We had a successful meeting with a new potential flag supplier yesterday. We currently buy flags from 3 other local suppliers. Some are cheaper than others, but we have to shop around because the cheaper guys don't stock all of the 200+ country flags (in 2 different sizes each).

The company we met yesterday seemed to be the first to "get" what we are trying to do - be an online retailer for their manufacturing capabilities. All the others give us a miserly 10% discount, which we means we have to be the most expensive in the industry in order to survive. These guys understand that we're not competitors, but a complimentary business. Even though they also sell directly to the public they suggested linking from their own website to our's, crediting us as a source for buying flags online. They understand that marketing is usually the hard bit in business, so if they can get us to do it for them it's worth giving a healthy discount.

It was a good meeting in amongst a difficult day of dealing with customer complaints (see Shane's previous post). Selling physical stuff seems a lot harder than our experiences of making websites for clients.

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