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The Sanity of Math and the numbers to survival

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IanB said:
So we did the taxes for 2011, and the meadery 'technically' lost 4k dollars. We have about 30 accounts, with 10 really active accounts, we do tastings at least 2x a month, and we sell about 150 cases a year.

The good news is that we are making changes (since you can't keep losing money forever right?) and one of the things that has been good has been to perform smaller batches.

The reason you do smaller batches isn't to leverage any cost efficiencies, we make smaller batches right now because we need to understand and learn about what people want to buy!

If you only have 3 products for a whole year, that inventory is all tied up in those three products, and if people don't want them, you are screwed. Also for the people that like your products, they only have three choices (think of an ice-cream stand, it is FAR easier to go back to an ice-cream stand that you love, that carries 58 flavors, than a stand you love, but only has 3 flavors. Maybe you don't want vanilla or chocolate or chocolate chip, maybe you want mango today? see what I mean?)

Design of your label and the 'look' of your product matters a lot. No idea 'how' to do this correctly, I guess it is just the 'special sauce' that people can pick individually for themselves, but if you get a good design, you will sell more.

Lastly, keep coming out with new stuff, all accounts like to buy new stuff. Then when you find something that is working, do variations on the new stuff that worked. For instance sweet mead sells better than dry for us, so we are taking our sweet and making a variation by carbonating it to make sparkling sweet. Get the idea?

Good luck fellow Mead Makers and I will update the next time some 'great' knowledge comes along to share!
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I recomend you this software:

http://www.inflowinventory.com/

I have been using it for 5 years and it's just the best for inventory control and for costing.

Now I'm selling only two kind of mead, why: it's easier, clients get used to them and to the brand. Many mead could create confusion.

Remember, it is important that somebody buy your mead, but it's more important is that this person buy it for a second time and if you don't have the needed stock then you're not giving to your clients the chance to evaluate your product once again, they won't become loyal to you if they don't taste your mead again.

The best way to find out which mead will be acepted is to validate your formula. For example, right now I'm working in my third commercial mead. I have the basis and 5 variation. Then I'll took one bottle to "visit" a friend (my personal guinea pig) who happen to have a good taste on wines and foods. If by the end of the evening there's mead in the bottle it means that's not the formula I'm looking for, but if the bottle is empety, then it means I'm on the right path.

Saludos
 
Akueck - Umm, when I use the terms 'technically' it is what the accountant tells me. Depreciation for equipment is very minimal as I have franken-brew equipment that really didn't cost much but a few hundred dollars for most everything, or I bought a tank at a scrap yard in Cash, and can't depreciate a cash expense that came out of my savings vs my business accounts.

But what I REALLY mean by 'Technically' is that I am always focused on CASH, how it comes in and how it goes out and if I have enough to keep this thing going. When you run out of Cash (not sales) you are broke. (as you know from your question above this is a familiar topic) so that is what I mean by 'Technically'.

The reason we run out of cash, is that we are experimenting to find a 'hit' and so we try to do differant things, because when we tried to only make 3 meads but have a deep market penetration it didn't work, because people didn't like those 3 meads 'enough' to sustain that business model/growth.

Like I have said before in other threads, generally people want sweet (and really sweet too like 1.015+), I think they also want carbonation too.
 
I can say I that I agree to the carbonation.

The very, very sweet... Well, I can say my tastes have changed. The first 'real' commercial mead I ever tasted was sweet. I liked it, and it got me into brewing my own.

I next sampled a very, very dry mead. It too was very good, when it was in it's element.

I have noticed that there isn't much in the middle of that spectrum, which is where I've been trying to run with my own home-brewed mead.

I think a well made semi-sweet mead is something the market (at least around where I live) is missing.
 
IanB said:
The reason we run out of cash, is that we are experimenting to find a 'hit' and so we try to do differant things, because when we tried to only make 3 meads but have a deep market penetration it didn't work, because people didn't like those 3 meads 'enough' to sustain that business model/growth.

Like I have said before in other threads, generally people want sweet (and really sweet too like 1.015+), I think they also want carbonation too.
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Don't experiment with the market - placing something into the market should be the result of previus studies.

It seems to me like if you're in a Piñata - blindfold. You have to make small batches (1-3 gallons), don't share them with other mead makers, share them preferably with other people, people that doesn't know nothing about mead, wine drinkers are good guinea pigs. Take notes and try not to lie to yourself.

You have to be patient - sweet mead is good if you're in a hurry, but I found here that people taste is as follows:

  1. Semi-Sweet
  2. Dry
  3. Sweet

And I'm not going to change that, it's just their taste.

So, It takes to me 1.5 to 2 years to have something semi-sweet or dry in the market, it's a lot of money and a lot of time for experimenting.

Here people said to me that sweet mead reminds them cough syrup. Another thing they said is that they have two or three and then they don't want more, to them sweet mead is just "sickly". That is why right now I don't make sweet mead, but I didn't give up yet, I'm designing a Melomel and I hope this time they'll enjoy it.

Let me show you the last WineShow where my mead were tasted with good grades:

http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.427353387288790.101209.200056566685141&type=3

We are already invited to our wine festival, of course the only "öur wine" will be my mead, all other wines are from Chile, Argentina, Spain, Italy and France, there are Californian too.

Saludos,
 
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