When starting up a catalog, be ready for surprises – and have budget contingencies in place to cover the snafus that become costly.
VivaTerra founding partner Claire Gordon shared some of her thoughts on starting up a new catalog venture Friday with members of the New England Mail Order Association at NEMOA's spring conference.
VivaTerra is a gift and home catalog targeted at environmentally concerned upscale consumers who aren't the "granola" activist set, she noted. After the catalog mailed its first book in October 2004, the catalog was lucky it had the budget in place to cover some unexpected operations problems.
"We were lucky that we were self funded," so we didn't have to answer to investors, said Gordon. "Cash flow forecasting in a startup can be very challenging, because you have so little information about the business' behavior."
Vendors can also spring surprises on catalogers, she said, noting that VivaTerra deals with a lot of small artisans to source their products. While many do behave very professionally, others may not answer the phone for weeks at a time. One – whom the company was relying on for $20,000 worth of backordered product – simply disappeared without a trace.
"Suppliers may behave unexpectedly," she said. "Expect the unexpected, because it will happen."
