Rich...
Are you having an "out of the egg" sale this year?
Sorry, but no, I am not.
For a couple of reasons.
(1) This was always a "pre-hatching" sale to get some cash flowing during the slow season when I was mostly out of the prior year's babies. Hatching began around the first part of June, so the "pre-hatching" part is over with.
(2) That sale was always VERY stressful to do. It would take me HOURS trying to find the animals for the orders scheduled to go out only to find out that I was missing that one last female (after sexing a dozen males) in order to complete an order. So during the busiest time of the year when I have babies hatching out that I need to set up, sex, label, and get feeding, like a dummy, I put a bunch of sales right in the middle of it. I tried one year to run the sale based on unsexed babies, to save me a lot of headaches, but that just was not well received.
(3) I've reduced the numbers I work with, so the workload won't be as punishing as in years past.
(4) Running sales is just a bad idea. I know how I change my buying habits with companies that run periodic sales. I don't buy from them UNTIL they run a sale, because I know sure as hell, right after I buy something, they will put it on sale. Happens every time. So I really don't want to get caught up in that where everyone just doesn't buy UNTIL I run a sale. Which puts me in a pickle, because I have people who did happen to buy something a week ago pissed at me. If I have to make price adjustments retroactively, that would be an enormous headache to have to deal with. So my policy is to just cease with the sales like I have been doing.
(5) And finally, I am leaning more and more towards wholesale rather than retail anyways. Most of my sales lately have been that way, so perhaps it is best if I just save the lower prices to entice the wholesale business anyway.
Hope that explains my reasoning. Been thinking a LOT lately about where I want to go with my SerpenCo business in the future. I'll be 58 years old in July, and quite honestly, my body tells me each and every day that I am not as young and chipper as I used to be. I just have to admit to myself that I just cannot do everything I used to be able to do.....
