Here’s a High Profit Business That Changes With The Seasons
Imagine, having a business that changes with the seasons. One in which your products are swapped out and your theme completely changed several times a year. What if you could sell Christmas trees in December, plants and flowers in the spring, vegetables in the fall, pumpkins in October …and so forth?
Why would anyone want to run a business like this?
Well, because all of these items are in hot demand at their specific time of year. In December, people are scrambling to find the ideal Christmas tree, and most are willing to pay a premium for a quality product. In the spring, householders are on the lookout for plants and flowers. In the fall, everyone enjoys harvest time and the variety of fresh local produce. In late October, you’ll find families cruising the city looking for that perfect Halloween pumpkin.
In many instances, the demand for these items will outstrip supplies, and anyone with any inventory left can not only sell it at full price, but expect to be sold out in no time.
Of course, in order to start such a business, you’re going to need to have access to some land within a major population area. However, be prepared to pay a premium price for your lot – especially if it’s on a busy thruway. This will be your number one challenge – and it’s probably the main reason why most people can’t get this off the ground.
Your next challenge (and this is just about as big) will be finding reliable suppliers to provide you with your seasonal wares. This will take a lot of effort and legwork on your part. Creating relationships with local farmers for produce and pumpkins will be fairly straightforward. Sourcing Christmas trees could be a little more challenging. And finding a greenhouse to provide you with all those spring flowers could test you even further. Fortunately, once you’ve got working business relationships with these suppliers, you should be all set.
If you are unable to find a lot to rent, or you simply don’t want the headache, you might consider renting an outside booth at your local flea market. In most cases, an outside booth doesn’t fall within the 10 x 10 confines of your typical indoor booth. More often than not, you simply rent a large area of land situated outside the flea market building. This “lot” sized area is generally large enough to sell the items described above.
Although there are no long-term commitments and you can literally get set up within a day, there are drawbacks. There may be no room on the flea market grounds to store your merchandise. That means you’ll need a place to store and receive your goods, and a truck to transport everything to the flea market each day. With that being said, some locations will allow you to store your merchandise on site as long as you have a way of securing your inventory. One solution might be to rent a steel container.
Ideally, it would be nice to make a deal with the flea market owner for you to have a permanent spot outside where you could receive deliveries directly from your suppliers and store your inventory overnight. Anything less than storing your merchandise in a steel container exposes you to risk. One positive is that your inventory may not be valuable enough to attract the attention of would-be thieves anyway.
If you’re able to get your own lot, so much the better. This will allow you to be creative in ways that you would never be able to in a flea market venue. You could have a small trailer/office set up with heat where you could warm up between customers. You could install whatever signage and lighting you saw fit. You could broadcast music of the season to get people in the mood. Essentially, you could create the ideal atmosphere for your customers. That’s a lot more than you’d be allowed to do at a flea market.
Once your business gets established, you might also start thinking about selling additional items that your customers would be interested in. Perhaps you could start selling firewood in the fall and winter months. You could start selling bags of soil and fertilizer to go with your flowers in the spring. You could sell pumpkin carving kits for your pumpkins in October. You could start selling Christmas wreaths, tree stands and decorations to go with your Christmas trees in December. You are only limited by your own imagination.
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