At IDPshops our mission is to create a product marketplace that will use the Internet as well as Brick and Mortar stores to achieve financial success for small businesses. IDPshops will allow small and medium sized suppliers and manufacturers to reach the retail marketplace as cost effectively as possible using independent retailers, in a manner that will permit small businesses to compete on price, value and selection with Big Box retailers such as Walmart, Home Depot, and Target.
After years of working for a family business selling garden decorations, Aaron (founder and CEO of IDPshops ) helped the family business branch out and helped to manage their e Commerce website back in 1999. In a few short years that business became a booming business in its own right, with sales surpassing the brick and mortar family business which had been around for over 50 years.
By 2003, the e Commerce company was nearly large enough to import garden decorations directly from China and India. So in 2004, a wholesale company was formed to start importing products, selling most of the product to the retail family business, while using the wholesale company to basically clear out the remaining inventory. This allowed the family business to have the pricing power of buying in bulk, yet they only had to sell half the inventory. The wholesale company would sell the rest to other small businesses around the country.
In running the e Commerce company, Aaron realized that using third party custom software developers to make our business' e Commerce websites was not only expensive but took nearly a year to complete. The decision was made to bring the software development in house and create a custom e Commerce solution from scratch. To do this Aaron trusted none other than his brother to complete the task.
Aaron's brother, Chad, built a website platform that would allow the e Commerce company to create ‘niche’ websites quickly and easily for the family business. This was something that the e Commerce industry had started to do, as these ‘niche’ sites would create better conversions and sales numbers than an all inclusive website with thousands of products on it. Right as this project was completed, Aaron in his never satisfied and always ‘thinking Big’ spirit, wondered out loud “if we could create sites like this for our family business, what if we could create these sites for all the family businesses that our wholesale business sells to?”
The idea behind IDPshops was born
In making this journey we have learned many things, the most important is that if somebody doesn’t change the way small business works, then there will be nothing left of small business in America. We believe strongly that IDPshops can be a part of creating a better way to do business, and one small business at a time, we will work to reshape how business gets done.
Aaron Hamann CEO
Growing up in a small family business I developed a true passion for working with fellow small business owners. I have worked hard at creating a software platform that is truly unique, and will solve many of the problems that small business owners are faced with. Too many times over the past several years I have seen small businesses make terrible business choices when it comes to getting their business online, that is why I have created IDPshops.
To be clear, you don't need to have an existing small business before starting an IDPshop, it is just that I created IDPshops with the small business owner in mind. Once you create an IDPshop, you will become a fellow small business owner, even if you have never been in business before. Maybe you will decide to open a small store with products you sell on your IDPshop, maybe you will become an IDPshop supplier and make products to sell to other store owners, or maybe you will learn to search out new suppliers and help add their products to our database of products. All of these things are possible with IDPshops.
If you are a current small business owner, then you might be reading this as you search for a way to bring your small business online. I would like to give some advice to you by sharing some mistakes I have made myself, and mistakes that I have seen others make along the way.
1) An internet store is a NEW business, it takes time and effort - If you decide to hire a big company and spend $1,000's of dollars on a new e Commerce store, you need to realize that the people you hire are going to leave someday, either that or you have to keep paying them. A traditional online e Commerce store needs constant updating, marketing, and it will become a full time job, so remember this as you make your decision in bringing your store online. The good news is we have built IDPshops with this in mind. We 100% manage your online store. If you want to take time to make changes then you can do that, but we process orders, ship orders, update product information, add products, and manage vendors. We are the ONLY e Commerce solution that does all of this for you.
2) Do what you do best - Many of you worked hard to get to the point where you have a small business. Some of you reading this might be landscapers, hardware store owners, clothing store owners, or you could own any other number of great businesses. You got to where you are most likely because you enjoyed some of what you are doing, you are good at it, and over time you learned a lot about what you are doing. The internet is the same way. Just because you know a lot about landscaping, doesn't mean you know anything about computers and running an e Commerce store. We allow you to keep doing what you are currently doing. You can just place your website address on your business card, at your store counter, or just tell people about it. Let IDPshops manage your eCommerce presence so you can keep doing the things that have made you successful.
I am happy to personally answer any questions or concerns that you might have.
Feel free to send me an e-mail at ahamann@idpshops.com
Sincerely,
Aaron Hamann
Founder/ CEO IDPshops, LLC
