Most of you have a much better chance than I have. My home town is Meta, Ky. Population 115. We have one service station which is the local groucery store and used to be the post office till they closed it. The town has two part time employee's and one full time. The Mayor acts as the only police officer we have. For me to ship or mail a package I have to drive to pikeville about a half hour drive. So I do my shipping on one day a week Friday. To ge my raw wood, I have to drive 4 hours one way. I do that on Saturdays I get up early so that I will arrive at the saw mill by 9 am. (they close at noon on saturday) I buy as much as my 1500 chevy truck will haul plus what my small trailer will haul.
To get screws or nails etc I have to drive 30 minutes...
My home town market everyone has bought almost every thing... Several people drop by to see what I have new.. By the end of the week every one knows about the new products, and the ones that want one have come by...
All of my customers except one are at least 2.5 hour drive from my shop, I ship to 15 states, most of the ones out of state I have never been too. Some have seen my products at shows or heard about my product and ordered from me..
Most of my customers I have driven to and showed them my product. Every state has state parks, found out which have gift shops call and set up a appointment with the buyer and go show them your product. While driving to the state park look for other stores get their phone number, call them talk to the person that does the buying offer to ship a sample or set up a time to come by to show them the full line.
I use the calling time as small vactions for my wife and I... We leave on thursday's or friday's and drive to a town that we have never been too. On the way we do a little cold calling and gather phone numbers.
If I can make a good living, those that are in large towns can make a good living alot easier than I have.
You can make all the products in the world, but if you do not show them to the right people or stores they are useless and just sit there on your shelf..
Get out there and find wholesale customers make good money and enjoy
doing so... Take your wife on these trips gives you quality time and browny points..