  present the customer with everything “she” needed to create a beautiful and functional centerpiece without having to spend precious time scrounging for compatible components which might fit together on a tray.  We initially attributed our success with this new category of decorative lighting to the facts that we created an enormous value in the product, including a tray, rocks candles, glass elements, etc… and of course to our particular designs.  In the beginning, we were indeed able to imbue a great value in the item, but of course with the endless march of time, commodity increases, and competition, that benefit began to wane.   As the category matured, I began looking for ways to justify a higher retail, and while I was  never able to create successful candle gardens which were above 29.99 at retail, the candle garden remained a staple for Pomeroy until the activation of the anti-dumping duty tax placed on Chinese wax, championed by a few large domestic candle makers and their congressmen. 

As with most government sponsored programs; there were unintended consequences.  Ten years ago when the duty was originally activated the market for fragranced candles was very strong and was arguably at a peak with candles and fragranced wax lighting representing major businesses in all department stores, as well as specialty retailers.  Since that time, the market has shifted dramatically, with any type of fragranced candle programs all but disappearing from department store shelves with the exception of commodity priced, fragrance filled, glass jars which can be found anywhere from gas stations and drug stores, to Nieman Marcus, with very little separating them other than the distance and time it takes to drive from one to the other.

Occasionally one of the large companies controlling the wax jar business comes out with a new shape, or maybe a new label, but as far as any meaningful design changes which might propel the business into an exciting new direction that the consumer can embrace; well, we’ve been waiting ten years for that one.  In fact, since the antidumping duties were imposed the overall wax fragrance business has continued to decline.  This is a case whereby the government, in an effort to support a domestic industry, has eliminated any creative competition, and while unintended, has led to the decline of that particular industry as a whole.   In the end, I’m not sure that there were any beneficiaries of the action other than management at those companies and the congressmen who represented them.

While Pomeroy continues to design candle gardens to this day, the category as a whole has diminished significantly, and with it retail sales totaling hundreds of millions,  which I attribute to the antidumping duties placed on Chinese wax so many years ago, but not for the reasons you might suspect.  Yes, of course pricing increased dramatically for the underlying commodity (wax) being imported, but it was, I believe, for a creative reason:  by virtually halting the importation of any type of candle from China, the creative market went running and screaming from any new developments coming from that market; which by that time had become a world power in the category.  This had the obvious effect of many factory closures in China which in turn halted new candle developments which curiously were not competing with American production anyway; in addition to the fact that no one was designing new candles for the American market due to the restrictions.  

These resulting events basically cut off any new creative developments in the category (with the exception of Pomeroy, as we remain a “stubborn” company),   hence the near disappearance of the fragranced candle business as we knew it.  There is a phenomenon in retail that happens whereby a store telegraphs the importance of a category to the customer and can actually drive sales; or NOT.  This was the retail mechanism that drove the actual decline in the fragranced candle business.  No creative supply and impossible price points led to the retailer removing its “importance” from its’ shelves, and voila!  A category dies, and in this case, a pointless death. 

There are of course, still fragranced candles being produced in the United States, but because these cannot easily be combined with other items to create more elaborate displays (centerpieces for example) the business has not grown and has no way to expand.  Thus, we have the fragmented and decidedly dull fragrance wax business as it is today, with a sea of glass jars all clamoring for attention, which in the end can barely be seen through the endless promotions which define their life on the store shelf.

    

The One Order Relationship

Welcome Ceremony In India

One of the hardest concepts that I have found to explain to factories is Pomeroy’s particular way of working.  In the beginning of a relationship even when I explain how we work to a factory owner, in most cases he or she only expects to snag one order if possible, and the notion of a repeat order is as foreign as the person standing in front of them.

