Radio 702 MoneyShow Challenge Update: Week 6

A very exciting day: The Grande Finale!

Whether I win or lose, this has been a wonderful experience. The most rewarding part of it has been in bringing joy to others: Those who have helped me, those whom I have helped (by creating employment), and those who became clients or customers by purchasing Beautiful Bracelets!

Achievements:

Beautiful Bracelets have sold to people from different towns and cities in South Africa, and have traveled to India, Sweden, England and America! So Beautiful Bracelets has in the short space of 6 weeks become a truly international company, by virtue of being found on the wrists of ladies living overseas..

We found 2 retailers in Johannesburg willing to stock the Bracelets, and this past week, The Ballet Box in Cape Town paid for stock which should be delivered shortly.

Production of Beautiful Bracelets was better than all previous weeks in anticipation of a Weekend Market where 600 women were attending a Conference. Sales were good, although I had hoped to sell more!

I think one of the things I can rejoice over is that "Beautiful Bracelets" has been extremely well branded over this period directly as a result of being a part of this Radio 702 / Cape Talk MoneyShow Challenge, although I was thrilled to have been inspired in the middle of the first night of the Challenge 6 weeks ago with such a catchy name.. And what a win to find the domain name available, as if it had been a "hidden treasure" for years, waiting for this moment! Having mentioned the great publicity, I should point out that although the Branding of the Name has been excellent, so far it seems only 25% of sales have come as a direct result of this competition and its branding (which is quite a lot), most of the sales have been as a result of my existing networks with family, friends and colleagues, as well as my energetic sales initiatives.

Something I am really thrilled about is the Book: "1000 Beautiful Bracelets" (How I made a profit on R1000 in just 6 weeks and how you can too). A real winner! The book will be published by Modjaji Books and should be on the shelves by April 2013, pre-order on the Beautiful Bracelets website here. People are already putting their names down on the list..

Disappointments:

I would have liked to have sold more Beautiful Bracelets. I had a personal goal to sell 1000 Beautiful Bracelets, probably ambitious... but the year isn't over yet: we will certainly celebrate once this target is reached.

A Good Result:

The most important part for me in this Radio 702 MoneyShow Challenge is that I have not just created this business as a 6 Week Wonder: Beautiful Bracelets is on a good path towards ever-increasing successes, a business that will continue to help people by continuing  to create employment and bring hope to people or are unemployed and perhaps even hurting and broken people, especially women. We already have Christmas Markets lined up from now until the end of the year, and look forward to excellent sales in the remainder of 2012.

Radio 702 MoneyShow Challenge Update: Week 5

Although I try to get this Weekly Update on Beautiful Bracelets done first thing each Monday, this one is a bit late on purpose, I didn't want to pre-empt the In-studio Radio 702/Cape Talk interview with Bruce Whitfield on the Money Show. If you missed this, you can listen/download the Podcast here: http://bit.ly/WrdS7z 

With Bruce Witfield in the Radio 702 Studios

There were a few landmark things that happened in Week 5:

1. First international order confirmed via the Beautiful Bracelets website (for 14 Beautiful Bracelets, from London!).
2. Firehouse Gifts, Dunkeld West Shopping Centre, Jan Smuts Ave, Johannesburg requested and took delivery of Beautiful Bracelets and 2 of these bracelets sold to a customer who walked in whilst I was standing there!
3. A Cape Town Publisher, Modjaji Books, agreed to publish the book in April 2013, which will probably be titled "1000 Beautiful Bracelets" (subtitle: "How I made a profit from R1000 in just 6 weeks and how you can too")
4. Employees: Beautiful Bracelets is now the proud employer of  TWO people, creating employment being one of the major aims of this new business. But of course, one has to watch the profits carefully and ensure that expansion of the staff is in line with growth in the business. This is something we will continue to monitor carefully.

Like many people reading this Blog, we are sitting on the edge of our seats and working very hard until the last second, doing our best to beat the other 4 Contestants in the Radio 702/Cape Talk Money Show R1000 Business Challenge.. Since Beautiful Bracelets is a retail item, it all comes down to sales at the end of the day, and we are not sure how all the contestants are doing, so from our side we are doing our best and working as hard as is humanly possible to ensure success. We can do our best. The final decision rests in the hands of the Judge.