This is Day 2 of my 30 Day Challenge. For those of you are just tuning into this video, in 30 days I am trying to see if I can start a successful ecommerce store. I am going to launch it on Shopify but it is actually an ecommerce store and do a Kickstarter. I am giving myself 30 days. One of the things to keep in mind though is that what I am doing is I am only working on it one day a week so it is 30 “working” days. I am going to be doing it every Friday kind of like my fun time. Google has what they call 20% time meaning that Google employees are allowed for 20% of the time work on whatever project they want. This is my 20% time project.

So, in this video I am actually going to explain what my company is going to be. I am not going to give all of the details but I am going to give more details. In the first video, Day 1, I did not give almost any details about what I was doing. Which I think is kind of silly. I think I might as well start telling. Plus, I have a lot of cool things that I want to explain and I need to tell you what the product is to do that. So, I am going to tell you what the product is and I am going to tell you what I did for this second day.

One of the first things I did, one of the most important things, is I called a bunch of co-packers. When you are creating a business, a lot of times you do not want to do the manufacturing yourself, especially if you are going to scale or grow larger. I am looking to produce about 2,000, maybe 3,000, units that will be for sale. If I am going to do that, I cannot do that on my own kitchen. So, one of the things I did – you know, I am just going to tell you what it is right now and leave the rest of the video a lot easier. It is actually going  to be a nut butter. So, one of the things I did was I went out and bought a bunch of competitor’s products for examples. You have probably seen things like this. Justin’s Nut Butter is a good example. It is nuts. Nutzo is a kind of a good example of the kind of thing that I will be doing. Artisana– and there are others.  So, I went to Whole Foods and I saw what they had and I saw what they had. There were a lot of different  kinds. I do not know if you can see all of these. So, one of the first thing I did was buy a lot of different competitors’ brands so that I could see what their packaging looked like, what was their consistency. The next thing I did was I actually called some of these brands to see if maybe they could manufacture this product for me and if you cannot, can you direct me to someone who could. That is one of the big lessons I learned was that you can call the people, the people that would the ideal people, people who are doing something similar in the market. Now, some of these companies are smaller companies and they are willing to – they have some excess capacity. They have some room in their production line and they are not using the production line to its full capacity. So, if I come in and say, “Hey, I will buy an 8 hour shift,” they are willing to help out. It is extra money in their pocket.

Another thing I learned, originally I was going to have three flavors of the nut butter. I decided to just go to one. I am following the Lean Startup Method. If you have not read the book, you should do so. I believe it is called Lean Startup. Read that book. especially if you are starting up a company. It is hard. I have been struggling with it. Originally, I wanted to have three SKUs and I wanted to do this, that and have all of the bells and whistles. But, I had to cut it lot of that out. I decided I was going to go a lot more simple and start with one SKU. I also want to try to get the first saleable sample ready as quickly as possible.

One of the next things I did was I created my first batch of nut butter. I am not going to tell exactly what is in it but it looks a little weird because it is a golden tab. I recycled an old Mason jar that I had so I whipped up the first batch just right in my kitchen. I had a food processor and I just mixed it up and started getting people to taste test it. Obviously, I taste tested it and I had two friends also taste it. It is really, really good. I am really happy with version 1.0. I have some tweaks and changes that I might want to add but it is good. Basically, I can see this thing becoming a really big success.

Another thing I did was I wanted to test it. See if I could get it into little packets. So, I bought some of these little packets and I bought a heat sealer from Amazon. This one I actually cut and ripped off and whatever. I then tried to see if I could put the nut butter in these packets. And then use the heat sealer to seal the packets. I wanted to see if this would really work. Actually, funny enough, you can actually see, I do not know if you can see it on screen, but some of the Macadamia Nut or Almond Butter or whatever – actually that is not the exact ingredients I have, some of my nut butter dripped out here. The way I had to do it was put my nut butter in here and then I had to close it. So, some of it kind of squished out. So, it did not really work so well. So, my initial idea was to try and make some batches myself and – you know, actually, I will just try to show you. You can kind of see when if it comes into focus. See, it does not actually close all of the way. The nut butter actually got in the way of sealing the package.

One of the things I learned from that, which I think can apply to anybody trying to start up a business, is that the heat sealer was about $25 to $30 and the packets were about $5. It was a hypothesis that I had. Something that I wanted to test was could I do this on my own? Do I need to do use a co-packer or can I maybe produce a hundred packets on my own and try selling them on my own at farmers’ markets, gyms or whatever. The answer is no. It is really heard to do myself. I originally wanted to this to so that I could give out test samples to people. I probably will not be able to do it. One of the things I might be able to do is buy bigger containers and I could have someone fill it so the nut butter did not get in the way. But that is for later on.

