Ideas on how to set this side line business up.

[Earl Smith]

My business is a small embroidery, garment printing and Sublimation shop. Recently Ive bought a holiday home on the biggest campsite in northern Europe. Its the size of a small town with a fixed population of around 3000 over the summer and up to 4,000 travelling campers most weekends (tents, caravans and campervans) in the summer. A lot of foot traffic.
I print all their uniforms and mugs for them. 65 employees, so they are good customers.

Yesterday I spoke with the owner and persueded him to start selling more souveneers(?) with the site logo on them. Plus a range of t-shirts, sweats, Jkts etc. Basically anything that I can print in my shop. Plus I can advertise my main business as an embroidery/print shop.
Now here is my problem. I cannot afford staff for this, even if its staffed only at the weekend it will cost me about 600€ a month. So how can I set this up. I do not want customers asking campsite workers for souveneers , they are busy enough. I cannot put up a sign saying to see me in my main shop either, I am 42klms away.
Has anybody on here tried something like this? If so how did you do it?

I have lots of ideas but thought Id ask here first. You never know, there might be someone on here who has the right solutiion for me.

[Dave271069]

Maybe setting up at the campsite for part of the week, you could use the shop to do the products but when at the site take orders and show off what you can sell at the shop, close the shop say sun mon tues.
without nowing much about your shop/business it's a difficult one to answer.

[WorthDoingRight]

Well perhaps you could do order forms that you collected on say one or two days per week and processed these back at base then dropped the items off another day. I imagine a number of the campers stay a week or more.

[mrs maggot]

start off simple with 5 or 6 lines - non personalised just the site photo/details, stock it up well, then have an order form and take it from there - smaller items will work well, its easier to find room for a jigsaw puzzles and t shirts than larger items.

In the summer i would be there as others have said 2-3 times a week (learn swap over day etc) also let the club reps know what you are doing, and offer them a small commission if thats allowable with the park owner, then you will have your own sales team - they will already earn comission for offering excursions etc so that is along the same lines. Allow for "shrinkage" of stock as you are bound to have bits go missing

[pisquee]

Is there a way you could have a shop space, which is secure, so that it can be open to the public as a veiwing space ... i.e. everything locked in glass cabinets, for days when you aren't on site, with order forms (and pens!) available and a postbox, where they can leave orders.
Obviously, having production equipment in a back room of that shop space would be ideal, so you can make stuff while you are onsite.

[Earl Smith]

Some interesting ideas there, thank you. Because my main shop , 42klms away, is not nearbye, I cannot send them there. I cannot take time away from my shop either as I have enough work to keep me busy 10 hours a day. Plus Saturday mornings as well. So I cannot be at the campsite for the customer during the week.
The owner is willing to give me a cabinate in the entrance to the site office. This is helpfully made up of small glass cubes so its easy to seperate and display the articles. I like the idea of a Post box and order forms, thanks. Every camper has an address so all they would have to do is leave that ( and tel number) so I could find them on Sundays. They are also offering me a room, free of charge, to store things. Things like lighters, pens and mugs can be sold in the office when Im not there. The problem comes when they want to try on clothing and thats where I have to see the customers on Sundays.
What I also want to show in the display cabinate will be my "real" work. Embroidery and garment printing. The site has many campers that stay all summer or come every weekend. They are often self employed and want work clothing. Its these customers I want to grab and more profitable.
During the summer season there are often shows on the site. Old time cars/bikes a Darts tournament in the hall, just to name a few. The owner will allow me to set up a market stand where the show is. Its a great opportunity , Im just trying to find the most efficient way to do it without wearing myself out.

[WorthDoingRight]

Well it sounds like you now have an idea of how to make it work. I still wonder whether you could not afford maybe to employ someone for perhaps a few hours a week on-site to assist you.

[pisquee]

Could you employ someone on a trial basis to see if it is viable

[Traynor26]

Nice one Earl,

sounds like fab a opportunity mate

[Earl Smith]

Thanks Lee, It is . And I will have a telephone line to my Mobil home with a local dialing code. Im going to set up another website from this IP address with a local tel number forwarded to my main shop 40 odd Klms away. Locals tend to go for local businesses so I will appear to be in their town. This town is full of small businesses as is typical here and there is only one other Embroidery shop in the nearbye town so I hope to pick up some business from that.
Thats the plan anyway. Just hope I dont wear myself out doing it.