Mastering Wholesale: Insights from Delaney Peters on Building Successful Partnerships

welcome to this session of the summit this one is really really interesting we're going to talk about wholesale and

we're going to talk with Delaney Peters who is someone that I see doing wholesale really really well in her

community and just furthering the locally produced food movement delaney I'm so excited to learn from you now

this conversation is not going to be applicable to everyone unfortunately some people in states like Texas where I

am we can't do wholesale yet but for those of us who can or even those of us who are hopeful for change in the future

we're going to learn so much from you so Delaneie thanks for being here will you just real quick let us know a little bit

about who you are and where you're based and kind of how you got started for sure thanks Caroline for having me

again it's super fun to talk to you and thanks for asking me to be a part but I'm Delaney i am from Palmer Alaska i

have been running my micro bakery this is going to be my third year and I've been doing wholesale since last summer

here in Alaska our cottage food laws have recently changed and opened up so right when those opened up right when I

learned the cottage food the new cottage food laws I was able to reach out and collaborate with some businesses that

were near and dear to my heart and yeah so it's all still new for my state but I'm super grateful things opened up for

us that is so amazing i know a lot of us are hoping for that there's some

proposed change right now on the table for Texas and so we are really optimistic and hopeful good when I first

started baking Alaska's cottage food laws were actually super restrictive they had a very low income cap and yeah

obviously no wholesale it almost seemed like you couldn't even make it a full-time uh job so I do think there is

hope for Texas because uh I think the cottage food movement is growing and your customers might even just demand it

so that's really cool i hope so very much hope so so when you first got started and you set up that

first wholesale relationship how did that begin so it's kind of funny uh when I thought

about maybe doing wholesale I reached out to this coffee shop that I love they prioritize

um local milk local ingredients local honey they really care about like healthminded things so they they already

were very much aligned with the products that I was producing and I reached out to them and they were like "Oh we're

actually gonna try and do our own thing." And they rejected me at first and I had to wait several months to hear

back from them and then I thought "Okay I'll just move on." But they asked me a couple months later "Oh can we do a

little giveaway with you instead?" And I said "Oh sure." So we did a little I think it was a year anniversary of their

coffee shop we gave away like mini scones so I wasn't selling i wasn't uh like basically hired on as a vendor

but the turnout from people coming to grab the scones was so good and they basically were able to see with their

eyes oh this product might actually do really well here so they ended up following up with me and saying hey

let's actually make this happen so I initially was rejected by them and probably three to four other coffee

shops before I landed my first one so that's kind of my story it's not always immediate success

that is interesting to hear and you stuck with it you kept trying yeah i I wasn't pushy with them but yeah I was

still hopeful yes we're going to get just kind of like

really I would love for people to come away from with this from this conversation feeling like they know how

to approach a partner maybe even equipped on how to handle those rejections let's talk about finding the

right partners you mentioned that the first one you approached was already aligned with kind of what you believed

in what kind of businesses make great wholesale clients yeah I think for me personally I think I

am probably more picky than maybe some but I do look at um uh ingredients for one but I do think

maybe um having a relationship with the owners is really useful are you even on the same page with communication i

recently did try and work with a coffee shop but I actually just they were super interested they wanted to sell some

things but they were taking like five six days in between texts and I was like "Okay that doesn't really work in the

sourdough world it's not a last minute order." So I think communication business value is super

important for me location do I have to commute a long way to go and do my uh deliveries because that's one thing to

keep in mind with sourdough and baking like your profit margins are pretty small so uh it does really need to be

worth it for you the other thing are they ordering do they want to order regularly or is it super sporadic and um

yeah those are some of the like main things I look for i think that's really helpful because

even that like the communication time may not have occurred to people until they kind of experience it and realize

oh work through this and this the ordering so do you I'm getting ahead of myself but do you have your vend your

your partners on a regular schedule yes so for my coffee shops I have two right now one is just on a set every

week they want this amount that's great and and I only have to email them when um flavors change which is probably

every 3 months so that's kind of set in um really low maintenance then the other side is a little bit of a busier like

drive-thru so their numbers fluctuate and it's a good range of fluctuation so I feel like I can keep up with that so

for them they have to get their orders in by Tuesday for a Thursday delivery and then I just started selling

to a local like farm stand with like breads and other artisan pastries and such and they have to get for a

