Wright Accessories 

In 2021 I created Wright Accessories, a small online retail brand. I bought 10,000 soap dispensers at auction in Switzerland. Yeah, another crazy story, but let me explain. I only paid £0.10 per unit, but hadn't realised it would cost me an additional £1,000 to ship them to the United Kingdom. Anyway, all in all I had only paid £2,000 (£0.20 per item).

 

I planned to sell them all for £10 each, giving me a turnover of £100,000. Yeah - another idea that didn't go to plan! I actually sold 2,000 units (at 2 for £10), making £10,000. After shipping and Amazon fee, I netted around £6,000. Well - I guess that's not bad for a £2,000 investment. 

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I sold the rest on pallets in bundles of 500 units for 70p each, making £5,600, with costs:

 15% auction fee = £840 

pallet shipping fee 16 x £70 = £1,120 

leaving me £3,640 profit. 

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Overall I finished with £9,640 - not the £100,000 I was expecting, but better than a loss. However, the process took over 2 years start to finish, and involved a lot of blood, sweat, and tears. 

 

From this business I learned: 

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1. It's crucial to get a quote for international pallet shipping before buying goods from overseas. 

2. Do your market research to establish customer demand before buying. 

3. Work out the time involvement for a business idea. 

4. Project all costs that impact your net profit (eg Amazon, shipping, etc).