How To Find Wholesale Sources

Writen by Paul Taylor

In my last article "How To Open a Business," I wanted you to answer questions that needed to be answered before opening your business. Everyone at one time or another has said to themselves "I want my own business." But is it enough just to want your own business?

Your answers to the questions should give you an idea if you are the type of person that can handle the stress of owning your own business.

Since you have decided to open your own business, "NOW WHAT?"

Let's say that you decide to open a dollar store – where everything is a dollar. You have found what you believe is the perfect location. You have talked with the landlord and are working out a lease. You have gone to your county and bought a business license. And you have applied for a tax id in your state.

Now the next big question is "where do I buy my items wholesale?"

This morning I googled the term "wholesale" and there were 231,000,000 sites listed. Look at that number again - 231 million sites listed for "wholesale." How does one begin to search through that many sites to find what they want to sell? And how do you know that the companies that are listed are reputable.

I have owned several businesses – some successful and some not so successful. And one of the biggest problems that I faced was finding good wholesale sources at a good price. I now sell on ebay and finding wholesale sources that were cheap enough to make a profit and compete with others selling the same things was difficult.

Most business owners know that to make a profit, you have to find items at great wholesale prices. I have always been told "you make your money when you buy the items, not when you sell them."

Some of the so-called "wholesale sources" prices that I have found were more than I could have bought the same item for on ebay - including shipping. If you have ever tried to find wholesale sources, it can be a daunting task. So where to begin is the biggest question.

One of the ways that you can check and see if a company is reputable is by checking a website called alexa.com. This site lets customers review other sites. Some of the sites may not have any reviews about them, but some of them may. And just because someone else didn't like the company does not mean that it is a bad company.

You can also check the page rank at google; however, if a site is relatively new, it will probably have a 0 page rank. This rank is a rating that tells how important google thinks that a website is. However, many of the most visited websites on the web only rank a 0 or 1 or 2.

Finding wholesale sources is easy. Finding "good" wholesale sources takes a lot of work and patience.

Another question to research is the shipping costs. I found one wholesale source that had very good prices, but the shipping costs was too high. I think that this company was trying to make their profit on the shipping. Most of the reputable companies will cap the shipping costs with a minimum purchase. Many of the ones I have dealt with cap the shipping costs at 10% with a $1000 minimum order. However, with gas prices rising and shipping rates rising, companies may have to raise the minimum requirements in order to cap the shipping costs.

Educate yourself about what items are available. Many of the name brand companies will not sell to small business. They already have their distribution channels set up and if you want to sell these brands, you may have to find a middleman that will sell them to you. You may have to pay a little more for the items, but if it is important to you to have name brands, it just might be worth it.

Another way to find good wholesale sources is to go to the merchandise shows. These shows have thousands of wholesalers at one place and you can browse all the booths until you find what you are interested in. Some of the biggest wholesale merchandise shows are located in the larger cities such as: New York, Las Vegas, Chicago, and Atlanta.

Traveling to these wholesale merchandise shows is time consuming and can be expensive. However, usually the wholesale shows have special rates arranged with hotels.

Well, that is all for now. Visit my website: www.wholesalemap.com for more information about finding "good" wholesale sources. It is free. Also, I have just begun a blog and if you have any ideas or wholesale sites that I need to review, let me know.

Paul Taylor is a business owner that helps others to find wholesale sources. To find the best wholesale sources for starting a business, visit http://www.wholesalemap.com.

Paul Taylor is a business owner that helps others to find wholesale sources. To find the best wholesale sources for starting a business, visit http://www.wholesalemap.com.

Think The Unthinkable

Writen by Arvind Kumar

What the people in business think they know about customer and market is more likely to be wrong than right. There is only one person who really knows: the customer. In his book "Managing for results" Peter F Drucker has pinpoint very justifiable who is the king of market. Brand managers and owner think themselves the leader of market. They let them think that they decide the fate of market and they can carry their leadership in one segment to another segment easily with there brand name. Many have jump into this rat race.

When Xerox saw a big opportunity in PC market they planned to jump into this market with the brand name 'Xerox'. They let themselves in thinking that both are of same kind of product. Customer will buy in their thinking and they will buy Xerox name in PC. But to their surprise and million of dollar write off, they realized that customer take PC a very apart product from the photocopier business. To them, Xerox represent photocopier. Xerox means photocopier.

Business people think that they know their customer genes. But customer's genes are not hard and fast stable jeans like human genes. They keep changing. 'Our engineers had to suspend the law of nature to make this or that possible. "But customer has a very unique and different way of mind set. They can , very much possible, think that if it so much difficult, there may be a big chances that it will not work at all. End result would falter of the product. Peter Drucker states, "No one company and brand is important to market". Market defines rules for the game. A lot of play the game and efficient player in all the department become the leader. But she is the leader not the market itself. If an organization goes down it can at most affect it employees, owners, shareholders and the government. But not at all the customer. Customer has a vast option to decide on. He will switch his vendor, Simple and straight as bamboo.

But brand owner has a very unique way of market view. They see themselves not as leader of market but the leader of customers. They themselves decide that customer will buy anything that they produce given the following in one segment of market. While deciding on these strategies, they ignore the huge amount of data and facts available to them and fancy themselves with speculations.