Wednesday delivery they need to let me know by Sunday night and for a Saturday delivery I need to know by Wednesday

night so I really try and make sure that those who want to partner with me know how my like ordering system works so

then they're not disappointed if they miss their window because they already know and I don't have to like go out of

my way to like do you want anything this week if you know what I mean right absolutely so do you mostly

communicate via email or do you have an ordering platform how do they submit their orders to you so I generally just

email or text or phone call i know that maybe I could do an ordering form but right now that's just what's working for

me and honestly it's the fastest way to get a hold of like small business owners and then I I obviously do like

pre-ordering and things with individual customers so that I use hot plate but this is just kind of the easiest way for

me right now that makes sense cuz you're you said you have four clients right

mhm that makes sense that email would be a great way to manage them because you're not working with the same volume

that you are your forge pickups yeah yeah and it's it's like a big bulk order and I'll invoice them i use uh

QuickBooks so that's really handy maybe there's a way for them to order through that i'm not sure but everything is like

organized but I guess my communications with the owners one-on-one is pretty casual but it's been working

i love that i love that that maybe gives people freedom to say like it doesn't have to be super plan you're organized

you have a system but you also don't have to build a full website for it you can work with what you have what about

the pitch itself i think that's probably something that people get fearful around nervous about actually starting the

conversation and you've gone through rejection you said three or four times what advice do you have for people to

approach without feeling salesy yeah that is a good question i would say I think for a lot of people think about

how you want to be approached by someone i think I would be I'd be turned off if someone's like "Hey I want you to sell

my stuff." So I with my the first couple coffee shops that clicked and wanted to work with me I took note of the fact

that um they were aligned with my business so that's how what I went in with was like

"Hey I really love what you do in the community i think that you're surveying really quality items." Um I think that

uh yeah you're like acknowledging how they're special and like their place in the community and their value and then

saying "I would really love to partner with you." what look at it as a collaboration not a hey I want you to

sell my stuff or you know what I mean so I kind of approach it as like hey I see what you're doing i love it and I think

that we could be aligned in that so I think always leading in with like complimenting

them maybe like parallel showing the parallel in your business with them and yeah and then just have it with open

hands because honestly I really believe that if you do have a rejection like there's probably a good reason for that

and you want to click with the business that you're going to work with that's such good

advice i It seems like that would be the most pivotal part is just really making sure that you have trust have rapport

have that relationship and you're not just approaching to sell but really to build a partnership that benefits the

community yes exactly and I think it's also important to um freely offer samples be willing to deliver those

samples ask to maybe even deliver the samples to the owner uh one mistake I made uh when I first started pitching to

people is I was talking to the owner on the phone on the phone but I went to the drive-thru I handed these scones to the

barista said "Oh this person asked for these." And then you know got my drink drove away and then we never had that

face to face connection so definitely I would definitely make sure there's a face to your product and a personal

connection with the owner so that they so that door is open even more cuz I could see

um some maybe a baker this is just the coffee shop world i'm sorry that's specific but I could see you dropping

off a sample a bara thinks "Oh this is a gift." You know what I'm saying and then it's out of sight out of mind so yeah

right you just got to be really clear that makes so much sense that is so solid and really really good advice what

about the pricing side of things i know there's lower margin in wholesale yes and that can make or break it it can

either be a really great relationship or you can not price enough what is your pricing strategy

yeah so kind of funny with price changes it's sort of shifted for me but when I was selling or when I started selling

scones specifically I was actually selling them for the same price that I sold them to my one-on-one customers

since then I haven't changed my prices for my wholesale but I have marked my scones up from then about 30%

and then I suggest I suggested my wholesale clients to mark up 30% so that's one thing that I learned early

on is to suggest their sale price because you could sell your scone let's say $3 a scone to the coffee shop and

then let's say they want to do like $6 which is like kind of crazy depending on where you live but you think "Oh my

customers would be totally willing to spend $450 to $5 or something like that." I think that it's okay to suggest

to your wholesale clients your pricing if that makes sense i kind of went on a I didn't answer your question exactly

but that was something that came to mind recently that's really helpful so you said you

