Starting Up a Pik'n'Mix At a Car Boot Sale ... Thoughts, Suggestions ?

Money_maker

Reminds me of when I used to sell tomatoes at boot sales. I would put some in a bag with a peg on it. Sales would be based on **p per peg with free tomatoes.

How about **p per cup and fill it with sweets of your choice for free?

Tescos pick and mix is around 79p per 100g.

LittleVoice

mervyn11 wrote: »

You will NOT be able to sell the sweets in cups without weighing them out and declaring the weight.
You cannot sell things like that on a 'cupfull' basis...its against the law.

If you are selling loose, is this the case?

If it is, what legislation is this?

Gti_Sikh

@mervyn - could i just state, 'anything over 50g that fits in the cup will be 1GBP' ?

@Paulwf - thats a good idea, ill get about 4 kg to start, if they sell well, ill buy wholesale after

@Bluemonkey - ill still have to think of a pricing list, ill consider keeping one unit at 1GBP

@no.1swimmum - Nice idea, ill make some premade ones for people in a rush ... Thanks for that

@badmumof1 - Thanks for that ! How may Kgs do you buy at what cost ? How many Kgs do you sell ? How much Profit in a month ? Drop me a pm ... cheers

@chalkie99 + Money Maker - Hmm, ill have to revise my costs ! ... I could stick an offer in, e.g. small pack of haribo with every purchase.

Drawing up a spreadsheet with figures now.
This has been a great help, better than anything id get in any other forum ... gotta great community going on here

greyteam1959

badmumof1 wrote: »

we have been doing this every weekend ( apart from the rain) for 7 years and love every minute of it.
We sell roughly 100g for 50p or sell on RRP but have noticed alot of the famous sweets like black jacks, fruit salads, milk teeth made by Barrett are slowly disapearing due to Barrett wanting more money wholesale.
If you state you are selling by weight you must label this and it has to be true.
We have never been pulled by weights and measures because we dont state this on our boards.
People buy from us because they want to and they continue to do so week in week out.
We do get the odd person that says you dont get much for 50p but then i think what can you get for 50p these days.
We have a range of 80 different varieties of sweet and also make up kids mix up bags.
All our sweets are the best quality brands such as haribo, swizzles matlow, Chewits ( malaco), Vidal, Tilleys to name but a few.

Good luck on your adventure. If i can be of any help just message me.

Yes I am sure you can sell your sweets at 50p per 100g.........
No Wages
No VAT
No PAYE
No National Insurance
No Public Liability Insurance
No Premises Insurance
No vehicle Running Costs
No Rent
No Wages
No Rates
No Electric Bill
No Gas Bill
Etc Etc

Thats why evrybody else has to charge more to make a living selling sweets......50p per 100g is ludicrous if ou factor in all the above costs which you would have to do if you were going to make a full time business out of it.
Part time at a car boot sale is not realistic.

greyteam1959

@mervyn - could i just state, 'anything over 50g that fits in the cup will be 1GBP' ?
I suppose you could but the cost of the cups is far too much over the cost of a paper bag.
I think I would give your local Trading Standards a ring ( if you can find a pnone number for them NOT Consumer Direct ) because the last thing you need is a problem at the outset of your venture however small.

rosalie-lavender

One thing you need to keep an eye on sadly is theft. My husband had a business selling at craft markets and theft was an issue that the traders had to watch out for. Get yourself some kind of money belt that goes round your waist. Keep your takings on your person not loose on the stall or if a large amount lock some of it up in your car.

Your excess stock that is not on the stall also needs to be kept out of sight or locked in your car.

Good luck.

badmumof1

mervyn11 wrote: »

Yes I am sure you can sell your sweets at 50p per 100g.........
No Wages
No VAT Yes
No PAYE Yes
No National Insurance Yes
No Public Liability Insurance Yes
No Premises Insurance
No vehicle Running Costs Yes
No Rent Yes
No Wages
No Rates
No Electric Bill
No Gas Bill
Etc Etc

Thats why evrybody else has to charge more to make a living selling sweets......50p per 100g is ludicrous if ou factor in all the above costs which you would have to do if you were going to make a full time business out of it.
Part time at a car boot sale is not realistic.

Gosh your a happy bunny.
Dont like anyone making a decent living??
we work damm hard every weekend. its not a case of putting them out on a table you know.
We have to purchase from wholesalers then bag them up which can take quite a bit of time. They then have to be stored in airtight stackable containers if they dont fit into our display boxes
We havent got a tin pot set up we have spent out alot of money on proper display boxes with sealed lids, a decent 10ft table that cost us 50 plus ply boards, and then a decent canopy to go over them set us back 150 as i will not sell unless we are undercover.
We have Public libility as this comes with our NMTF membership that is 100 per year. we have to have this if we do trade fairs during the week.

50p per 100g is not really ludicrous when you consider that my morrisons can sell candyKing Sweets at 59p per 100 grams and my local corner shop can sell the same for 65p per 100grams.
Also i did say that not all are sold by weight. Some are sold RRP.
if you went into a penny sweets shop and purchased 50p of penny cherries that would weight more than 100 grams.
the answer is this we are not greedy with profit.
We buy from reputable wholesalers at reasonable prices with discounts on amounts we purchase.

chalkie99

Gti_Sikh - you are really missing the point.

Look at the posts by badmumof1 - she is succeeding by undercutting supermarket prices by 15% but your prices mean charging much, much more than the supermarkets - perhaps 350% more. That cannot be how car boot type sales work - customers want cheap, cheap, cheap.

You need a complete re-think.

badmumof1

Gti-Sikh i am going to message you

Evie82

We have a local car boot sale and there is a stall which sells sweets. Instead of pic and mix, they have pre bagged up sweets into sealable sandwhich bags, from an assortment of different sweets to a bag full of one type.
Each bag sells for 50p and the contents are pretty good, they seem happy and make a profit i assume as they come weekly. I wouldnt want to do a "pic and mix" as such for my kids, i would rather grab a bag and go, but thats my preference.
Best of luck, as others have said, have a trial run with some stock and see how popular it is.