APA Open Community

We work closely with a few local sewing/embroidery shops. The owners of these shops come to us for engraving services mostly. The local military community comprises a large percentage of our business and their business. The sewing shops are located closer to the military base than we are.
Over the last few years, the sewing shop owners have been purchasing some of our plaques and other military-themed awards and they display them in their shops. All of these items leave our store with our business name either engraved into the back or with our sticker on the item. At times, the sewing shops take orders for the plaques. We complete the items, the sewing shops pick them up from us and sell them to their customers for a higher price than we sell the items for in our store. In these instances; the sewing shop owners pay us full retail price for these items.

Recently, a soldier brought one of our custom plaques into one of the sewing shops and asked whether they could order a similar plaque. Due to the fact that this particular plaque is one we designed and consider proprietary to us, we're hesitant to accept the order through the sewing shop. We're concerned that errors made during the order-taking process, or misinformation getting relayed to us from the sewing shop, may result in production errors, the potential for an unsatisfied customer and the potential for negative repercussions for us.

We're curious whether others work with other local businesses like this and how you might handle this type of situation.

We're mostly happy with the relationships we have with these other business owners and don't want to do anything to damage those relationships.


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Judi Brown, Owner
Tacoma Trophy
4021 100th St SW #B, Lakewood WA 98499
253.302.5566
judi@tacomatrophy.com
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We also sell to a local print/embroidery shop.  It's up to them to interface with the customer in every aspect of the order.  We get artwork and relevant instructions from them.  If there is any confusion, they gladly clear things up fairly quickly.  We are acting as a promo "supplier" in this case.  We value the repeat work and offer wholesale pricing as an incentive. 

All of this to say, if you can get your customer to provide you with an adequate mock-up and any special instructions, then reply to them with a proof/virtual that they can provide to the customer for sign-off, then you're safe, i.e., your reputation remains intact. If not, then perhaps you could take the customer direct and offer your "partner" a commission. You are doing well if you've got local shops selling for you at full retail! 

I hope I've added some value to your question.

-Brett
VisionCraft Awards & Promotions

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Brett Winston
VisionCraft
Mount Airy MD
240.394.8296
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To me, there are two questions here.

1- Do you share a proprietary design with someone who is selling for you? I can't answer that one for you, but if we have a new design, unless it was created specifically for a certain customer, we want to sell as many as we can, to whoever wants them. That, to me, is the whole point of being in business. 
2- Do I sell this design and risk errors being made by the seller? I don't see how this is any different than any other product you sell to them. The same opportunity for error (spelling, dates, etc.) exists on any order they sell for you. Your reputation should be no more at risk with this product than any other. If they submit an order with errors, then the mistake is theirs and the responsibility rests on them to have it corrected at their cost. Whether you offer a discount for a re-do is up to you.

Is there something about the design that would make an error more egregious? Maybe I'm missing something here.
If you don't produce the product for them, would they look for another source? Unless you've had some custom piece made for your design, it's really kind of hard to imagine something that another shop could not duplicate. If you produce it for them, they will have no reason to look for other sources.

Always keep in mind that by helping them sell your products, they begin to build a customer base looking for those products. The inquiry about your proprietary design is an example of this. You said your name was on the back of everything, yet the customer came to the sewing shop to get the product made. Since you are selling to them at retail, their prices are higher than yours and their costs are much higher than if they produced it themselves. I predict they will be making their own within the next 12 months and will become your competitor. 

You said you're "mostly happy" with the relationship so it's not perfect already and they may not have any problem going into business against you. They are located closer to the base and you're helping them build their customer base in your type products. I think it's inevitable that they will enter the industry, especially with our entry barriers so low.

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Sam Varn, CRM
Awards4U
President / Zen Master of Recognition
sam.varn@awards4u.com
850-878-7187
Tallahassee, FL USA
www.awards4u.com
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I am going to take this into a diff direction. I see the opportunity for you to buy one of these sewing - embroidery companies or get into the embroidery business 100%. It's a big step but similar businesses sharing customers and trading profit dollars is ripe with opportunity to grow, Just my take from the peanut gallery.


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Mark Conde
Firepoint Creations
Noblesville IN
317.626.0022
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Hi Judi

We sell to several local businesses who resell our product.  Embroidery places, jewelry stores, sign shops, print houses, ad specialty dealers even other trophy companies.

The goal being that even at a discount these are new sales and are helping the bottom line.  I figured that once we hit our breakeven point then sales over that just need to cover any variable cost associated with that order.  I am certainly not giving it away but this way they can make a little money and keep their customer happy and become a repeat customer.

a further benefit from this is the sign shops make larger signs for us at a discount and the print places do print for us at a discount.

The only thing to watch for is if the wholesale works uses too much of your bandwidth and you are not able to sell more to the new full price customers you want to bring in.

good luck
Rick Woltman









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Rick Woltman CRS
Woltman Trophies & Awards
Bridgeton MO
314.306.4307
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Original Message:
Sent: 11/3/2022 9:37:00 AM
From: Rick Woltman
Subject: RE: Other local businesses selling our products

Hi Judi

We sell to several local businesses who resell our product.  Embroidery places, jewelry stores, sign shops, print houses, ad specialty dealers even other trophy companies.

The goal being that even at a discount these are new sales and are helping the bottom line.  I figured that once we hit our breakeven point then sales over that just need to cover any variable cost associated with that order.  I am certainly not giving it away but this way they can make a little money and keep their customer happy and become a repeat customer.

a further benefit from this is the sign shops make larger signs for us at a discount and the print places do print for us at a discount.

The only thing to watch for is if the wholesale works uses too much of your bandwidth and you are not able to sell more to the new full price customers you want to bring in.

good luck
Rick Woltman









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Rick Woltman CRS
Woltman Trophies & Awards
Bridgeton MO
314.306.4307
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