We typically work with the same factories for years, never on a single order basis. This can be unusual.  In the beginning a factory will quote on a project and if they get the order, will not expect to ever see that customer again. The buying habits of major retailers has created this environment; as they typically work with buying agents or trading companies and have little personal contact with the factory owners.  This style of working makes it pretty easy to drop and add factories at will without ever really developing any type of relationship.  I know a particular case in which an off price retailer, not particularly interested in design created a system of buying brass, whereby they would simply weigh the pieces and pay by weight.  This system for buying product certainly removes the need to create a relationship, or getting to know the factory’s capabilities, much less the possibility of generating repeat business.  Often is the case where a factory will have significant business built with a customer, working through an agent, only to have it stripped away without warning for whatever reason; which of course leaves the factory vulnerable to the whim of the person in control of the relationship with the customer. 

Pomeroy works best with a trading company when our products, being diverse, require a wide range of raw material sourcing and production techniques as well as consolidation of components.  A trading company is also critical in a situation where language is an issue making direct communication impossible. In this case unfortunately, while I make a point to meet and work on developments directly with the factory,  the customer is the trading company, and not Pomeroy.  This creates a situation whereby as much as I might like the work of a particular factory I cannot always control whether we maintain a relationship or not.  They may want to raise prices in the middle of a season and do not understand that we in turn cannot raise our pricing as there are retail programs in place where pricing may not change, and indeed in my experience it is simply better to terminate a particular item in lieu of trying to raise a price on an item; as our retail customers will not accept increases anyway.  This dynamic forces the trading company to constantly search for additional sources for production to maintain consistent pricing.  And while this does not foster the kind of long term relationships that Pomeroy espouses, it can have a positive effect in the end by effectively challenging the factory to improve their cost structure or efficiency to come back and work with us again in the future.

In other countries Pomeroy deals more or less directly with the factories using an agent for communication relating to orders, product development, quality control, printing, and shipping.  I have worked for twelve years in a particular country, mostly with the same factories, and have been able to maintain relationships with the owners, which is rare.  Wherever possible, the factory should try to develop and maintain direct communication with the customer; if for no other reason than to learn and understand the other side of the equation relating to these global transactions. While it may sound positively byzantine at times to learn how major retailers function in the U.S., it is important that they make the effort.  A better understanding of case pack requirements, pre-ticketing requirements, packing label requirements, testing, etc… will improve communication between the customer and the factory.  And no matter what the category of discussion, in the end more communication between the customer and the factory will only create more opportunities for both.

Orders From Chaos

Well-Appointed Showroom

Looking for the "Crown Jewel"

One of my favorite things is to skulk around in the back rooms of factories, scouring the floor, peering onto random shelves, and into dusty bins.  I move like a cat when I’m working in a factory; not a fast cat, but rather a slow hunting sort of cat; because I cannot afford to miss something that can become something else that I desperately need for my collection. In the heart of these rooms filled with dusty bins and shelves, most factories have an area which is full of parts, broken bits, and buckets of who knows what’s, with all sorts of things lying about which have not yet found a use and indeed may never. Nestled comfortably amongst the bits of this and splashes of that, is a cup of cold tea, ashtrays, small bowls of paints, cans of thinner, and all kinds of mysterious powders and such.  This is usually where the “tinkerer” spends his or her time if a factory is lucky enough to have such a person.  It’s usually in a room like this; dirty to the point of grimy, disorganized to be kind, and utterly fascinatingly rich in smells (I’ll leave that to your imagination), that I find something truly inspiring.

This is the” crown jewel” of every factory even though they would never recognize it. Most factories aspire to have a lovely well- appointed showroom with refreshments and snacks in which to entertain buyers, and it would never occur to them to take a buyer to the area I am describing, yet this is where I long to be, because this is where I’m going to find a castaway component or fragment which will help set me apart from the teaming mass of designers and buyers out there all lurking in the well-appointed showrooms with refreshments and snacks.  The showroom is still a critical component to any sales effort to be sure, but many new items will be picked to display in the showroom arbitrarily and many other potential unique finishes or shapes lie in the chaos that is the crown jewel which may speak to a new rising color trend or technique albeit buried under some rags, or fragments of other things that “went wrong”, and for whatever reason were not developed into a new range of product.  

