Buy one get one free?
Reiterating what Henry said, time is flying by.... so at the moment my contributions to the blog are suffering! So I've vowed to sort it out and this should be the last time that I leave it a week before updating you all.
So following on from what Henry said we made it up to Liverpool (I wasn't that late) and on Monday had an interesting meeting with a small company that specialises in bringing new alcoholic drinks to the major buyers in the 'on-trade' (anywhere that serves alcohol for consumption on site eg pubs/ bars). So we discussed our product and once again it looks like we have a convert to the joys of Real Fruit Cocktails. The conclusion was that we did truly have a different offering to everything else on the market and that some of the bigger groups may be interested.
He was meeting a large national distributor the next day and agreed to take the product along to see what they thought. Their conclusion was that it really could sell, but that it was too costly for them (and their clients). This was not far off what we had expected given that what we have produced is something that is truly different and more premium than anything else that they currently sold.
Undetered we have decided to focus on clients that specialise in niche natural products. Once the market understands that a real fruit cocktail in a bottle is expensive to make (and therefore buy) we will take it back to this national distributor.
We've also begun to focus our efforts on the off-trade (the supermarkets and the off-licenses). After much deliberation we have picked one supermarket and are going to progress with attempting to get on to their shelves so that people can enjoy the real fruit cocktail at home! If you want the product at home we have an interim solution that involves us delivering it or couriering it to people.... but this is not the long term solution! Incidentally if you want details of this please let me or Henry know (rupert@muddlercocktails.com or henry@muddlercocktails.com).
After we have had such positive feedback from our first customers and the drinking public we decided that it was time to get our product out to the masses (and those beyond our London foothold) so we've decided to push on with these expansion plans. Whether they'll work or not time will tell (and it'll take us a few months to finalise details with either an off-trade or on-trade large scale supplier). What's also clear is that you wont be expecting to see us on a buy one get one free deal in your local supermarket.... the margins for us are very slim and if they are expecting us to fund many (or any) of those deals then it might be a step to far for us. Its early days though... lets see what happens.
We also spent some of last week back on the roads and have some additional bars to add to the current list. I'll publish a full list of pubs/ bars over the next couple of days, but the good news is that my local The Florence (in Herne Hill) is now offering me (and others) a Muddler Cocktail on an evening out!
Some more updates soon... but must go now as there are some repeat orders in that need to be fulfilled.
Talking of buy one get one free deals... Wessex House is offering buy one Muddler get one free before Midnight on a Friday night.
And my new (Aussie) housemate (Ben) wont stop asking for a mention on the blog. Something about attributing our success to his arrival... I'm not convinced that grabbing the occasional bottle of Muddler from our fridge is helping... but if it stops him talking about English weather....
I say grab me a Muddler whilst you are there.
So following on from what Henry said we made it up to Liverpool (I wasn't that late) and on Monday had an interesting meeting with a small company that specialises in bringing new alcoholic drinks to the major buyers in the 'on-trade' (anywhere that serves alcohol for consumption on site eg pubs/ bars). So we discussed our product and once again it looks like we have a convert to the joys of Real Fruit Cocktails. The conclusion was that we did truly have a different offering to everything else on the market and that some of the bigger groups may be interested.
He was meeting a large national distributor the next day and agreed to take the product along to see what they thought. Their conclusion was that it really could sell, but that it was too costly for them (and their clients). This was not far off what we had expected given that what we have produced is something that is truly different and more premium than anything else that they currently sold.
Undetered we have decided to focus on clients that specialise in niche natural products. Once the market understands that a real fruit cocktail in a bottle is expensive to make (and therefore buy) we will take it back to this national distributor.
We've also begun to focus our efforts on the off-trade (the supermarkets and the off-licenses). After much deliberation we have picked one supermarket and are going to progress with attempting to get on to their shelves so that people can enjoy the real fruit cocktail at home! If you want the product at home we have an interim solution that involves us delivering it or couriering it to people.... but this is not the long term solution! Incidentally if you want details of this please let me or Henry know (rupert@muddlercocktails.com or henry@muddlercocktails.com).
After we have had such positive feedback from our first customers and the drinking public we decided that it was time to get our product out to the masses (and those beyond our London foothold) so we've decided to push on with these expansion plans. Whether they'll work or not time will tell (and it'll take us a few months to finalise details with either an off-trade or on-trade large scale supplier). What's also clear is that you wont be expecting to see us on a buy one get one free deal in your local supermarket.... the margins for us are very slim and if they are expecting us to fund many (or any) of those deals then it might be a step to far for us. Its early days though... lets see what happens.
We also spent some of last week back on the roads and have some additional bars to add to the current list. I'll publish a full list of pubs/ bars over the next couple of days, but the good news is that my local The Florence (in Herne Hill) is now offering me (and others) a Muddler Cocktail on an evening out!
Some more updates soon... but must go now as there are some repeat orders in that need to be fulfilled.
Talking of buy one get one free deals... Wessex House is offering buy one Muddler get one free before Midnight on a Friday night.
And my new (Aussie) housemate (Ben) wont stop asking for a mention on the blog. Something about attributing our success to his arrival... I'm not convinced that grabbing the occasional bottle of Muddler from our fridge is helping... but if it stops him talking about English weather....
I say grab me a Muddler whilst you are there.
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