AboutEric Hofer Expertise Over 27 years experience, with 17 in international FMCG in back office operations and in field sales and data collection, including design, development and deployment of Handhelds, Marketing Equipment (Service, Tracking and Return on Investment), reporting and Vending management. Have participated on the launch of operations in new markets, and re-engineered the back office in several countries.
Experience Designed and led the development and deployment internal ERP system for Pepsi used in On-Premise/Vending in 13 markets.
Designed 2 handheld systems, the latest is now deployed in 4 markets internationally.
Re-engineered the back office functions (settlements, despatch, invoicing, credit control, etc) for over 20 snack, confectionary and beverage operators.
Developing software: Progress, VB, Access, C, Sybase, SA
Organizations Innovative-Selling Solutions
Publications BudapestSun
Education/Credentials State University of New York - BA Economics
NYU - Courant - Graduate work - Computing
Past/Present clients PepsiAmericas
PepsiCola International
PepsiCola Company
British Steel
British Telecom
Britvic (Pepsi's bottler in the UK)
AT&T
BellSouth
Mars Overseas Bottling
Pepsi France
Matutano (Frito-Lay Spain)
Frito-Lay
Pepsi Foods International
Chase Manhattan Bank
Kidder Peabody
National Power
SmithKline Beecham
Mars Overseas Bottling (Pepsi Azerbaijan)
A&P Bottling (Pepsi Serbia & Montenegro)
Iberia Bottlers (Pepsi Georgia)
I have a great product, which has amazing health benefits, some even too
good to be true. we came up with a great name and storyline that sells the
beverage. It mixes well with liquor and tastes great and refressing. What do I
do next, after i have secured the supplier and locked in distributorship?
Any help is apprieciated. Thanks.
Answer Asher,
Your question exudes excitement which is great to hear in these times when lots of people are losing their verve!
Launching a product involves a lot of tasks, capital and the ability to reach the market.
You have some choices with trade-offs and risks.
- Go it alone and grow it organically;
- Control it, but job out production, control, etc., retaining sales & logistics
- Outsource logistics and/or sales.
- Put everything you've got into it
- Involve "friends, families and fools" - the 3F approach to funding
- Involve a major or minor player
- Piggyback with others
As you can imagine each carries risks while solving other issues.
Key to all is to prove that what you think is a good idea / product is saleable. That way you'll be better able to secure the talent/skills and capital to take it to the next level.
To do the test, you need to identify your target market; supply product into that market and get repeat custom. NB, you cannot base your test on 1st (trial) custom, but rather on the fact that people return for more.
As the steps afterwards are involved, I'd rather know more about your thinking before diving into details and wasting your time and mine. The elements to discuss are:
- preferences for funding
- willingness to part with equity, etc.
- capability, resources and time available to build up a product
- access to the market
It would be easier and quicker to interactively chat. Do you use Skype (www.skype.com)? It's free and works as both IRC and voice chat... I'm Eric.Hofer on that system.