started out by selling them at your at that time retail price if you didn't have that set how would

you go about pricing would you mark down a little bit or would you just again sell it at at your current retail so

since expanding from wholesale with like just scones I'm I'm now doing like a across the board 30% markdown and then

suggesting the real retail price to the owners so that they can make some profit off of it as well

and I assume you probably have had to understand your own profit margins and make sure that you that that 30%

markdown is still leaving enough for you to to profit healthfully have a healthy

profit too yeah yeah i think it's a fine balance one thing that helps is you know um making sure you're selling items that

are like worth your time so there's some things where I'm like "Yeah this doesn't work for me to sell

uh in such large quantities as it would be if I was just selling one-on-one." Um so yeah I think there is like a

little bit of learning curve but generally 20 to 30% markdown is my aim okay have you made any mistakes in this

that you've learned from or do you feel like you kind of started out well and were able to just roll with that no I

think I have made some mistakes uh I mentioned that I was selling at a farm stand and there was one item that I

communicated the same price that I sell um yeah my regular market price i was selling it to them and then I went into

the store and then I saw how much they were selling and I was like whoa that's outrageous it it alerted me that I made

a mistake in communication so I just reached out to the owner i was like "Hey these should actually be this

price." Uh and then they were obviously grateful that I adjusted the price you know that's one example and then yeah

I'm trying to think i think that it also yeah very much depends on the thing that you're

selling loaves are gonna probably not be the most profitable item just because of like the time but uh if you're able to

do loaves this is what I've been doing do loaves and like cookies and some other things i've noticed that sweets

kind of help with the profit margin for me okay that's so helpful that leads me

into what I'm curious about next and that is just kind of first identifying the pro the

products that work really well but then moving into kind of your fulfillment routine you said you have a couple of

bake days what does that look like without letting it take over your life yeah now I'm still in the like I've just

recently changed my schedule so I'm still kind of working out the kinks but right now I do I have a bake day on

Wednesday bake day and delivery day and then I also have a bake and delivery day on Saturdays so the dough days are

preceding the bake days so I'm really working like two full days and like two half days if that makes sense right now

and one thing that I did it does I think that we'll see how it this all shakes out as the summer season

comes i still plan on doing a farmers market so right now it's really great but I always communicate with like my

vendors that like they're the priority and like I will fulfill as best as I can but right now I am capping certain items

and they all seem like totally okay with that and it's kind of protecting my time too i love that do you feel like there's

anything that you have identified or kind of worked out in your own routine that you're like this is genius or this

works really really well that maybe people listening can learn from yeah so over the winter I switched my

dough days from starting in the morning to night um and I'm lucky to live in Alaska where it's just generally cooler

so I'm able to do this pretty easily i don't know about in Texas you'd probably have to use a very

very small amount of starter but uh I just recently switched my doe's to prove overnight and that has really helped me

a lot so that I'm not watching dough all day and I'm able to spend like the middle of the day with my kid more

focused on him than like being more spread out so that's been a really good flow and

then I'm trying to think I think the refrigerator is your friend so I try and elongate the fermentations as long as I

can in the fridge so that like I was saying you're not working with a bunch of warm dough that

uh you stress over I guess yeah i love that so this week it's we're recording on a Wednesday you said it's

bake day so did you mix your dough Monday night shape it Tuesday bake it this morning yep yeah so Monday night we

mix all of our artisan um dough we mix our English muffin dough and then we'll shape we'll shape the loaves uh my dad

has started working for me so he comes over around then he mixes all the cookie dough Tuesday morning uh I put the

English muffin dough that we mixed Monday night into the fridge and then let's see i then I mix the scones during

the day and then Tuesday night my husband makes the English muffins i work on

packaging or mixing more scones if I need to and then Wednesday morning I'm baking packaging delivering so yeah

that's the like first half of the week and then Thursday night I will mix bagel dough and then um Friday morning

afternoon I'm shaping them putting them in the fridge and then Saturday morning we're baking and then all Saturday I

also bake more scones or sorry sorry not more scones i bake more cookies and that's the same dough that my dad makes

