Why Consider expanding your Product Range

If you’re someone who has a solid company, customer base, and a lot of orders that are repeating, that's great. 

But as you start to grow, gaining a larger audience, you need to meet the demands of these customers. 

At some point, while a lot of people may like one product, they may want something with some changes, such as less sugar, a desire for alternatives, and at this point, you may want to consider the product range expansion. 

Usually, this involves more SKUs, which means that you need to be mindful and strategic to keep the proliferation in check. 

But expanding the product range is really important, and here, we’ll go over why. 

Product Range, Product Mix, and Product line 

The right management of an SKU does involve making sure that you replenish, keep track of, and are able to rationalize the SKUs of a company, expanding the product range and line to create new lines and ranges. 

A product range is basically a bunch of variants of a specific category of products, whereas the product mix is considered the entire stock and types of products that some company offers. 

For example, product mix includes beauty products, hair care products, skincare, and body care products. 

A product range for hair care products is basically anything involving that, or maybe specific variants of this. 

A product line and product range are actually used in an interchangeable manner, but that’s actually not correct. 

Product line is used for variants of products, whereas a product range is a much broader type of product gamut, and may include products that are complementary. 

Hair care product ranges may involve the shampoos that address different concerns. A product line is for variants of one product, such as for specific hair types. 

Why Expanding the Product Ranges Mattes 

It’s actually really good for those that are growing. It can expand the average order value, as customers buy more and more products at once. 

This offers more chances for bundles and kits. When you increase this, you can also recommend products that are complementary to customers in order to create bundles that save costs. 

It also impacts the loyalty of products, as it lets you have more options, and they won’t want to go to competitors as much, and they’ll keep coming back to you, building the customer base, and increasing the lifetime value of the person. 

There are a few product range cons that come with this. 

The first thing, is the costs. It can be expensive to develop this, and you also need to focus on supplying and manufacturing costs, and any costs to market along with selling all of that to fulfill them. 

When they’re not executed in the correct way, it can definitely make things costlier than they should be. 

The second thing, is you have to realize not every product is going to be a winner. Sometimes, there are those that dind’t sell well, which impacts the investments, and it ca case larger inventory stock to stick around, and lower turnover of inventory, and it can impact the inventory to sales ratios, the days, sales inventory, and the like, and you may see lower revenue per unit, even though some some items are selling quite well.

Making sure that you rationalize the SKU is really important, as it helps to make sure that the items that don’t sell aren’t sticking around, and those that do are there for a bit too

Using An Office Moving Checklist To Organize Your Relocation

Relocating an office usually begins a new chapter in the life of thebusiness. Having a smooth relocation is important to keep the company running well and having a successful future. Relocating offices can be a challenge and need to be planned properly and carefully. It needs to be quick and efficient to minimalize the downtime the companyhas to endure. A good office move checklist will keep your business functioning properly during the moving process. Here are a couple tips to make sure your business move is seamless.

Three to six months prior to move date
Figure out the timeframe of the move and create a schedule. Pick a date for everyone and everything to be out of the office and then make a calendar full of details highlighting the tasks that need to be completed before that date. Include all deadlines for task completion. Find a new office, decide where you want the office to be and the type of building you need, including the size. Delegate responsibilities to your employees and make sure everyone understands their role in the process and how to get their tasks done. Move coordinators within each department can help track progress and make sure things are running smoothly. Create an inventory of your office furniture and figure out which pieces you will take with you and which ones will get sold. Figure out a relocation budget and consider the costs of moving and make a financial plan for the relocation. Make a list of everyone who needs to know your new business address consider the people, businesses, organizations and institutions.

Two months ahead of move day
Create a floor plan detailing what new office furniture, wiring, signage and equipment are needed. Plan for network and communications setup. Contact your providers and plan out relocating servers setting up internet and transferring phone numbers. Change your address with government agencies, banks, insurance, and any subscriptions. Review your current lease and make sure you are returning the property within the right timeframe and in the right conditions. Figure out if you need any special move help with your current office equipment. Hire a good moving company that has experience moving offices. Get a few estimates and pick the one that includes the most important needs for your business. Get moving insurance to protect any technology, valuables, and artwork. Start holding weekly meetings with employees to go over any loose ends.
One month prior to move
Time to transfer your utilities, make an announcement to vendors, partners and clients. Meet to discuss labeling and packing methods with your employees. Inventory and tag all furniture, equipment and supplies that will be moved. Get the items you need for moving such as cardboard boxes. If you've hired movers they may have something else for you to pack your computers and desk items in. Archive old files, get new stationary and business cards on order. Figure out how you need to secure the files and data that will be transported, get any parking or moving permits and hire a cleaning service to get your old office cleaned once you're out.