I am going to finish up here with some big lessons, some big takeaways for Day 2. To recap, here is what I did. I called a bunch of co-packers and that is something that is very uncomfortable is to get on the phone and start calling people. One of the things I realized is – a buddy of mine kept saying this – you do not really believe it until you find multiple people – but he kept saying, “Remember, you are the prize.” This is their business to get new people coming in so they could help them manufacture your product. When I only had one person – So far I had at least two, I actually had three companies that were able to do exactly what I want. Manufacture the nut butters, put them in the pouches. All of that stuff. There are three companies right now that can do it. One of them I like better than the others. I do not know if they are necessarily the best co-packers out there but I could still deal with that. But now, since I have two other options, I have more negotiating power and I am realizing that I am the “prize.” I am the person who – I am the prize. Any engagement I have with them, I have the power. So, right now I have three companies. There are about 20 or  30 other companies out there and I am going to call them out. By the time I am done, I will have six or seven that can do exactly what I am looking to do. It is also making me think about different possible options on how I can produce it.

The next thing I realized is – like I said, I am trying to follow The Lean Startup model.  I  am probably going to get about 50 of these Mason jars and go down to Farmers’  Market or stand out front of Whole Foods – I am going to figure it out – and try to get into their hands. Try to sell it to people. I would ask their opinions. Ask them, “hey, would you pay $25 for this. Would you pay whatever?” Try to follow up with them, too. Maybe get their phone number. Ask them how they liked it, what could I change to make it better. All of that kind of stuff.

I am really excited about this. So, I could reiterate really quickly, and try to figure it out. I do want to launch a Kickstarter so I want it to be pretty decent by the time I launch it as a Kickstarter. It is not going to be perfect. You know what, part of that is going to be the first 1,000 I ship out, people might complain, “Oh, it is too this or too that. It is too salty or not enough salt. I do not like this flavor or I wish it had this flavor instead. Whatever it is. My idea is to iterate as soon as possible and get out the first sample and go from there.

Another thing I learned is simplify. I had this grand vision and that is probably one year down the road. I wanted to start with three different flavors. That is not yet. I had to realize that. That is next that is not for now. Another thing I learned is so far it has been a really fun experience.

I also learned to spend some money. Like I said, I paid $25 to $30 for this sealer, $5 for the bags. Something that is funny, I spent about 30 minutes researching this heat sealer and trying to figure out the perfect pouches. I was kind of nervous. Do I spend the money or do I not spend the money. You know if I had been a little bit more – not impulsive, that’s the wrong word. If I had been a little more decisive, let’s do it. This is a test. I would not have wasted that 30 minutes probably to an hour looking for that perfect heat sealer and the perfect pouches and I probably still would have come to the same conclusion that this is probably not a great idea. That being said, I might try it again perhaps with bigger pouches. I might try it again with some other things that I might tweak and change – somebody to fill the pouches etc.

So one of the big lessons to take away is to test as early as possible. I would not recommend hanging onto this elaborate vision and then waiting a year and testing all of the pieces in small batches. Test in big batches. What I mean by that is try to get into people’s hands as early as possible. Try to sell it as early as possible. It is still a little premature for me to say that because I still have not sold anything. But, one of my goals for the next week or the week after that is to actually buy like 50 of these Mason jars and stand outside in front of a gym or something and just see if I can get people to taste test it, see if I can get people to buy it. I think that is my big conclusion.

Like I said, next week my big goal is to keep calling co-packers. It is kind of hard to get a hold of them especially on Friday. A lot of people have checked out and that is the main day I am working on this project. I also want to check on the co-packers I already have. Try and get some things more solidified. And, hopefully, within the next week or two, get the Mason jars. I am also going to be starting an Instagram for it and starting some other little bits and pieces here.

Another thing I would probably do is make some kind of design just something very simple for the jars because this looks kind of goofy. It just looks like a jar of goop. But, I think if I put a nice, pretty label on there, it will make a huge difference.  So, along with the other things I will probably try to make a basic label on sticker paper. That way when I am handing out samples, even to friends, it does not look like it is some kind of homemade concoction. It looks a little bit better. Nothing too crazy, I will probably just spend 30 minutes on that.

So, that is what I am doing. Thanks for watching this video. I will keep giving you details about what I am doing. I will keep giving you all of the updates on what is going on.

If you enjoyed this video, make sure you click that subscribe button. If you have any questions about starting an ecommerce business, please put them in the Comments section below. I will answer all of them. Chances are, if it is a decent question, I will just make a video out of it. By decent, I mean that others will probably be interested in, too.