Independent Retailer » hats

Buck Wholesale Hats and Caps

Publisher — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 05:01:20 +0000

Leading the way to a brighter economic landscape is the wholesale and retail apparel industry, persuading once general merchandiser, BuckWholesale.com, to narrow its market to the sale of hats and caps. Serving the wholesale community online since 2003, the distributor has attained a broad spectrum of buyers, including flea marketers, dollar stores, gift shops and military surplus stores. “After eight years and 12,000 plus happy customers, our wholesale products have increased from 100 to over 6,000 high quality goods,” says Timmy Liu of BuckWholesale.com. “But our motto stays the same: ‘Quality caps, hats, cheap wholesale price.’”

Fun and Functional Hats Sell

Among the year’s best sellers are fedoras, wholesaling per unit for $5 and under, and by the 12 piece case for $4 and under. “Other favorites are our military inspired cadet hats, Christian embroidered caps, and blank baseball caps,” notes Liu. “We have more than 500 styles of embroidered and blank hats in our warehouse, enabling us to offer wholesale caps and hats at a value that no other retailer providing this level of quality can rival.” As for this upcoming winter, Liu is predicting beanies and the newest addition, animal hats, to be the most popular. Whether you are looking for plush or knit, or you have a preference for dogs or bears, BuckWholesale.com has a vast selection of animal themed, head warming accessories. As the items are moving quickly, the wholesaler ensures an updated in-stock status on its ecommerce site. Wholesaling for under $6 a unit or for $4 or less for a 12 piece case, retailers can expect to make keystone or more. “Most of our hats retail around $10,” says Liu.

BuckWholesale.com imports its hats directly from the manufacturer, cutting out the middleman and saving money to keep costs low for customers. Also available to buyers is the option to buy one unit or a 12 piece case, with no minimum order and limited discounts offered through ads found in Independent Retailer magazine. The wholesaler also offers a drop ship program. “Please remember to write in “drop ship,” as well as the address in the notes section while placing your order,” adds Liu.

For more information:
BuckWholesale.com
4265 Creek Park Drive, Ste 100
Suwanee, GA 30024
Tel.: 866-408-buck (2825), 770-904-2052
Fax: 888-855-7068
Email: service@afareast.com
Website: www.buckwholesale.com

More New Products from Independent Retailer.

Infidel Hats & Flags

Publisher — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 04:01:01 +0000

With patriotism running high, it’s a good time to be in the wholesale flag business, according to Andy Fuqua, operations manager at Ruffin Flag Company. “We actually got started about 20 years ago when there was no Internet,” Fuqua says. “Confederate battle flags were rare back then, and we did good business with them, selling to groups like the Daughters and Sons of the American Revolution,” he adds. Today, Ruffin Flag Company does a brisk business not only in flags, but also with thousands of other patriotic themed items. “We sell to gift shops, Army-Navy surplus stores, resellers, flea market vendors, fairs, festivals, military stores such as PXs, historical groups and more,” Fuqua says.

A visit to RuffinFlagCompany.net shows a wide variety of items at deeply discounted prices. “Our best sellers are anything with USA branded on it,” Fuqua says. The items range from lapel pins and hats, to 30’ x 60’ American flags. “Our Confederate items are a close second in sales, and we’re also moving a lot of patriotic items like, ‘Don’t Tread on Me,’ and, ‘Liberty or Death’ flags,” he adds.

Ruffin Flag has just rolled out a new line of items, all branded with the word, “Infidel,” in response to the word terrorists use to describe Americans. “We’ve only been carrying them for a few months, but we are getting a huge response,” he says. “The hats, flags, mugs, and bumper stickers are all selling really well.” The Infidel flags wholesale for $2 each and retail for $10. The hats are fetching $10 to $12 at retail, but are only $4 each wholesale. “We’ve also got Infidel mugs that come with a matching 12” x 18” flag. They wholesale for $5 and retail $10 and up,” Fuqua says. Another fast seller is the Infidel bumper sticker that wholesales for 50 cents each, and retails from $2 to $3.99. “If you’re selling to an American audience, we’ve got what you want,” Fuqua says.

For more information:

Ruffin Flag Co.

