A reader of Idea Accelerator asked the question, “How do I come up with ideas for selling foodstuffs on community markets?”
It sounds like a cliche, and you hear it everywhere these days, but you need to have a deep interest in what you are selling if you are to stand a chance of making it successful.
The first thing to be done is to think about what it is you want to sell. Some people have a natural gravitation towards certain products. For example, you may have had a mother or grandmother who made wonderful food and your are still inspired by their delicious food that you ate as a child. This will give you motivation and inspiration to take one of those recipes, or more than one, and try it out on a Saturday morning market.
The passion must be in your blood so to speak otherwise you’re not going to follow through and when you hit rocks in the road you are not going to be able to move them aside.
That’s half of the equation. The other half is that you have to be realistic and think about what people want today. Tastes may have changed. Will your prospective buyers open their wallets for whatever you decide to sell? Is it a product that people will buy on a regular basis? Does it fill a need in the market that others are not fulfilling?
Decide on one or two options, make the product and then try it out on family and friends. If they like it, it might be an indicator that it could be desired by other people.
Another step you can take is to go visit as many morning markets as you can. These days there are charity markets, Saturday morning markets, farmers’ markets and organic markets. Find out which one of these appeals to you. Look around, speak to people and afterwards try to assess the potential of the market you are interested in with an eye to the future.
Coming up with an idea for a food product, especially home-made, doesn’t necessarily require you to come up with brain storming and idea generation. However, of course, it will take one solid, powerful and compelling idea to get you motivated and to attract buyers to your product.
In the next few posts we will look at other areas of entering food markets, some of the information will be valuable for new entrants who may not have thought through everything that is required to be successful.
