YOUNG ACHIEVEMENT AUSTRALIA – TRADE EXPO

Southbank Market, August 22, 2009 – Young Achievement Australia (YAA) is a non-government, not for profit charitable institution that is committed to develop the potential of young Australians by sharpening individual business skill and imparting corporate experience. Earlier this year in April, student teams from high schools and universities took off with weekly meetings to brainstorm ideas to raise capital from shares, come up with a unique product, market and hopefully reap a chunk of profit from it. Last month, YAA organised a trade expo, which was staged in Southbank Market to provide the teams an opportunity to pitch their ideas and promote their sponsors and giving the public a chance to see the students in action and buying the unique products.

It was a golden opportunity for most teams as Southbank market is a well diversified trading location set just minutes of walk from the city. Despite the fact that teams had to fork out $60 for this one-off event, it was effective in driving teams to be detail oriented and competitive because of the sunk cost. This resulted in higher standards and critical ideas being implemented for the sake of trade expo, which are still being practised in our regular activities.

Friya, one of the teams formed mainly from University of Queensland, participated in the trade expo. There were twenty other teams more or less from southeast Queensland region competing in that event. My team had been working on silicone wristbands that targets age range within high school and university students. We have been running a continuous research in popular colours and slogans that appeal to our target demographics.

All team members were obliged to show up for at least a couple hours on this special event, and I’d like to share my personal encounter from that day as I was present most of it.

Jennifer Chew, state manager for YAA Queensland, gave an introduction to the public on what the teams were offering generally. With the public informed; however, first hour’s sales was anything but optimistic as few people turn up as early as 9am on a Saturday morning, not to mention that our event was held slightly further and isolated from the main market.

As the sun rose, activities picked up too; couples and groups of families or friends could be seen strolling the fronts of our stalls. Smelling hope, other teams intensely increased promotion to passer bys.  What seem like harassment to the potential customers, were tiny expectations to break-even hundreds of dollars in fixed cost. At $4 a wristband, we managed to push out forty units by noon through selling points such as glow-in-the-dark, charity contribution and several more which are heavily overrated in my honest opinion.

During my break at 1pm, I took my chance to nose around competitors. Within minutes I could tell that lady accessories, with correct pricing and promotion strategies, became a big hit that day, especially the Pandora jewellery. Having said that, I had to praise a few bold stalls for selling organic soaps, recycled DVD holders as shelves and alike. These are great valid ideas, only issue was they were dealing with niche markets and they were effortlessly butchered in the middle of a gruesome pricing and consumer demand battle.

As I looked on from customer’s point of view, I realised that human resource, specifically the salesperson, played a key role in executing a sale. Even with meticulous product design and careful planning since day one, without the flair and presentation skill of a good salesperson, seeing eye to eye with potential customers can be frustratingly difficult. Such as stalls with timid sales personnel, the lack of self-confidence and active approach to strangers passing by or even a curious shopper spelled disaster for business revenue.

While it may be safe to strike the popular card such as choosing to sell classic print-on

T-shirts, product differentiation was vital for survival on trade expo. As I observed, there were three stalls selling T-shirts with very slight variation among their service or product offering. The managing directors from one of those groups painfully admitted themselves that sales had been rather disappointing. It was important to consider demand on an aggregate basis and not just at the customer’s angle; nonetheless, good effort by them.

Far from my expectation of observation, minor things like the weather had an impact on sales too; a very eager team was promoting their thick, black hoodies to any passer by; unfortunately, it was a cloudless sunny day with temperatures blazing at around thirty degrees. Majority of the crowd were shocked and moved on. It is true that August is a winter month, yet we don’t call Queensland the sunshine state for nothing.

In between three to four in the afternoon, Jennifer called it a day and various awards were given to winning teams. As anticipated, the team which sold Pandora jewellery emerged as overall winner whereas Friya earned the marketing award through its extension of market audience through the incorporation of charity organisation, Mission Australia.

Keith

Sales and Marketing Director,

Friya @ YAA

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