What is happening to some of our clients is that several suppliers are moving to another supplier.

While setting up a new supplier is easy, it is often annoying that much of the previous sales history is lost. To make an order now, you must go back and forward from the old supplier history screen to the new supplier orders.

Well, do not worry, we will fix it fast.

Go to Creditor Maintenance> Merging.

Put in the old and new creditors and move the information into the new creditor. Do not worry about the account details, as these will not be moved over. If that has to be done, you need to do that manually.

Enjoy.

If you are serious about selling products like gifts, you need to buy much of your products directly.  This means overseas. 

If you are not what you will find, your supplier buys it for X and sells it to you at X plus extra, so you have to sell it to make a profit for X plus a lot more.  Then what you will often find is that the gifts you have are not particularly difficult to get. Many other shops are selling what you have.  So you do not get much margin. 

The ones that make good profits in the gifts industry specialise in a product line and import direct.  

Now it is a bit harder to buy overseas, but it is also more profitable. This is because of the recent movements in world currencies. It also depends on when you or your supplier has paid for the goods. Plus how much they have in stock and their movements etc. This is why the difference in prices on offer for the same goods often are now huge.

So my tip is now is a good time to shop between suppliers. 

One site I recommend which has everything is Alibaba.  Look at what you are buying now and see what you can get it there. Do not be afraid to bargain with them over quantity and price. That is why the site is there.  Try a few orders and see how you go. 

A tip I recommend is always buying from overseas suppliers with PayPal or  Alibaba. That way, you get a guarantee if something is not right, the fact is that you do not know them. 

I had one client that decided to buy mobile cases. He contacted a few overseas suppliers and decided on a few. Over time, he built up his purchases. He now sells a lot of mobile cases with decent margins.

Required by businesses is a strategy with your suppliers.  Without suppliers, no business can function. 

We call this strategy Supplier relationship management (SRM).

You have to be careful as suppliers have many interests. Some of these interests are not in your interest. Still, they have a vested interest in helping you market more products. They tend to be much more informed about your products, market, and competition then you. Much of your success depends on them. Yet before you can plan an SRM, you need to find exactly how important each supplier is to your business. 

Here is a quick and effortless way to get this, which will take a few seconds.

Go to Cash register reports> Sales - Stock > Supplier Stock Sales for a Given Period.

Now, although there are many options there, let us keep it simple for the first run. Pick the last financial year and let it rip.

You will get a very detailed summary report of sale details by the supplier in a few moments. 

As a rule, I suggest you look at the largest few in the quantity column as these suppliers are bring in the customers.

Also look at the largest few by profit as they are paying your bills.

Now readers go for it and let me know what you find out!