I sell stuff

Hey everyone, i'm back!

  It's time to start talking about stuff that relates to marketing.  Don't worry, I will try to make it interesting.

I have a sweat shop

That's my garage at night. (above)  It's also where I produce products that I sell.  No, it's not a grow operation.

I use a variety of tools and compounds to create secret book safes out of regular hardcover books.

Looks like a regular book

On the inside it looks like this

Another example:

And here is the link to my online store: TheSafeChoice

My most recent sale was to someone in Colorado... I wonder what they're storing in it!

My inventory is getting low, but production will resume as soon as it warms up a little.

Why did I start making these?  

Over the summer I was sitting around thinking of ways to make money without working for other people and I thought it would be cool to make a hollow book.  So I looked on Youtube and some guy basically made an hour long video that details how he builds them and sells them on Etsy.   I then went to harbor freight tools with my hopes, dreams, and a credit card, and I purchased everything I needed to start manufacturing.

Long story short, that guy on YouTube spent his valuable time showing me how to build book safes and now i'm stealing a portion of his market share on Etsy.  I expanded on his ideas and made my safes better and cheaper than his!!!  Not a smart move on his part.  

There is a reason Coca-Cola keeps their recipe in this safe: 

They don't want every crazy person like me trying to copy their drink.

So anyway, that's one thing I've been doing as a hobby.  I started selling them over the summer.  At first, sales were pretty slow, but as I made my page look more professional and as I started getting 5 star reviews, my sales and viewership started to increase.

Things I do to get good reviews:

-I ship items very quickly

-I put surprise sweeteners in each order (2 dollar bills, dollar coins, and random things I find on the floor)

People respond well when you surprise them with extra stuff and money, and that has been one of my strategies to try and get people to leave good reviews.

My goal for 2014: 

 I would like to crank out 500 safes before next Christmas.  That seems to be when people are really interested in finding unique items.  To meet that goal I need to build 10 a week starting now.  I have built 10 in one day before, so it's definitely doable.  The great thing is, they don't go bad if I don't sell them, so any that I create in excess of demand is basically just cash waiting to happen.  

Well that's all for tonight!

Kraig