Worm Farm Business No-No #4

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Once again, common mistakes in the Worm Farming Business:.

1. Not paying attention to your worms
2. Over selling your worms
3. Under selling (not expanding your market)
4. Expanding too fast
5. Poor customer service
6. Poor marketing
7. Not delegating

Worm Farming Business Mistake #4

Today's post concerns mistake #4: "Expanding too fast".  Not to be confused with #2 "Over selling your worms".  Here we're talking about expanding your customers base, particularly wholesalers, to the point that you're unable to fulfill your customer's orders and you're making everybody mad at you.

Servicing too many wholesale customers can get you into trouble.  It will be tempting in the beginning to take on anybody and everybody who wants to stock your worms for resale.  Wholesale accounts are great, but the profit margin is less than retail.  And generally this type of customer will buy larger quantities and more often than a retail customer, so you're worm stock will be stressed.

With that in mind, if you commit to too many wholesalers, you run the risk of running out of worm stock.  As we discussed in #2, if you deplete your worm stock too much, the breeding is slowed down and your future as a successful worm farmer is in jeopardy.

When you upset a customer by not being able to fulfill his order for that large fishing party he expects this weekend, you most likely will loose him forever.  He will look for worms somewhere else and may never call you again.  

Of course, it helps to get a contract up front when you agree to a wholesale account.  That way, the customer is committed to buying so many worms from you for the year.  However, if you fail to deliver, this contract is not going to stand up very well.

Be realistic as to how many customers you can handle and when to take on more wholesale accounts.  At first, it's really best to stick to retail sales.  You'll get top price for selling fewer worms.  Wait until you get a large inventory built up, see how fast you can get more worms up to sale size, and work out all the kinks before venturing into the wholesale part of worm marketing.

More Worm Farming Marketing Secrets

Find more information on worm marketing  details in my Worm Farm Manual: A Step-By-Step Guide to Raising Earthworms for Fun and Profit.

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