Garden Products Recycling Business Plan

Hair Recycling Technologies marketing strategy is to enhance, promote, and support the fact that our products, SMART SOIL and HARE AWAY are organic, recycled, and more effective than our competitors. HRT will target the environmentally conscious gardener. Our marketing will show the customer that HRT will be the leading company in the organic soil enhancer and animal deterrent business for the 21st century. The quality and competitive price of our products will be used to generate sales, and HRT will introduce its products through retail outlets and through the Internet.

6.1 Strategy Pyramid

The first step is to create a website to promote our products. The creation of our website is expected to take a minimum amount of time and effort after contracting with a developer. This will be one source for selling our products directly to our customers.

Second, there will be much emphasis placed on contacting and securing contracts with buyers of large retail establishments who supply home and garden products to the marketplace. Establishments will include large nurseries such as Franks and discount stores such as K-Mart, Mynards, Myers, and Wal-Mart. We will also focus on selling to mid-sized retailers through direct selling.

Third, we will contact various online gardening sites to help us market our product. We will give commission for products that are sold either on their gardening sites or if they post a link to HRT’s website. Websites that we will target include the following:

• Gardensupply.com at www.gardensupply.com. This site offers a healthy patch of down to earth products and bushels of expert gardening advice. Helpful hints from real-life gardening gurus are sprinkled throughout the site.
• Home Harvest Garden Supply Online at www.homeharvest.com offers natural and organic gardening products. It has product information, gardening tips, and lists products available year-round.
• Landscape USA at www.landscape.com is for green thumb gardeners with unique and desirable plants, tools, and how-to information.
• Martha Stewart Living at www.marthastewart.com is the grand maven of unique ideas pertaining to home and gardening.
• Santa Fe Greenhouses at www.santafegreenhouses.com helps desert gardens grow with garden supplies.
• Amazon.com at www.amazon.com, the bookseller that also has become a purveyor of lawn and garden tools, along with Home Depot and Sears.

6.1.1 Future Marketing Strategy

During the first year of operations, HRT will use traditional marketing channels such as direct marketing and through the use of channel partners. In recent years, there has been a large increase in the number of distribution channels. Less expensive and more effective ways of promoting a product have emerged. Infomercials are a big part of this new trend. HRT may plan to use this channel during our third and forth year of operations.

6.2 Value Proposition

HRT will focus its advertising efforts toward the home gardener. The company will stress the fact that our product is organic, recycled, and does not require many applications. This advertising strategy is aimed toward the environmentally conscious gardener who believes SMART SOIL will add more time and require less maintenance to their gardening experience. The animal deterrent HARE AWAY will be marketed toward the gardener who needs protection for his or her plants.

6.3 Competitive Edge

The suggested retail price for a bag of our soil enhancer is $2.99. Our wholesale price for the same bag is $1.50, and our cost per bag is less than 50 cents. The retail price for our bagged hair is $1.99. The wholesale price for the bagged hair is 85 cents a bag, and our cost per bag is less than 15 cents.

The price for the soil enhancer and bagged hair are fairly inelastic. With the environmental issues our world faces today, the consumer is more demanding of organic and recycled products. We believe that most gardeners are true environmentalists and will pay a premium for organic products.

The price margins on our products are relatively high. These margins may shrink with possible unexpected costs and competitors, however, the margins are high enough to sustain a considerable amount of growth and allocation toward a strong, aggressive advertising campaign.

6.4 Strategic Alliances

HRT’s advertising will play an important role in reaching our target market. The company will try to reach the target market through print advertising. There are dozens of gardening magazines which have thousands of subscribers. Organic Gardening and Farming and Organic Gardening are two of the largest publications dealing with our business. These publications will be one of our first channels of advertising. As stated earlier, HRT will also advertise through relationships with online retailers of home and gardening supplies.

6.4.1 Advertising Budget

Advertising expenses for the first two years of operation can be summarized in the table below.