Two weeks before the move
Confirm all systems are setup for when you arrive. Start packing up and cleaning the old office. Backup important files and company information. Make a list of contacts needed for the move and share with employees. Confirm your dates and times with the movers you've hired.
Move week
Thoroughly inspect the new office. Give out the new keys and access cards. Make sure are confidential information is stored away and safe. Disconnect all appliances and electronic devices so they are ready to be moved. Put aside anything you do not want to go onto moving truck.
Move day
Arrange for move coordinators to be on the scene with the movers. Meet up with the movers and give them any information they need. Assign someone to complete a final walkthrough of the old space to make sure nothing was forgotten. Make welcome packets at new location for the employees.

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Cardboard almost got me fired

 One of the most annoying days in my life was when I was almost fired for doing nothing wrong.  This was unfortunate because in my State I am able to be fired at will for no reason or fault of my own.  This day was all based on the failure of shipping materials and it was not my fault at all.  I worked at a car dealership and at the time was working in the parts department.  My job was to sometimes pick parts up and then go and catalog them into our system and get them ready to sell or be put on our service department cars.  This was a rather easy job and was mostly all about organization and creating processes to get parts in and out of our system and storage most efficiently. So on this day, a large part was supposed to be on our shipping truck. This was where the whole day began.

 

It was a really nice morning on this regular Tuesday.  The diesel truck that was scheduled to arrive was on time and was going to be bringing lots of parts for high-end cars.  It was a racing car company and they were delivering some panels and tires which were of great expense.  The panel on this day was one of 450 parts that were on the truck for us. The driver backs the truck in and I started to unload the parts with the driver.  Most of our parts are either bare or are loaded in cardboard boxes for protection.  Large expensive parts are usually covered in a box and in this case, a 29 thousand dollar panel for a racing car was set to be delivered.  Unknown to myself the part had actually cut the box.  This meant that the part was sitting outside the cardboard box. 

 

What happened was that the driver had picked it up and it ended up dragging on the concrete floor.  This was unknown to all of us checking in the product and in the end, all the parts were checked in and I started to store them away.  It was not until a week later that the tear was found when the part was needed to be installed.  The panel had bent and the paint was chipped due to the part being exposed to the concrete and floor.  Since I was the person who had checked the product in I was responsible for it.  It was actually not myself who had put the product away and I was not aware of anything but the product being in the store. 

 

The paper product had failed to contain the panel and it ended up being damaged.  This was not only a 29 thousand dollar loss for the store but the car was not able to be fixed until another one was shipped. So we had to eat the cost of the two weeks the racing car sat in our garage.  It was a sad situation and I was the only one blamed.  The parts failure was not my fault and I was told I would be fired for it.  After explaining the situation to my direct manager he was convinced that it was incompetence.  I simply told the store manager the exact story and he agreed with me that I did as any normal person would in the situation.  This took a week and was stressful to get through and insurance ended up covering the loss.

If You Are Working From Home Right Now, Then Read This!!!

So I know a thing or two about the business world. Let’s just say I’ve done my fair share of entrepreneurship and business administration to know the do’s and don’ts of business. The biggest thing for me is that I see a lot of companies doing a lot of things wrong. Specifically, I see businesses starting to call their workers back from working at home to come back into the office. If you’re not quite sure what I’m talking about, the COVID19 pandemic caused our world to pretty much go into complete shut down, and a lot of businesses either closed completely or sent their employees to work from home. Many people actually enjoyed working at home, and we saw a lot of people commit themselves to working at home and really being productive during quarantine.

However, it is true that a lot of businesses are starting to pull their employees back into the office now that regulations are being lifted and more and more people are getting vaccinated. I personally am vaccinated, so I’m all set in that area. Yeah that’s right, I got both doses of the COVID19 vaccine and am all set for whatever kind of COVID virus comes my way. So in this article, I will be talking about some of the pros and cons of working from home, and this hopefully will serve as a guide for any business owners or managers who are trying to decide whether or not to bring their employees back to in-person work. Or, maybe you are trying to figure out if working remotely is something that you as an employee want; in that case, this article is for you too.

So first off, I must say that there are a lot of pros to working from home. Let’s start with talking about working from home first. I think the biggest benefit of working at home is that you don’t have to drive all the way to work, especially when it is busy on the roads or if it is rush hour or something like that. Not only do employees get to save on gas costs of traveling, it also reduces the total carbon emissions from a company’s employees which will help save the planet a little bit longer from its ultimate and inevitable destruction. Another benefit of working from home is that you do not have to worry about dressing up.

Now this depends on the person and the work; what I mean by this is that some businesses require employees to dress up in very formal attire and look extremely professional at work, while others require a simple business casual or even completely casual look. Where the difference is, is that some people enjoy dressing up while others don’t. I personally like to dress in business casual, because it is enough to get me in the mindset of working for the day, but it’s not to the point where it has to take a long time in the morning or be a big deal. I will say, working at home means you can get your mail quicker, and open those Amazon cardboard boxes faster to get your stuff faster. I absolutely love getting cardboard boxes in the mail because it means that I’ve gotten cool stuff.