GIFT BASKET BUSINESS
How To Start a Gift Basket Business
 Gift Basket Business
By Kelly Land, © 2006-2008, All rights reserved.
Christmas, Mother's Day, birthdays--at one time or another, everyone needs to
buy gifts. When consumers can't find the perfect present, who comes to the
rescue? Gift-basket entrepreneurs, of course.
Do you have that creative touch?
Designing gift baskets can be fun and profitable! Gift-basket entrepreneurs buy
gift items and baskets, use an artistic flair to package them attractively, then
find creative ways to market their eye-catching creations to others. The
gift-basket industry has been going strong for nearly 15 years, and the outlook
continues to be bright. "Annual sales for gift baskets totaled about $800
million in 1996, up from $700 million in 1992. It's certainly a growing
industry," says Kathy Horak, editor of Gift Basket Review. A recent survey by
the magazine reveals the majority of American gift-basket designers in business
at least one year boast annual sales of $50,000 or more; approximately 30
percent enjoy sales of at least $100,000 annually.
Basket of Profits
The most typical gift-basket buyers, according to the Gift Basket Review survey,
are women between the ages of 35 and 49, who account for more than 76 percent of
gift-basket sales. Next in line are corporate customers, who account for
approximately 20 percent of sales. Because prices for gift baskets run anywhere
from $15 to $1,000, customers tend to come from the moderate to upper-middle
income levels. Despite the baskets' widespread appeal, running a successful
gift-basket business can pose a few challenges. "This is an incredibly
competitive business," says Jo Masterson, owner of Mountain View Gift Baskets in
Redmond, Washington. "The main thing that surprised me when I entered this
industry five years ago was the amount of competition that's out there. In my
area, for instance, we have more than two pages' worth of gift-basket provider
listings in the local telephone book, and there's another gift-basket shop just
three blocks down the street from mine." Other gift-basket services aren't your
only competitors. Masterson notes that florists offer similar convenience and
prices and target the same market. Masterson has succeeded in this competitive
environment by focusing her marketing efforts on corporate rather than
individual clients. "When I started out, I targeted my offerings to individuals
rather than to businesses, because that's who I already knew. But my intention
from the beginning was to gradually shift my focus to the corporate market,"
Masterson explains. "That's because a company that uses your service regularly
tends to place five or six gift-basket orders a month, whereas most individuals
order only one or two times a year. In short, for the same amount of marketing
and physical effort, you generally get a bigger return with the corporate
market." This doesn't mean, however, that Masterson turns her back on
individuals. "Today, I sell about 20 percent to 25 percent of my items to
individuals," she says, "many of whom learn of my business through the
workplace."
 Take
a closer look.....
Starting a Gift Basket Business
- Complete business package to help you easily and quickly start your own
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Gift Basket Drop Ship Secrets -
Start your own Gift Basket Business without keeping any inventory! Start
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101 Gift Basket Ideas - Create
101 Simple & Easy Gift Baskets like a Pro!
Basket Biz Help - Info,
resources & eBooks for starting your own retail or homebased Gift Basket
Business. Wholesale Directory is hot!
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Making It Work
Anyone operating a gift-basket service should be prepared to spend much of the
holiday season working long hours, especially during the weeks before Christmas.
"The demand for our baskets is steady all year long, but it's during the last
few months of the year when things really heat up and we work very, very hard,"
Nichols says. Still, operating a gift-basket service offers a variety of
distinct advantages. The market for gift baskets is sizable, with repeat
business being not the exception, but the rule. Start-up costs can be as low as
$3,000. It's possible to make substantial profits running this business part
time, as Masterson did. "I ran this as a part-time home based business for my
first two years and had some success that way, but once I realized I really
enjoyed the gift-basket business, I decided I needed to move things up a notch,"
Masterson says. "So I quit my day job as a nurse and moved into a retail spot
with a showroom and a warehouse. That definitely took the business to a whole
different level, converting it from a hobby into a full-time `real job.' " Sales
also reached a new level: Mountain View Gift Baskets brought in sales of more
than $100,000 in 1997. For gift-basket entrepreneurs, the rewards are more than
financial. "Being creative, seeing your visions come to fruition, and [seeing]
the responses of [people] who receive your baskets--that makes all the
difference," Nichols says. "When you get a call from someone who tells you how
happy one of your creations made them, it just makes you feel so darn good." For
More Information Contact the Gift Association of America, 612 W. Broad St.,
Bethlehem, PA 18018, (610) 861-9445. Subscribe to Gift Basket Review ($29.95 for
a one-year subscription), Festivities Publications Inc., 815 Haines St.,
Jacksonville, FL 32206, (800) 729-6338.
Copyright 2006-2008. All rights reserved. Any reproduction of this article in whole
or in part without written or verbal permission is strictly prohibited.
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