Looking to setup an online business

Yurt

I'm looking to setup a small online business but have no idea where to start.I'm looking to export an Irish product that is only available here and i would be looking to sell it to Irish based people abroad,people of slight Irish decent,and people who have traveled abroad and used this product (sorry for being vague but it would be very easy to copy and there is no one currently doing this)

What i want to know is how much would i need to spend and on what ? The product itself would cost me nothing and i would be looking to export for 30$ per unit.

What are the steps i would have to take e.g purchasing a domain name,Website design,shipping,marketing,registering a company etc.

Would i be eligible for any grants,how hard would it be to obtain a loan (I'm currently in my final year of college on course for a marketing degree,i am working 3 days a week part-time and have never needed a loan before.

After initially starting up i would look to diversify into other "Irish" based products.

Any help would be much appreciated.

riveratom

Yurt wrote: »

I'm looking to setup a small online business but have no idea where to start.I'm looking to export an Irish product that is only available here and i would be looking to sell it to Irish based people abroad,people of slight Irish decent,and people who have traveled abroad and used this product (sorry for being vague but it would be very easy to copy and there is no one currently doing this)

What i want to know is how much would i need to spend and on what ? The product itself would cost me nothing and i would be looking to export for 30$ per unit.

What are the steps i would have to take e.g purchasing a domain name,Website design,shipping,marketing,registering a company etc.

Would i be eligible for any grants,how hard would it be to obtain a loan (I'm currently in my final year of college on course for a marketing degree,i am working 3 days a week part-time and have never needed a loan before.

After initially starting up i would look to diversify into other "Irish" based products.

Any help would be much appreciated.

If it isn't already being sold to Irish people abroad, are you sure there's a market for it?

TheWaterboy

I think it might be a good idea to test the market first as investing quite a bit of time and money into setting up an online store to sell something for 30 cent per unit will mean you have to sell very high volumes to make any profit.

How about trying to sell it on Ebay first. It can be setup very quick and simple and you are coming near Christmas so have a perfect opportunity to hit a big market.

If you are happy with your sales then you can look at developing your own online store.

oo7

Developing an online store is not expensive these days... pm me if you need further help / advice, but like the others said, do some market research before you invest your time pursuing your venture

TsuDhoNimh

Yurt wrote: »

The product itself would cost me nothing and i would be looking to export for 30$ per unit.

Perhaps this is simply a case of simplification to the point of falsification and not wanting to go into too much detail, but thought I'd flag it just in case.

This doesn't seem right. Either you've found a genuine million dollar idea or else you're missing some of the fundamentals there. Even something that is 'technically' free, so wild heather or shamrock for example, has significant costs associated with trying to turn them into a product for export.

Even before testing the market (which is an obvious requirement) or looking into marketing or monetising it, I'd suggest taking a much closer look at what your base costs will be to see if a proposed cost of $30 per unit will actually provide a return.

daigo75

TsuDhoNimh wrote: »

Perhaps this is simply a case of simplification to the point of falsification and not wanting to go into too much detail, but thought I'd flag it just in case.

This doesn't seem right. Either you've found a genuine million dollar idea or else you're missing some of the fundamentals there. Even something that is 'technically' free, so wild heather or shamrock for example, has significant costs associated with trying to turn them into a product for export.

I agree. On top of that, I would double check if the product is really available only in Ireland (nowadays, everything can be found everywhere). If it is available only in Ireland, and it really costs nothing, I would make sure that it's not a protected natural resource.

Peterdalkey

We had a customer in the UK called Moon Estates and they were selling plots on the moon! We did special custom packaging for them for the title deeds etc. they did some volume I can tell you! Google them?

Mad things are not always totally MAD! As long as they work.

Good on you, if you can pull it off!

Cheers

Peter

The Apprentice

Hey pete, off topic i know but i think personally that you should be hitting up LinkedIn and start Making social waves with some contacts.. In your industry i think its way better than the social mediums your currently using, ive found in similar industrys its where the decision makers hang out !

Cheers