314 Water Street

Washington, GA 30673

Tel.: 706-678-9090

Fax: 706-678-1347

Email: ruffinflag@msn.com

Website: www.ruffinflagcompany.net

Summit Hats Stays on Top by Offering Wide Variety, Low Prices, Fast Shipping

Rory J. Thompson — Wed, 16 Mar 2011 13:00:52 +0000

Ken Tsai, owner of Summit Hats in Houston, TX, recalls how his father got started in the hat business. “Dad had a restaurant with a flea market behind it, and occasionally he’d walk through the market,” Tsai recalls. “A gentleman selling Western products asked if he could get some feather hatbands from Asia, which dad did. But when they arrived the guy didn’t want them, so dad sold them to nearby stores. They were really popular, and dad realized he could make money by selling them as well as the hats. So that’s how it all started.” Today, 40 years later, Summit Hats is a leading wholesaler of Western style and other headgear, selling to fair and rodeo vendors, as well as mom and pops, gas stations, flea market sellers and others.

“We carry more than 200 different product lines,” Tsai says. “Right now our biggest seller is probably the Raffia Straw hat, which comes in a variety of colors and hatbands.” While Tsai prefers not to disclose his wholesale prices to be fair to his customers, he will say that retailers enjoy a more than 100 percent markup on all his products. With a minimum order of only $50, independent retailers can start with a small order to see how well the hats sell. Tsai is also excited about Summit’s latest offering, “Palm (Gus) Hats” with a four-inch brim, which come with a turquoise hatband and binding on the edge, as well as other new styles the company has in the pipeline, which it will unveil shortly.

Summit Hats does offer volume discounts on certain hats, and will also do custom orders for special quantities. “We encourage retailers to call us with their specific requests,” Tsai says. “We’re here to help.”

–Rory J. Thompson

For More Information:
Summit Hats, Inc.
1120 Roberts Street
Houston, TX 77003
Tel.: 713-224-2683
Toll Free: 888-741-5987
Fax: 713-224-2684
Email: info@summithats.com
Website: www.summithats.com

A Treasure Trove of Licensed Goods from NFL to Disney

Publisher — Fri, 30 Apr 2010 20:55:31 +0000

There aren’t many wholesalers out there that can offer the kind of wide variety of licensed merchandise that St. Louis Wholesale can. Whether it’s Harley Davidson, John Deere, NFL, NHL, MLB, NASCAR, Disney, St. Louis Wholesale has it. Buyers can choose from such branded items as hats, blankets, jewelry, money clips, beanies, candles, keychains and much more. In order to offer such a selection of legal, licensed merchandise, a lot of overseas connections are required, and St. Louis Wholesale has them.

“The company imports the mjaority of the merchandise, typically under the license-holders license, or via company-held licenses, or the company buys them on the closeout market from the manufacturer,” explains owner Craig Pinkerton. “So there are three ways in which merchandise is obtained, giving the retailer the best price on the market, and the most unique licensed products selection in the country. When we do trade shows, I dont think there’s anybody that can stack up to us.”

Pinkerton’s most valuable license is for the NFL–one that’s very tough to come by. By comparison, an NCAA license is very easy to obtain, which is why college merchandise is much more widely available. The same goes for NASCAR. In addition to the NFL, Pinkerton points to NHL, MLB, John Deere and Disney as tough nuts to crack. In order to get the licenses, St. Louis Wholesale buys direct, and has relationships with the manufacturers of certain items. At the end of a specific year, when a license-holder is about to give up their license and liquidate, St. Louis Wholesale will come in and buy out their inventory.

“The catch 22 to that is, you have to take it all–you get the good with the bad,” Pinkerton says. “You always have your top tier teams, your top 10 which sell year in and year out, and then you have the rest of the league. I would say that 70 percent of the sales come from the top 10 teams. Thirty percent of the sales come from the others teams. I attribute it to your longer running teams, like the Pittsurgh Steelers would be the best license I can think of for anything, period. It’s because theyve been around so long and have such a rooted history. So people have now moved from those locations and gone as far as California, and we still have followers of that team, all over the coutry,. That would apply to all the top sports teams. Usually they’re big-city teams. In MLB, 80% of the merchandise sold by us is from the top four teams: Red Sox, Cardinals, Yankees and Cubs.

The most popular items are the knit hats the wholesale price of which ranges from $3 to $9. Suggested retail price is anywhere from $7.99 up to $34.99. Minimum order is $100, and hat displays are available.

