making ofmarketing and branding

some lonesome statistics and stories

Here’s a some statistical data for you.

I changed the sample pricing for my Lonesome Rider on www.lonesomerider.website and charge 4 $ (US) per sample now. I was kickstarted to do so after a couple of zero price orders from perfume lovers. Before I share the data, here a few anecdotes and bits that are funny.

On facebook, there was a lot of “ah I wish you would ship to …” Canada and Lithuania, for instance. I learned that many of these wishes do not materialize in the end. And hence, … well: You can draw your conclusion. Here’s one funny experience. I never got an order from Lithuania, besides one, whereby the client could not order by credit card. Thus, I was super flexible and told them: Pay me what you think is fair by just sending money  through paypal and we’ll ship to Lithuania.

I got an “order” for 5 samples, and was sent through paypal zero (0) $ for the samples (I got 4$ for shipment as this rate was fixed). I shipped it and – of course, as Lithuania is not top of the list when it comes to postal service,- the samples did not arrive, and the client asked for a reshipment; a wish that I did not fulfill but I just sent the money back.

I also stopped shipping to Spain, like 1 day after I started shipping there, because most perfume lovers there ordered their samples for close to nothing.

I also got an email from a German client asking me why he had to pay for samples anyhow, as samples are my marketing expense. My take on that statement: Very German, and totally true for your average industry brand where you pay for the marketing expenses. I like the statement as it tells me a lot about the race to the bottom.

My take on it all: – my lips are sealed. And yes, this was an interesting experiment and I will take the results into consideration for a couple of things that I want to get done over the year.

I leave it to you to come to your own conclusions.

Paid price in $ US on average per sample from Feb 1- Mar 21. In brackets:  total number of samples ordered by region.
USA 2.4 (366)
Switzerland 2.8 (33)
Germany 2.1 (79)
Netherlands 1.78 (30)
Spain 1.25 (44)

Picture of today: My left hand, pencil sketch.