Do you want to know how to approach retail stores to sell your products?

If yes, then you’ve landed at the right place!

Getting your products into traditional retailers can be an excellent growth strategy.

In today’s article, I’ll show you how to approach retail stores to sell your products. Done right, it can significantly boost your revenue. Some other factors affect building your company, and we’ll also discuss them in this article. 

Benefits Of Approaching Retail Stores To Sell Your Products

As I mentioned earlier, building your brand’s awareness and business is a great strategy. 

Following are some benefits of doing so:

1. Growth Opportunity

One significant advantage of selling your goods at a retail outlet is the chance for expansion that this retail store gives. 

To get your goods into big box retailers, you must have a proven track record of success, and selling your product at small, independent stores is a superb method to establish demand for your product. 

Once you’ve created contacts with several independent retail businesses, you can nurture distribution chances with larger store chains and possibly get your goods into larger stores. Selling your product through a retail store allows you to grow and succeed.

2. Broad Geographic Coverage

According to Statista, retail stores are projected to grow by 3.8% in 2022. There are 37 million retail stores in the USA, so it shows a retail store on every corner. 

Similarly, there are a massive amount of stores all over the world, and if you make a good strategy to approach them, then you can open gates to an enormous amount of audience. 

So approaching retailers to sell your products will help you cover a wide geographic area and increase your brand awareness and sales. 

3. Great Place to Test Products

You can sell a product to a few retailers at different locations to see how it sells, and then if people are buying it frequently, it’ll increase the demand for the product, and you can then work on scaling it. 

There are also some other benefits of selling to retail stores like:

• It highlights the necessity of having adequate profit margins on your items.
• It implies that your shipping and logistics systems must be faultless.
• You must also have a plan to handle exceptionally huge volumes if necessary.

How To Select Good Retail Stores To Sell Your Products?

Finding good retail stores to sell your products is not as hard as it seems. You need to take care of a few things, and you can find good retailers. 

Here are the things that you should keep in mind before selecting retail stores to sell your products. 

1. Retail Store Niche

There are around 37 million retail stores in the USA only, and all of them are not of your niche. Some stores sell products from a specific niche. 

If you are trying to sell your products to retail stores in completely different niches than yours, it is clear that you are making a big mistake, and your business might get down before even starting. 

So make sure to target the retail stores of your niche for better growth and good results. Some big departmental stores sell products from different niches that you can also target to make them your wholesale customer. 

2. Store Marketing Strategy

Selecting a store that advertises itself or has a good marketing strategy will help you to showcase your products to a relevant audience for free. It will also help you sell more products to your wholesale customers. 

Do they even advertise their shop? Or perhaps they don’t have to. 

In any case, you’d want a retail store with a comprehensive marketing approach. Remember, the goal is to target their market and route them to yours.

3. Business Goal

Every business owner needs to set a goal/financial forecast for the coming years of milestones to achieve. And if your goals and business ethos match with the retail store owner, it might be an excellent fit for your product. 

For example, if you sell food products targeting stores like Whole Foods might be a great fit for your product since your values would align.

How to Approach Retail Stores To Sell your Product?

Selling to retailers differs from selling directly to customers. Retailers have varying requirements and will want to inspect your product to determine if it is a good fit before stocking it or placing a significant order.

So it is essential to approach the retail stores with the right pitch, and to do so, there are two ways to approach the retail store owners or shop managers:

1. By Directly Scheduling a Meeting With the Retail Shop Owner

To be a successful business owner, you should consider visiting the retail outlets where you are attempting to sell your products and schedule a meeting with the business representative.

In-person visits and meetings with big head offices have several advantages:

• You can show the product.
• They can touch and use the goods.
• Clear any concerns and objections on the spot.

You take the sample of the wholesale products to the retailers so they can see them, and if everything goes well, they’ll approve the sample, and you completed the first step. Now focus on packaging and shipping to make the product a success. 

I’ll review how to pitch your goods to a retail store later.