This is the part of the job which can be truly fun and invigorating, because when I find something in a place that looks like a whirling dervish, and buried under a bunch of ” random artifacts”, I can be assured that it has never seen the light of day (in a product sense), and indeed the owner of the factory probably does not realize that it exists, because it never made it out of the whirling dervish in the first place.  This is Nirvana for someone like myself because I can take a new finish and create an entire range of new product and combine with other unexpected raw materials to create extensions to the original idea and in the end have a new driver for the business which all started under a tarp, in the corner of a room, which was full of other tarps, and broken things, all waiting for a guy like me to bring a little order; or maybe a big one! 

Neutral Is A Color

Ceramic Fragrance Diffuser Pots Ready For Firing

Todd In Central China

Many years ago when I was a protégé senior majoring in graphic design, working at the University of Houston, with my mentor (we’ll call him P.B.) , I recall asking the question, “Hey, why don’t we do this particular exercise in color; why always black and white?”  Without hesitation he said, “if it looks good in black and white then it will only look better in color.”  

I live by those words to this day; even when I’m working on something I think I already understand and have a solution for; even when I am so confident that I can jump ahead in my process (which never works for me), I always come back to that tired old axiom.  Well, old certainly now that I’m over fifty but still as true as the day he uttered those words. 

I remember working with a ceramic factory in Vietnam some years ago and the sales manager there was making fun of me because she always thought my color direction was so boring, “Always browns!.”   “Why don’t you ever use colors?” While I do recall feeling somewhat inadequate and dull as a designer when she said that, and while I have begun using a lot more color in my collections, I am still very cautious. Admittedly mauve to normal people is bright pink to me; as my color ranges are usually pretty muted.  That being said; one can have too many colors, textures, circles, whatever.  One can have too much of a good thing.  I blame my love of neutrals on my training as a graphic designer, as well as my experience designing for the home, and probably my childhood (just kidding!)  Neutral does not have to be boring and indeed can be positively striking if used in an interesting way.  Black and white is about as basic as it gets; but add a warm brown and make something a texture, etc...and voila!  Start with a cold gray straight from The Eastern Bloc fifty years ago,  add contrast, and warmth, and you have a new urban basic. 

In the end I let my customers tell me what is right.  Karl Lagerfeld said it best when he said, “We as designers can only propose ideas, we cannot make the customers buy anything.”    Our customer will always make her feelings known, her preferences heard; and in the end, she will have a lot of basic neutrals in her closet, as well as in her home.

Ambiente, The Frankfurt Fair (Part Two)

New Ceramic Product

To those of us toiling in the “Home" categories, Ambiente is the world’s buying Mecca; simply put it is the largest decorative, living, and giving market in the world, which takes place once a year in February,  (The coldest month of the year I might add), not in the Middle East, but Frankfurt , Germany.   Each year buyers and sellers converge here (with overcoats in hand) looking for the next new thing, or just hoping that they might have the next new thing, and that the worlds buyers will beat a path to their stand. Never mind that their stand might be only a hundred square feet,  in a sea of ten foot stands, on the fourth floor of building number six, located in a complex that has eleven buildings.  Well, you get the picture, the Frankfurt Fair is a big place!  

Pomeroy, finally started exhibiting at the fair some years ago, as I had been reticent to show in Frankfurt for a variety of reasons:  one of which was simply a question of what merchandise to show; should we show our gift box line, San Miguel, or open stock decorative items as well.  My primary concern however, was that culturally what I was designing for the American market, decorative lighting in a box, would not appeal aesthetically to the rest of the world, and what if no one saw the value of our concept, not to mention that exhibiting at a fair, thousands of miles away is expensive and complicated.  After much debate we made the decision to attend, and we would finally find out what all of the noise was about; and besides, if we could just write enough business to cover the cost of the show then at least we could consider the show a success. In the end we decided to show primarily our photo boxed gift and lighting line with some open stock mixed in to break up all of those boxes.  

Make no mistake, I have known plenty of companies over the years that have shown at Frankfurt and not written any business at all much less getting to a breakeven point.  Frankfurt is the “marketplace” in action; your concepts, designs, and pricing can either be validated, vindicated, or simply ignored.  The answer to our question, whether we would be understood by the marketplace came swiftly:  by the end of the four day show we had sold to customers in approximately ten countries for a total of half a million dollars; it was the largest writing show we had ever had. As sweet as that validation was, I am constantly reminded of the markets fickleness as I was recently, during this year’s Ambiente, and how easily it could have gone the other way, walking by so many companies who are eating lunch, talking to the person next door, or playing cards on their computers, because they have nothing else to do, waiting for at least one customer who is looking for the next new thing;   who will get them to breakeven, or maybe, just maybe, in the black.  