Billions of dollars has gone under drain only due to defocusing and fancy mind of mindless CEOs of big boys of corporate world. And to my best of knowledge, these so called intelligent guys are not learning fast enough.

Arvind Kumar is an internet marketer and consultant for last 3 year. He is founder and CEO of http://www.nuttymarketer.com. You can reach him at arvind@nuttymarketer.com.

Productivity The Greatest Tv Story Ever Told

Writen by Robert Abbott

The gains we get from increased productivity come to us in two main ways: higher wages, or less expensive products. Let's take a look at one product that costs less and delivers more value because of higher productivity:

When I grew up in the 1950s, everyone in the neighborhood took notice when a new television set arrived. The cost of a set represented a big portion of a family's income.

And then there was upkeep. In those days, we could count on our TV sets to make a funny noise and go black just before the car chase came to a climax, just before the big wedding on a soap opera, or just before the championship game. So we called a TV repairman, who came to the house, replaced a tube or two, and gave us a bill for which we hadn't budgeted.

On the other hand, when you go to a discount store and buy a new TV set, the cost likely represents less than a day's pay, and you'll probably never call a repairman (assuming you could even find one). Your set will last for many years, and when it shows its last commercial, you will simply throw it out and buy a new one. In effect, TV sets have become so inexpensive they're a disposable product.

Our television sets are just one of the many products that cost less, at least in real dollars, because of productivity improvements. If we look through our houses we will see many products that effectively cost less and do more than they did a generation ago.

We might even say that the greatest television story ever told is one you won't see on the screen; it's the story of a half century of improvements that pulled the real prices of television sets way down, and pushed product quality way up. And that's true of many household products, especially electronic products.

Robert F. Abbott is the author of the forthcoming book, Ownership Revolution: How Working People are Buying Up Big Business, from which this article is taken. If you contribute to a pension fund, mutual fund, or whole life insurance policy, you're probably one of the new owners of the big corporations. Find out more at http://www.TheNewOwners.com.

Corporate Travel Managementpost 911

Writen by Dan N

When terrorists shook America and the world with the September 11 attacks of 2001, they didn't just hit the travel industry hard but also changed the way corporate travel management functioned. Post 9/11, corporate travel management in the U.S. has become as much about security as it is about booking low-priced tickets and hotel rooms. Though the terrorists could not deter business travelers too long despite using airliners to hit prominent targets in New York City and Washington, they certainly prompted corporate travel management firms to rethink strategy.

As business spreads to new and at times unstable parts of the world, corporate travelers are crisscrossing the globe more frequently and are becoming vulnerable to a greater variety of threats including terrorism, natural disasters, crime and unrest. Post 9-11, American companies are exercising stricter control over executives and employees' business travel plans, discouraging them from making their bookings online individually and urging them to go through the corporate travel managements firms they have hired. That is because when a corporate travel management firm is in charge, the company always knows where its business travelers are in case of an emergency.

In the aftermath of 9/11, most corporate travel management companies have launched round-the-clock emergency services so that a business traveler finding himself/herself in a difficult situation in a foreign land doesn't feel completely stranded. Many have crisis management mechanisms in place for better co-ordination during emergencies. Travel departments within most companies have also begun to link travel policies with security policies. Coupled with stricter security measures put in place by governments across the world - especially in areas receiving a large number of business and leisure travelers – travel has in many ways become safer post 9/11.

The Travel Team, Inc understands the increased security concerns for the business traveler post 9/11, which is why we have included a 24/7 worldwide emergency service among the facilities available to our corporate clients. Our comprehensive corporate travel management service strives to ensure that your executives and employees travel safely and at the lowest possible price, but without any compromise on quality of transport, board and lodge.

Visit http://www.thetravelteam.com for more information and contact us for details.

"Dan is a well know author in the field of finance and investment. He has authored many articles which are very popular in many of the portals over the internet. "

Doing Business Online Does Skin Color Really Matter

Writen by Lance Winslow

Recently I had been conversing with a gentleman online about a business endeavor that he thought was worthy after he read one of my articles on a new personal technology device concept I had dreamed up. As we shot back nearly 50 pages worth of text in emails and forum discussions, it never occurred to me that we might be different races. Not that it makes any difference anyway, however the subject came up and I though I should ask. Turns out he is a Black American and I am white. My question was simply; BTW are you black? In his reply he said, he is a man who happens to be black (smile). And I did, because it doesn't matter.

So I said to him in my email reply; "Well stated Sir." And since he is a Black American Man, well then I thought we ought to use this to his advantage, because god knows there is still a bit of adversity that comes with a different color of skin, even if not all in our country are willing to admit that. He is considering on forming a new business, which will need lots of funding. You see I take an online newsletter, which comes from The Black Chamber of Commerce, which often lists all the programs available from the government to help small business. Some but not all look as if they could be a very good thing. I would not consider it a crutch, but hey if someone is going to help streamline the process of funding a business, any business regardless of who owns, well it is time to say; "Thanks, I can use that!"

