As a beauty journalist, I am often asked for tips from people who are looking to buy wholesale high end cosmetics, usually with the hope of making some extra cash on ebay.
It may sound obvious, but planning is key. Do your research well and decide what wholesale cosmetics items you are going to buy and sell. Then before you buy any stock, set yourself a budget and stick to it. You should also ask yourself how much time you are prepared to spend working on your business, what sort of profit you are aiming for in return, and how much of any profits you need to reinvest in order to grow your business. Be realistic. All successful enterprises take hard work and do not just happen overnight.
Assuming that you have decided to go ahead and start your own make up business, here is my advice for finding trustworthy wholesale make up suppliers.
Why Are Reputable Wholesale Cosmetics Suppliers So Hard To Find?
Most high end cosmetics brands only sell through appointed distributors. In order to protect the brand’s reputation in the market place, most official distributors are not permitted to sell to small businesses like yours. The way round this is to find honest suppliers of surplus, authentic, high end cosmetics stock. The good suppliers do not usually advertise. They do not need to as there is such a demand for their products and they already have a loyal customer base.
What Are The Warning Signs I Need To Watch Out For?
If a seller is offering large quantities of a very hard to find brand or product, at very cheap prices, then you should be wary and proceed with caution. The goods are likely to be fake, damaged, or out of date etc. Also, you should only ever use secure payment methods, rather than untraceable payment methods such as cash transfers. Try to check out company names and contact details wherever possible. Remember the old cliche, if something seems to good to be true then it probably is. Also, only start out with small orders to minimise non-delivery risk and to give yourself a check the quality of the goods before you place a larger order.
What Are The Signs Of A Good Seller?
Reputable companies should be contactable and happy to provide you with further details and images of the products offered. They should make you aware of all important facts such as whether the items are boxed, be able to confirm whether the packaging is in perfect condition or if it is damaged in any way, or if the products are out of date. It is also more realistic to expect that a genuine seller would only have small quantities of a certain item, instead of unlimited supplies of an entire product range.