    

Ambiente, The Frankfurt Fair (Part One)

Ambiente Fair, Frankfurt, February 2012

Coral At the Pomeroy Showroom, Atlanta

While the Ambiente fair, held in Frankfurt,  Germany each February, is the single largest design event in the world for retail buyers and sellers of home categories, it holds particular interest for a small group of people who both participate in, and create for the various companies exhibiting there; Designers.

If I was going to compare it to a food related event (as I often do) then I would have to say it’s like Mario Batali going to a farmers market;   you can enjoy an tremendous variety of raw materials on display and even try finished dishes cooked in the small eateries which always seem close by.  Ambiente for the designer is like a wonderful cacophony of textures, smells, colors, and form, all positioned nicely in eleven buildings with multiple floors. Fortunately they do have moving sidewalks!

For myself, there are two main aspects to Frankfurt; aside from the fact that Pomeroy shows there for our international customers, as a designer my focus is twofold;  to meet any factories that I am currently working with; as well as new ones,  to see if they have any new finishes or materials, which I can use in my collections; and to visit the European designer exhibits; which are usually impressive, if not only for the fact that they are of a scale like nothing we can ever imagine in the United States.  

Indeed one can become intoxicated by the sheer enormity of these exhibits; not only by their physical size but by their vision of the design story they are telling.  Herein lies the seduction, which is easy enough to spot; there will be a theme for the exhibit and everything will support that particular theme; worked out to the last detail, including great design, rich and sophisticated color stories, and of course, cocktails!  The Champagne notwithstanding, it is easy, as an American, to become swept up in the strength and dynamism of these displays, but we always have to use our American filter to analyze the viability of the product.  That is to say, on the whole a presentation might be incredible,  but what happens when you take an item out from its cozy display and put it on a table by itself; is it still as interesting; is it still valid (at least for the American market)?   And while I do love these exhibits and at times cannot seem to get enough of them it is always the pull of my home market that drags me back kicking and screaming to the central question: “ Can we sell a vase that modern?”  If I teleported it to Dallas, Texas would it still “fit”.  Is orange really the new pink anywhere but Europe?  Why exactly does it appeal to me anyway?   These are all important and thorny questions which must inevitably be answered with cold hard analysis, and sometimes relaxing with your feet up, sipping an orange cocktail, like a mimosa.    

New Is Old and Old is New

Todd Taking A Tea Break

I return every year to the factories that I deal with the most for a couple of reasons; one is to renew our acquaintance and compare notes on our experiences with the business climate and their condition in particular, another is to walk through their showroom;  again.

At first blush it seems redundant to go back to a factory just to review a bunch of samples you have already seen.  I mean, what’s the point;  why would anyone do that?  First of all the factories are working for other customers as well as myself, which gives me a look into what competitors are thinking, which allows me to gauge myself against what they are doing.  In a competitive environment like our industry, I have to constantly re-evaluate what I am doing; in taste level, style, and price point.  

Something else interesting happens when I visit the factory again, I see things I did not notice before.  That’s not to say they were not there before but I just hadn’t noticed them.  This is a phenomenon which goes back to a changing fashion industry.  Two years ago, the thought of doing something in coral for example would never have crossed my mind, therefore had I seen something in this coloration I would have breezed past, simply because I had other things on my radar at the time.  On the next visit coral had indeed been added to my radars menu of items to focus on and I was able to take advantage of some decorating techniques on glass to capitalize on this new fashion color for one of my collections.

