Saturday, March 20, 2010

Yes? No? Maybe?

So, I have this problem where I'm physiologically unable to say the word "no". My lips and tongue just won't work together to form the word, even when my brain is screaming it over and over and over. Most of the time that's a real problem - I get myself into a ton of things that I don't really want to do, but just can't help it. Sometimes, though, it turns out okay.

For instance. An old friend recently began selling Scentsy products - yummy smelling wax tarts that melt in a decorative warmer via heat from a light bulb. No flames, no smoke, etc. She had posted several times on Facebook about starting her Scentsy business, how much she loved the products, and how she needed people to book parties. I ignored it for a little while, but when she mentioned the Cherry Limeade scent, well...my fingers grew a mind of their own and said that YES, I'd host a party! So I did, last night.

She rolled in with baskets upon baskets of little jars of scented wax, in nearly every scent you can imagine. Fruity, tropical, foody, coffee, manly, flowery...just everything. And although only a few very good friends showed up to party with us, we had a great time smelling them all, making lists of the ones we liked best, playing games. It was a great time, and I really did earn nice hostess credits for *very* minimal effort on my part. I had to clean my house (which I needed to do anyway) and make a few refreshments (big deal.)

It was SO easy, in fact, and I like the products SO much that I'm even contemplating becoming a Scentsy consultant myself. I would (hopefully) make a little money selling something that I enjoy. It hasn't been difficult at all for her to sell, and she's a full-time mom like me. Hmmm...

The things I'm thinking right now:
  • I've done the direct sale thing before. I've sold both Mary Kay and The Body Shop at Home, and failed miserably at both. However, the parties for both of those were waaaaaay more involved than a Scentsy party. With TBSaH, for instance, I had to haul in big tubs and fill them with warm water and set them out with towels and washcloths and scrubbers for everyone to soak their feet, scrub them, lotion them down, etc. I can see where that wouldn't appeal to everyone...and I can't tell you what a pain in the backside it was for me. With Scentsy...you plop everything on the table and watch everyone descend onto it and go into a happy sniffing frenzy. Then you talk to them a little between sniffs. MUCH easier.
  • My friend has had great success with Scentsy so far. She bought her warmer after seeing them at a home show and loving it. Over the next few days, she had people drop in and comment on how nice her house smelled, and place their orders through her. After she'd sold several hundred dollars worth of products for someone else, she finally decided to just sell it herself! And now that I've had a warmer burning in my home, I can vouch for how long the scent lasts. It was turned off at 8:00 last night - at 11:00 the next morning, my whole house still smells like yummy Black Raspberry Vanilla. She just posted on Facebook today that she's made her first $1000 in sales - and that's in her first month, with only one party (mine) under her belt. She hasn't even had her debut party yet!
  • It's $100 for the starter kit. That's not a LOT of money - certainly less than the startup for my last two flopped ventures. But it's still $100, and that kind of IS a lot to us right now. I'd have to sell $500 in products to make that money back. My friend has made twice that in a month. Could I do the same?
  • How would I get started? My mom has already offered to have a basket party - taking a box of miniature scent samples - to work with her. It's another $60 for the sample kit, though...of course, my friend's first basket party netted her $600 in sales, more than paying for the kit. I have a couple of other friends that I could probably guilt into having parties to help me out. Hopefully they'd invite people I don't know that would book parties with more people I don't know...but that's "hopefully", and it certainly didn't work out that way before. Of course, I didn't know the same people before, either.
  • I'd have a great "upline" in my friend. She's really into it, has watched the videos and scoured the web, and really knows her stuff. More than that, she really loves her stuff, and that can make a big difference.
  • I'm just not a salesperson. I couldn't sell a heater to a naked Brazilian in the Arctic on the coldest night of the year. I'm told that this stuff sells itself, which I absolutely believe to be true to a point - you still have to get people to smell the stuff. Once they do, well, they want it. :)  Can I get people to smell it?
So. Those are the things on my mind at present. I'm just not sure.

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And on a totally different subject...we're taking Milly to get her first haircut tonight! Praying it goes well - she generally doesn't like being too close to people she doesn't know well, much less sitting still in a chair for them while they get close to her face with scissors.

1 comment:

  1. Kristen, I DO remember you!! :D Actually, I was just wondering what happened to you and a few other mamas the other afternoon...so good to "see" you here! <3 I'll have to read now that I know where you are on the net. Blessings!

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