Is my pricing unreasonable

[businessfromhome]

im going to start selling home made shampoo made from natural ingredients, 120ml for £15 from home. My reasoning is that people will pay that much for a gift for a friend. It costs me £2.50 a bottle to make before I go into any other costs but before you jump on my case Im not a mass producer who can afford to flog a bottle of shampoo for a fiver. Companies sell thousands of those, Ill only get to sell a few because that is what I can afford. I live in a touristy village. i put a fake postcode in to mumsnet as i wasnt comfortable answering, sorry! other people are selling things like vegetables and eggs and jam from honesty boxes. there are a few craft shops but I wouldnt make anything as theyd want to make a big profit and i wouldnt make anything. that being said I know things are only worth what people will pay so just to get opinions, how much would you honestly pay for what I am selling

Did you really do proper market research? Because I don’t recall ever seeing a shampoo for £15 for 120ml.

We have a local business that sells lovely handmade skin and body care. She has built up a strong local following over the years. Her shampoo is £12.75 for 200ml. Her skin creams and soaps are amazing so I would pay that for her shampoo but not for someone I didn’t know. She gives away a lot of free samples and those help win her business. (Oleo Bodycare if anyone wants a look.)

I think this is a good idea- they can add their own choice of essential oils for custom fragrance. Tea, coffee and a slice of cake and make your own shampoo could probably charge £20

More than that round here, minimum £25 and £30 with glass of prosecco. Market it for hen nights/ girls nights out/ mother's day.

Why don't you actually give it a go before writing it off on the say so of some strangers in the internet? Do you always give in so quickly?

Yes you may have to tweak various things but you've come this far, paid money etc - why would you just stop now because Sue in Glasgow says she wouldn't buy it?

Unfortunately yes. Even my kerastase shampoo not as expensive as yours.

@businessfromhome

What does the CPSR for you product say about it's safe use?

The testing for a shampoo would generally be different from something used on bare skin multiple times per day.

Nope. How many times have you bought shampoo and it was bad for your hair and you didn't like it? Happens to me fairly regularly. There is no way I'd spend £15 for a bottle just on spec. Maybe do small tester bottles initially and sell cheap - some people, if they really love it, might pay £15 after trying it.

This!

I buy relatively expensive shampoo (Kerastase and Phytology - c£18 each). But there is no way I'd pay £15 for home-made shampoo, sorry.

Why would you invest so much money in something without doing the research to see if it’s actually a viable business?

Op what is the ph of your product?

Where have you purchased ingredients as in are they raw state materials?
And are they certified in any way?

What is your point of sale other than you've made it by hand at home?

You are dramatically overpricing this. Not compared to your costs, but compared to what people will pay.

I would give it a go OP. There are a surprising number of people who have money to burn. In general they aren’t on Mumsnet! You only need to look at the Property board to see that people here aren’t big spenders. They think a £15k kitchen is expensive... meanwhile in my job I regularly see people spending between £50k and £200k on kitchens.

It’s probably been mentioned but if you could get the cost down and have it certified could you contact local boutique hotels/bnbs in your area and try and get your shampoo into the samples that they have in the bathrooms? Could be a way to get the brand out there?

with the current market forces and squeeze on consumers, one of the easiest ways to cut back is ‘hand made/artisan’.

environmental scan needed - read the room. Who can afford or justify £12 for shampoo? It could be made of swans tears and pixie dust, but if I don’t have £12, I don’t have it.

This is bizarre it costs under £1 to make my soaps and shampoo bars and the liquid base is even cheaper. If I used plastic packaging it'd be even cheaper. And I have to pay about £12 shipping to NI. What wholesaler are you using?!

*£12 shipping for a big box of wholesale ingredients

I totally agree with this. Instead of focusing on the basic product price, which is far too high, turn it into a marketable tourist experience. People will come for the novelty at first, and then if they have fun will bring friends, or recommend to.other groups e.g. teen birthday parties, hen weekends. If they can personalise their take home product, even better. Charge £30/person for a 3 hour workshop, add in tea/coffee/prosecco and snacks to make it sociable. Post like mad on social media pages and create a recognisable brand focused on the experience. Try to tie it into your local area by incorporating locally sourced ingredients or with strong branding. All these things are way more value adding to your basic product and allow you to compete on a different level.

I’d buy shampoo as a gift. I have done for my sister and some of my close friends whose hair type I have an idea of. 120ml is too small for a gift though. Too small for any kind of regular use. I’d expect 250ml for that price. Are you targeting a specific hair type? Because I think most people I know are happy enough with the cheap supermarket stuff unless they have a specific hair problem they want to address. I have fine hair so I buy expensive shampoos to try and boost volume. One of my friends buys expensive shampoo for curly hair to accentuate her curls and reduce frizz. DS buys expensive shampoo to treat dry scalp. Does yours have a specific target market? What kind of results have people who tested it had? Can you get reviews from them? If you market it the right way and to the right people of course you could sell it. I don’t think you should give up, but you should definitely have a good marketing plan.

I wouldn't pay that. If I was going to spend that much on shampoo I would go for a known brand., And i would be worried it wasn't properly tested for allergies and so on.

I love buying shampoo and would happily receive it as a gift, so I’m probably your target market. Your bottles are far too small for even your target market. That’s really a travel sized shampoo, and very few people will pay £15 for that. I’d increase your bottle size to 240ml minimum. Then you would probably have more luck selling them.

I happily spend a lot of money on hair products, but they have to be branded. I wouldn't buy a bottle of shampoo from an unknown brand.

It’s not just the price, no one buys shampoo in that tiny quantity. You would need to make them in 250 ml size.

And you can’t possibly think people would spend 15 quid on what is effectively a travel sized bottle of shampoo from some randoms gate? You’d not gift it either, because the recipient would think you are tight as fuck and a bit odd buying them a tiny bottle of shampoo. “Here mate, happy birthday, have a tiny bottle of shampoo that I found at someone’s gate that is likely untested, good luck with that”

if you’d made a normal sized bottle you could likely have managed your costs better and you could have set up a face book page and flogged em on line, but you need to follow all the appropriate regulations

sounds to me like you didn’t research at all? Even common sense says that’s never going to work.?

I mean would you buy tiny bottles of shampoo from someone’s gate for 15 quid?