2. Direct Mail: Introductory Letter to Retailers

Direct mail is a scalable method for attracting retail businesses as wholesale clients. When you send a personalized written introduction letter to retail stores, it can be an effective technique to generate leads at scale.

There are a few things that you need to consider while sending a letter to retailers and make it a success.

• Research & personalize – Direct mail works best when it is personalized to the recipient.
• Send daily – Send daily if you want a steady flow of leads.
• Follow up – Always contact a few days after you know the parcel is delivered.

Retail buyers will pay attention if you write them an introductory letter and provide them with a sample of your product.

The idea behind “Lumpy Mail” is that if you send the correct person something that arrives in the mail with an unusual shape and is individually addressed, they are more likely to open it and give it some thought.

It will give them something tangible they can hold in their hands and utilize, preferable to merely watching images and videos.

Sample Letters to Retail Stores

Get to the point in your introduction letters by introducing yourself and your company, then tell them why you’re writing to them.

Like any marketing activity, you only have a few seconds to capture and maintain their attention, so it’s critical to be concise and precise in the letter.

If you are thinking of sending introductory letters to retail stores, the following letter samples can help you. 

Sample Letter 1

See more sample letter examples here.

Essential Points To Sell To Retail Stores

Knowing exactly how to pitch your goods to a business may seem difficult. Honestly, it is something you’ll learn through time and experience.

If you meet the retail store owners in person, then the following are some points that you should consider to sell to retail stores. 

1. Convince Them of a Meeting

First, you need to schedule a meeting with retailers. I have already mentioned the ways to approach the retail stores to sell your products. 

But if you pitch your product with face-to-face sales, you should schedule a time to go and meet them. 

2. Prepare a Good Product Demo

Demonstrating a product is incredibly effective. Here are a few points to give a great product demo. 

• Customize your demonstration for them – each customer is unique, so do your homework.
• Tell a story – consumers will relate more if you include the product in the story.
• Rehearse – A skilled sales representative will prepare and rehearse the delivery several times.
• Test everything early– if your product has the potential to fail, make sure you test it all before you go to the meeting.
• Call to action – asking is something that many overlook; the optimum moment to ask for the sale is immediately following the demo.

3. Give Them a Product Sell Sheet

A product sell sheet is a single piece of paper that informs your buyer about the primary features of the product as well as how to order.

It should clearly explain your product and its benefits. It is worth mentioning if your product has good previous sale records. 

Also, keep the sheet product-focused, precisely short, and don’t forget to add a CTA (Call To Action) at the end of the sheet. It will help you convince them to sign a contract. 

4. Follow Up

Usually, you’ll close the deal on the spot, but there are times when the retailers ask for time to think before closing the deal. 

So make sure to call them after a few days of meeting and ask them if they are interested in selling your product. Also, give them a last discount to show them profit.

How To Create an Online Store To Sell to Wholesalers and Retailers?

Since you are now going to sell your product to retailers, the next logical step is to add a wholesale component to your site. This will allow your wholesale customers to order at their convenience 24/7 and reduce the time spent fulfilling the orders.

WooCommerce is one of the most versatile eCommerce CMS for quickly launching your online store to sell to wholesalers and retailers simultaneously. 

It has extensive functionality for both B2B and B2C store creation. In a matter of minutes, you can set up a feature-rich store.

However, creating a wholesale store requires more than just the WooCommerce default features. You can easily create a professional store to sell to wholesale and retail customers by using a WooCommerce Wholesale Suite plugin.

Wrapping Up

That’s it for today’s tutorial. 

Now you know how to approach retail stores to sell your products and some essential points to keep in mind for a thriving wholesale business. I have tried explaining almost every step you need to approach retail stores, improve sales and make a product successful. 

Selling to retail stores will give you access to a broader audience you might never have been able to reach. It also means more sales and revenue for both of you.

If you have any questions, please post them in the comments section. I would love to answer all your questions. 
Ready to create your online business store? Download the WooCommerce Wholesale Suite plugin now!