Tuesday morning so it's not adding another thing for me to mix m sounds like a really good rhythm

it brings up two thoughts the first is that you are not doing it all alone which is probably especially when you

have multiple clients something that people can consider number one don't compare themselves to you

and then we talked more about working with an assistant when you were a guest on

the podcast so we're not going to dive into that right now but the other thing is you do a lot of scones and they must

be a fairly high margin item but for you how have you simplified that to be able to do so many at once

yes so scone process is like over a few days so generally Monday I'm pre-measuring all

the dry ingredients over everything and then the next step probably in the evening I'm blitzing all the butter and

those are all in bins in a cool environment and then the next day I'm actually mixing and shaping so if I were

to do the scones start to finish in one day I'd be very burnt out but spreading it out has helped and scones right now

are the only thing I'm hand mixing i recently started using my 30 C Estella to mix cookie dough and everything so

that's helped me save some time but scones are the more labor intensive item but it's also the item that I don't I

make sure I keep my price where it needs to be just because they are more hands-on if that makes sense so cookies

are going to be cheaper just overall they're easier to make yeah generally more cost-effective ingredients and

uh yeah I'm not glazing cookies and cutting them up and you know you know how it works

but yeah that's how that's what's worked for me yeah I love that that's so helpful

have you ever had a whole sale relationship that didn't feel like a good alignment or did you kind of vet

them ahead of time yes I had someone that I reached out to when the cottage laws opened and they

seemed interested but then the communication never really uh followed and so I thought okay like this is not

something to invest in that's fine i have other businesses to invest in etc then recently they reached out this is

who I was mentioning before like the communication was like very spacey they were like "Oh we want to sell your stuff

we have customers coming in asking for your scones." I was like "Oh that's great this seems like this could work

then." Yeah they didn't answer back but it worked out for me to bring some samples and some other things and then

when I did drop off I um kind of saw the environment and I was like "H I don't know if this is going to work." And then

I also just didn't have good communications with them so sometimes you do have to like be pretty picky

because it is your time and your energy spent on these people if that makes sense so

yeah I think it's better to end it before it really starts if you can but sometimes you don't know until you

really get into working with someone that's so helpful so it sounds like the top keys to success are excellent

communication really clear expectations a consistent schedule having your system in place

even if it's a simple system something that you can rinse and repeat and then setting your pricing high enough to give

you a margin is there anything else that you would add to that yeah I think one thing that'll save you

a headache is letting the businesses know your capacity um cuz I have had people asking for like very insane

numbers of things and you're like "Oh man I actually can only do this." And then that may kind of you know make them

question whether it's a good fit because they you are not meeting the demand if that makes sense so definitely be open

and honest about realistic numbers of what you could produce for each individual business every week or every

month whatever it works out to be but that'll save you and it'll help your family have really good boundaries as

far as saying yes and no to things i love that boundaries is a whole another rabbit hole that we could go

down i I think we don't have time to dive into it but that is really really important to consider and it's something

that we talked about it a little bit in our previous episode in our episode on the podcast too is there any like one

key that you feel really helps protect family boundaries yeah make sure you actually plan out in

your schedule days for rest i guess I kind of at first thought it was silly like "Oh we're going to rest when I'm

not doing things." But I have the personality that I will do as much as I can if I see time so I am someone that

has to actually like reel it in i'm kind of highly motivated so I have to reel it in and actually take days of rest take

days take days off just to be with my family um even though everything in my business is kind of intertwined I am

with my kid a lot doing this stuff i am with my husband we are working together but if we can have like set days and

don't let anything slip into that um we're doing good yeah that is so practical just to

schedule it in and make it a non-negotiable I love how strategic how thoughtful and

intentional you are with wholesale and just your bakery in general it just feels like you're really wellought out

and you have a system that supports you so people can keep learning from you your links are going to be over in your

speaker profile so they can find you there do you have any final encouragements for someone who's kind of

thinking about getting into wholesale yeah I would say don't be discouraged by the first no

keep searching out for places that you feel um you could collaborate with and let that be the thought is a

collaboration not a way to sell because ultimately it has to be something you're passionate about otherwise you will burn

out quickly so don't give up but be picky because it is your time too that is such good advice Delaney thank

you like I said your links are in your speaker profile for everyone who is not yet following you and we're going to

jump on over to the next session but thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom with us this has been so great

thank you Caroline it's super fun to chat again