This is a dramatization of course, but coral has in fact become more important and I began to add it to the collection last year.  At any rate you get the point; something that was not important a year ago, old in fact, can become important again overnight, provided we do not take the item as it is; an update is always necessary when taking an older look and applying to current fashion.  Vintage is a good example.  If we take a sheer layered lace encrusted white dress and put it together with Victorian mid ankle lace up boots then we have an “antique” or a historical replica of vintage, and let’s throw in a cameo broach for good measure. If we however combine taller lace up (combat) boots and some newer interesting jewelry with some current color accents, we have an updated version (urban vintage) that could even handle a cameo broach and survive.

So, you might ask why this discussion is even necessary. Mainly it’s because there are not many truly new techniques (save perhaps fish leather), that come onto the market very often; therefore we are left with the same basic raw materials to work with (and our imagination of course) and must always look for new combinations, techniques, or manipulations to render something fresh that might remind someone of something they saw once but is new, fresh with a twist, and definitely not their grandmothers prom dress. So, yes I suppose you could say I go back to factories every year looking for vintage and perhaps a technique that will elevate it…   

The Small Things

Todd Working In India

More often than not I find interesting details in odd places; like dusty corners, of dusty shelves, in dusty showrooms of dusty factories, which so happens to be my favorite environment.   When I see something interesting, I may react to it immediately and start to make notes for samples of the finish or sit and draw something appropriate for that finish, while other times I will continue to wander the factory until I catch myself staring at that same finish again.  A rule of thumb for me is, if I can’t take my eyes off of it,  then I have to do something with it.  The next instinctive question is;  what should I do with this; is it best suited for serve ware;  is it translucent (good for lighting);  or just plain beautiful.  In the case of the later I  generally  let logic play a role and use the finish on a number of pieces that coordinate together as a small decorative collection.  It may seem adolescent, but I still get chills when I see the “right” finish.  Sometimes the “right” finish is in fact a mistake,  like champagne.  Although to date none of my mistakes has turned into a new food group, I have stumbled onto some wonderful techniques on glass, iron, and wood, that have propelled my collections in meaningful new directions.

I like to visit the glass factories in India, even though they are located on the main highway from Delhi in a very rustic town south of Agra (the city where the Taj Mahal is located), called Firozabad.  I was there once (by accident) on election day and it was like being in Dodge City.  After that experience I understood why the bars all closed on election day!  Every time I go to Firozabad I find some detail or finish that I have not seen before or at least have not yet taken advantage of.  The Indian glass factories are very simple and uncomplicated affairs as they are in Mexico.  They use live electric wires to cut the blown glass (unllike Mexico), whose edge is then polished smooth.  

Over the years, by trial and error, I have learned that the Pomeroy customer accepts the edges finished in a couple of ways which depends on the finish on the glass as well.  If it is clear glass, they (she) prefers that I finish the glass with a sheet metal trim piece which is glued in place on the rim and finished to match the iron base on whatever the  item might be; such as a hurricane.  If however, I have the glass engraved then    

I can leave the raw (semi polished) edge of the glass exposed and the item is acceptable as it is.  My assumption has been that because we are cutting the glass anyway by engraving;  it is consistent to use a similar cut for the top of the glass, and that by doing so the details compliment one another. 

When trying a new technique (like engraving), finish, or color story,  my method is to start with baby steps, because lets face it no matter how much I may like something, I do not posses the crystal ball of fashion and good taste.  We are in the end only designers suggesting ideas to the consumer, and they will either accept (the suggestion) or not;  therefore it is very important to step lightly into a new area and react accordingly, which was the case with engraved glass from Firozabad.  I found myself as I often do, staring at some amazing engraving (with adolescent chills) and (fortunately), had the good sense to exercise my rule of thumb.   

Game Changers

Riviera Set of Two Wall Sconces

When I begin to look for a new category to design and develop product for, the first thing I do as part of my process is to look at the marketplace in as many retailers as possible to determine what is missing, that is what techniques, or function, or even scale are the current offerings not representing.  This can be the seed of an idea which will transform a given category even if only a little in the beginning.  

We, as designers cannot always transform the world with game changing ideas; most of the time we are lucky if we can move the needle one mark at a time until we have transformed a category.  A car is ultimately a thing that carries people from place to place and has a steering wheel, motor, and four wheels.  No matter how many design changes take place, in the end the final product is still a car.  The same is true for most mature categories;  in this case wall sconces.

