Vendor Tip: Making Discontinued Products Sell

One easy trick to make a profit on slow-moving merchandise

If your business model includes having a variety of products, you’ve probably noticed that some products are more popular than others. Some are hard to keep in stock, while others seem to sit forever.

It’s a constant game of figuring out which products or designs are worth keeping and which ones are taking up valuable table/shelf space without moving.

I’m constantly adjusting my inventory lineup. That being said, it’s important to note that several of my products regularly go through selling phases. For example, I’ll go several weeks or even months hardly selling any stickers or keychains, and then those products will suddenly become popular again. With that in mind, make sure you give a product/design adequate testing time before deciding to pull it.

I’ve completely discontinued products a few times after giving them a generous test run. My glass cutting boards, for example, took up a lot of table space and really didn’t sell. People loved them and gave me a lot of compliments, but consumers feared that they wouldn’t be able to use the product without damaging the artwork (even though the art was well protected underneath the textured glass, so it wasn’t actually an issue). Even when I assured them the cutting board was useable, it was still a tough sell, so I ended up discontinuing that product.

In other cases, I’ve kept a product line but discontinued certain designs. When I first started selling other items besides my books, I had photography as well as artwork. But I noticed that there was a much higher demand for the hand-drawn art than the photographs, so I phased the latter out of my lineup. Some of my photographs are still available online, but I don’t display them at events.

This is also the case with my keychains. I have a lot of keychain designs, and when certain designs don’t take off, I’ll discontinue them to make room for new designs.

But how do you sell those pesky products/designs that you just can’t get rid of? Sometimes, even offering a discount on discontinued items isn’t enough. So, do you give them away for free? Drawings and giveaways can be a fun way to drum up excitement, encourage engagement, and move unwanted products… but then you’ll have to eat the loss on your initial investment.

If you want to actually SELL those items, here’s a trick that’s worked surprisingly well for me.