Contact:
St. Louis Wholesale
3958 Shady Springs Lane
St. Peters, MO 63376
Ph: 636-922-4467
F: 636-922-4964
Website: http://www.stlouiswholesale.com
Email: info@stlouiswholesale.com

Create an Eco Buzz: Sell Hemp

Publisher — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 05:01:13 +0000

It happens nearly every time; whether it is at a street fair, the New York Fashion Boutique Show, a store, or a Grateful Dead show, the first thing a person does when they encounter products made from 100 percent hemp fabric is pick it up and smell it. Countless wholesale and retail customers all agree: this is the predominant reaction to someone’s first exposure to product made from hemp (Cannabis Sativa L.). This nasal curiosity is quite a buzz because according to the Webster’s Dictionary, and the U.S. government, hemp products are made from Marijuana, a psychoactive drug.

This reaction is a great conversation starter and quickly builds a strong rapport with a customer. More often than not, the discussion leads to a sale, and if there are other customers in the vicinity, a buying frenzy can occur. What does it smell like? Hemp, of course, and nothing else smells like it. If you have never smelled it, now is the time. It looks great and feels even better. Hemp is a plant that is great for sales both ecologically and financially, it requires zero pesticides to grow and there is little impact in processing its fabric. Current demand and improvements in manufacturing have made hemp a hot commodity for stores.

This coming May will mark the 20th year that Hempstar has been manufacturing and selling accessories and clothing made from hemp. We have sold thousands of pounds of hemp products all over the world. Entrepreneurs and environmentalists believe hemp is a dream substance, because it is the best and most environmentally safe fabric for sale in recent years.

One of Hempstar’s more popular hemp products, the tri-fold wallet, is made with an 18 to 20 oz. canvas that is four times stronger than cotton and has a much better feel than nylon or leather. The amazing strength and durability of hemp handbags and wallets is why customers are willing to pay a higher price.

Engaging your customers with some knowledge of hemp can be fun and profitable. Here are a few hemp trivia tidbits that often engender potential customers towards purchasing the Earth’s #1 environmental product:

The word canvas comes from the Dutch pronunciation of the Greek word “Kannabis.”
Hemp is the oldest known woven fabric, as it began to be worked in the eighth millennium (8,000-7,000 B.C.). According to The Columbia History of the World.
The long strands of the hemp are what makes it ultra strong when woven together.
Hemp contains natural disulfides, which help to eliminate odor and keep it from rotting. Hemp socks are the best for your feet!
Ninety percent of ship sails were once made from Hemp: Levi Strauss used hemp cloth, strengthened with rivets, to make his famous jeans, which did not rip when the pockets were filled with gold and sediment by 49′ers panning for gold.
Hemp needs no chemicals and has few weed or insect enemies.
Hemp fabric is more environmentally friendly than cotton.

Sales of hemp continue to increase across the country as the demand for high quality, eco friendly products increase. Small items like wallets, bags, hats and twine are produced affordably and with a nice profit margin for retailers. These items check through the cash register at a nice pace, with or without a mini hemp education dialogue. If a customer does not know what it is made of and you as a retailer explain it to them for the first time, see what their reaction is. I bet they smell it!

For more information:
Dave Martyn
Exodus Sales / Hempstar.com
1835 Newport Blvd., A109-127
Costa Mesa, CA 92627
Toll Free: 877-436-7786
Tel.: 949-246-4067
Fax: 949-645-0052
Email: dave@hempstar.com
Website: www.hempstar.com

Plush Animal Hats

Publisher — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 15:00:05 +0000

Hats

BUDDY TOP INC. has created a series of plush animal hats for children between the ages of about three to 12. There are currently six, “BuddyTops.” While their primary purpose is to keep kids warm, each animal also imparts a short lesson. Lilly the Dalmatian represents uniqueness, with ears of different colors and spots in odd places. Darby the Pig represents honesty, while Milton the Wolf represents sharing. Perseverance is the message touted by Benny the Bunny, and Ah Wah the Panda represents adventure. Courage is the realm of Stewart the Tiger. Additional Buddy Top animals are on the drawing board.

The hats have a high quality polyester shell and a soft inner lining. They are fully washable and durable, designed for daily use. Each comes with an individual serial number hologram that serves as proof of authenticity. The minimum order is negotiable, but typically consists of 40 to 50 units for a new buyer. The wholesale cost ranges from $7.75 to $12.50, depending on the quantity of an order. The suggested retail price is $25.

For more information:

Buddy Top Inc.
481 Eighth Avenue, Ste. 506
New York, NY 10001
Tel.: 347-612-3520
Fax: 718-008-9119
Email: info@buddytops.com
Website: www.buddytops.com