Many years ago, we at Pomeroy, had tremendous success with a very simple wrought iron wall sconce called Riviera.  This was a new idea at the time; not that a wall sconce was a something new;  it was new because we came up with the idea to create a set of two and include candles to create more value in the box, and to this day I am convinced that the item sold as well as it did because of the added value of the candles.

This product concept would be the beginning of a long line of gift box decorative candle lighting products which would transform our industry and continues as a product category to this day; and while there are products which will be game changers for categories of product, more often it is small continuous innovations which breath new life into a mature line of product.   

Showing At Shows (part two)

Pomeroy Showroom, Atlanta 2012

While that first show experience in San Francisco yielded modest results, it was encouraging enough to go further, especially considering my sales rep (we’ll call him A.M.) was very patient with me, even letting me crash on his couch in the basement (with the dalmatian).

Trade shows are a double edged affair;  while you are exhibiting to meet customers and write orders, you are also the target of other vendors, especially if you have come up with something unique. It used to upset me greatly in the early years when they would come by the booth;  retail in those days was healthy and competition intense.  After several years in the business I realized that a good offense is more important and effective than a good defense;  and actually in our business there is no defense anyway;  there is no real way to stop someone from copying your ideas or designs.  

When I did start designing product (a year or so after I started), I decided to follow a fashion strategy; that is I would develop product for two major introductions (Spring and Fall), and move fast; ALWAYS.  The idea being to cover every major account that I had with my new introductions and get orders placed as soon as possible.  When a company moves at this speed it is hard for a competitor to keep up, and when they do copy you, they only have price to compete with and by then you have moved on to new territory (designs), and their offerings are, well, just knockoffs.

Shows are still as exciting for me now as they were twenty years ago.  I still become excited, emotional, nervous, and generally hard to live with, prior to the first show of the season in Atlanta.  It is, for me a fashion show and I will live or die (metaphorically of course) based on the reaction to the new product.  I love the honesty of the marketplace;  something good is really good and something that doesn’t work needs to be re-thought or dropped altogether.  After a market you always know where you stand.  So while there is always competition about, whether it is another vendor or a large retailers product development team; I have learned to rely on my product game plan, designed to keep Pomeroy unique and different, and alway, S P E E D!   

Showing At Shows (part one)

Handblown Mexican Glassware

There are several important reasons to exhibit at a trade show, and the number of reasons expands as does a new company’s  customer base.  In the beginning when a company is just starting out and there is perhaps one key category of merchandise or even just one product, it is still the quickest, most effective way to get a market read on a new item, concept, or service.  Of course one must overcome the fear factors; such as, does my product serve a purpose; is the price something someone will pay; and who the heck will buy it anyway?

When it comes to customers, I always recommend that one start selling to specialty retailers first.  The specialty retailer is generally an individual or small chain of stores, who is as interested in a good value as any major “big box” retailer;  the difference is that the specialty retailer does not compete with a larger competitor on a particular item and certainly not on price.  They may, for instance sell the same category of goods; such as dog beds, but the specialty retailer will sell a better product; and while the bed will certainly be more expensive, the quality will also be higher than what one typically finds at a “big box” retailer;  the name of which provides a hint of what to expect inside.

The first Trade Show that I participated in was the Gourmet Show in San Francisco around 1990.  A sales representative that I convinced to help me sell my first handblown line of glassware from Mexico helped me set the booth with some cardboard pedestals and some wooden shelving he already had from previous shows.  As I recall, I didn’t really have enough merchandise to fill the booth, but then I wasn’t sure how much merchandise one should have anyway!

I don’t remember exactly how it went but I do remember that we wrote some orders; which were in the range of $150. each.  It was very exciting.  In my mind it had been a success as I knew definitively that there was a market for the items I was trying to sell.  I had not begun to design stemware yet, I was merely selling some existing styles from a factory that I was working with in Nuevo Laredo, Mexico, a small town on the Texas border.  And while this was a small beginning,  retail in the U.S. was strong and there were many players and opportunities, just waiting for a little creativity, which I was more than ready to provide.