In thinking on this gentleman's comments, it was hard to top his answer to my matter of factly asked question, but I gave it a shot and said; "Well I am a teenager at heart who happens to be white. But what the hell?" I decided to let him in on a personal secret of mine and told him;

"I can tell you this from sports, there were certainly times in Track, when I envied some of the other athletes for their agility in sprinting. Because at the end of a mile run, I sure as hell wish and would have given anything to have had some of the faster twitch genes in my body, because getting passed in those last 30-yards is worse than death, it truly sucks."

Indeed in sports the best athlete usually wins; that is to say the best trained, strongest willed, best genes and skill; it is the combination that counts. Luckily in sports I was able to make up for my inferior genes in sports, often enough, thru countless extra hours of beating my body into submission, it was something I overcame and it was not easy. You see while there are some differences in genetics, it is ever so slight and usually not enough to ever be noticeable. In fact in being white, I am not really sure what my genes are good at, but molecular genetic professors tell me that my earwax is greaser? So, What the hell? Not sure that does me any good in any other human endeavor. Its all good! So let's not sweat the small stuff, we are all on the same planet and therefore we are all on the same team. Think on it.

Lance Winslow - Online Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance; www.WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/

Medical Billing Ya0 Record

Writen by Michael Russell

In our previous installment on medical billing and the electronic transmission of claims, we briefly touched on multiple batches and why they're required when billing. In this installment, we're going to cover the batch trailer record and the individual fields it contains.

The batch trailer record is the YA0 record and comes at the very end of the batch for a provider, immediately after the last XA0 record for the last patient in that batch. If this record falls out of sequence, the whole claim file for that batch will be rejected. In some cases, the carrier will reject all batches in the file.

YA0 field 1, positions 1 - 3, is the record type. This needs to be filled in with YA0 otherwise the batch file will be rejected by the carrier.

YA0 field 2, positions 4 - 18, is the provider ID number. This must be the same provider ID number that is transmitted in the BA0 record in field number 2. If these numbers don't match, the whole batch will be rejected by the carrier.

YA0 field 3, positions 19 - 21, is the batch type. This field tells the carrier what type of batch is being sent. There are only two valid values for this field. The number 100 is transmitted for all batch types except dental. For dental claims, the number 200 is sent. This must also be identical to the number in the BA0 record, field number 3.

YA0 field 4, positions 22 - 25, is the batch number. This is the number of the batch being sent to the carrier. Any value between 0001 and 9999 is acceptable. This must match the batch number in BA0 field 4.

YA0 field 5, positions 26 - 31, is the batch identifier. This field is used to communicate information between provider and carrier for problem batches.

YA0 field 6, positions 32 - 40, is the provider tax ID number. This field simply transmits the provider's tax ID number to the carrier. This can either be an EIN number or a SSN.

YA0 field 7, positions 41 - 46, is reserved space. This is unused record space that is being reserved for future use. As of this article, this field is still not in use.

YA0 field 8, positions 47 - 53, is the batch service line count. This field transmits the number of line items to the carrier that are contained in the whole batch.

YA0 field 9, positions 54 - 60, is the batch record count. This field tells the carrier how many records are contained in the batch.

YA0 field 10, positions 61 - 67, is the batch claim count. This field tells the carrier how many claims are contained in the batch.

YA0 field 11, positions 68 - 76, is the batch total charges. This field tells the carrier what the total charges to them are in the whole batch.

YA0 field 12, positions 77 - 32, is filler national and must be filled with spaces.

This concludes our medical billing review of the YA0 batch trailer record.

Michael Russell Your Independent guide to Medical Billing

24 Key Factors To Investigate When Analyzing Any Business

Writen by Jeremy Gossman

It doesn't matter what business or investment you are looking at...it all comes down to analyzing a few key factors.

The higher each of these factors rate with you, plus the combination of them all, the better your potential for return.

Industry - Is the business's industry expanding or contracting?

Trends - Will you be ahead or behind the trends?

Timing - Are you early or late in the product & industry life cycle?

Products - Do they provide value for money to the end user?

Uniqueness - Does the company have any exclusivity, patents, etc?

Demand - How big is the market for the products & services?

Longevity - How long could the products last in the market?

Future - Are there more products "in the pipeline"?

Competition - Who else are you marketing against?

Profitability - Are there good profit margins?

Compensation - How much can you earn?

ROI - How soon can you return your initial investment?

Leverage - Do YOU have to do all the work or can you earn overrides?

Company - How long have they been in business?

Management - Who's running the company?

Legality - Does the company trade legally in all aspects?

Public or Private - Is the company listed on the Stock Market?

Marketing - How, what, why, when, where?

Global or Local - Does the company market worldwide or only local?

Internet - Are they "On the Net" and E-Commerce enabled?

Tools - Are you supplied with business tools to make your life easier?

Training - Will you be trained?

Commitment - how much time and/or money is required from you?

Lifestyle - Will you be able to live the lifestyle you planned?

(c)2004 All rights reserved.

About The Author To Learn More about how Jeremy's partner company matches up to these 24 Factors go to: http://www.ultimatewealthcreation.com/24factors.html jeremy@ultimatewealthcreation.com