25th July 2006

The turnout with the distributor whom I met yeterday wasnt how I expected it to be. I was thinking about how our conversations were taking place and felt I wasnt feeling good about it. She is not whom we need to do business with. Her ideas are copies from foreign brands, even the way it is packaged. So, today I search for other possible options.

I am left with the list of Phuket based companies I was able to download, thanks to google. All day long, I have to get in touch with the owners/presidents from the list. I have 11 prospects from the 15; 2 sounds like bakeries distributing breads, 1 i already have met yesterday and 1 which has the name of one of our competitors here.

I felt like a tele-marketer selling a product,hoping to get them interested with Beach Hut. I have prepared my script long before comprised of just 2 sentences. Back in the Philippines, I would have sold to all retail shops tasked to me, but now, the challenge is to find the right distributor and most importantly find someone within their company who could understand what I was trying to say; language barrier gives me a lot of headaches.

My office place? Robinsons in Phuket Town at the phone booth. i have to change my bills into coins to make the possible calls. Its the cheapest way which serves my purpose. The whole afternoon was very tasking, trying to find the simpliest and basic word for them to understand.

I went to a forwarding agents office, SkyTrade to follow-up on our shipments and I was informed that there are documents needed wherein which they cant proccess for us. I was advised (same advise I had before by a different company)to process it in Bangkok.

Now with the challenges I am facing, I have to think about how to deal with the situation. I have prospects here in Phuket but I have to go to Bangkok. Both are important matters that I have to attend to but I have drop one.