Trying to gauge the market... Interested in 500ml and 1000ml swing top bottles?

I am trying to gauge the market for swing top (grolsch) style bottles. I would like to make these bottles more affordable to home-brewers and I have been looking for a source for quite sometime.

I have now found a source, but I would have to make a substantial investment.

Please post how many cases of each you would be interested in at 1.35 per bottle for 500ml and 1.75 per bottle for 1000ml with caps (plus shipping).

Currently these bottles sell for 35 - 40 dollars and up per case (that is 3.00 to 3.50 each). If I could order in bulk we could be paying about 16-22 dollars per case instead, basically half price.

Please post what you think about this, I would have to buy around 500 cases initially...

Assuming shipping wouldn't be outrageous. I could easily see myself being interested in 2 or 3 cases of each size personally.

I ordered 2 cases of 500ml from BMW 2 weeks ago with a 12% off code and 6.99 shipping (and I ordered an all grain recipe with it) I ended up at around $2.35 per bottle total outlay. Unless I'm missing something that's about as good as it gets for onesie twosie ordering.

Great thanks for the reply. I currently have a commercial UPS account and think that shipping would be reasonable depending on where you are located. I am going to check into the rates today and try to post them so that everyone can get an idea of total costs.

Checked the UPS account today and looks like shipping would be in the 10.00 dollar range to just about anywhere. What did they package the bottles that you received in and what carrier did they use?

By the way your F- the Ocean website is one of the funniest things I have read in a while. All I have to say is F-CK the Ocean and it's creepy critters!!

Well, once you add shipping I wouldn't be saving much over my LHBS regular retail price. You are proposing selling them at a price(before shipping) that is only a couple dollars over the wholesale price that a small LHBS gets from one of the big homebrew wholesale companies, granted the wholesaler makes a profit too so if your getting them from a bottle manufacture you might be making a reasonable profit (I'm assuming your considering this a business venture). Some things you may not have considered in your business model:

• shipping costs to get the bottles to you from your source (you might be surprised what freight costs will be, also freight carriers typically won't deliver to a residential address if your running this out of your home but you might be able to pick up at the carriers loading dock, that many pallets you will need to rent a u-haul)
• repackaging costs for material and labor (don't under value your own labor here, it is a lot of work since you will likely need to repackage in a larger outer box with filler to ensure safe delivery to your customer plus print shipping labels etc.)
• inventory carrying costs (500 cases of bottles take a bunch of room even if it is in your own garage, I am guessing a pallet of 1-liter flip tops is about 55-65 cases)

Add to that the fact that you have only been a member here two days so I wouldn't consider ordering from you until you have been around longer and established yourself as a contributing member of the community.

For me this is a non-starter.

I'm sure the interest is there. I prefer 0.5L swingtops to 12oz bottles that need capped. I own at least 6 cases already.

I also have 3 cases of 1L swingtops I use for bottling mead.

And I have a 2L and 3L for taking beer to parties.

Thanks for all of the great replies.

Chris, I have taken all of these things into consideration.

I currently own and operate a business that is on a daily shipping schedule, we have a loading dock, and we have room in our 6000 sq ft building for storage. The final price would be $16.00 for .5L and $22.00 for 1L bottles after all things considered. This would not leave me making a killing, but it would be worth my time. You would not have to trust my reputation here. If I did start in on this venture I would probably sell through my e-bay store and on a separate website.

CucuzzaBrew said:

Thanks for all of the great replies.

Chris, I have taken all of these things into consideration.

I currently own and operate a business that is on a daily shipping schedule, we have a loading dock, and we have room in our 6000 sq ft building for storage. The final price would be $16.00 for .5L and $22.00 for 1L bottles after all things considered. This would not leave me making a killing, but it would be worth my time. You would not have to trust my reputation here. If I did start in on this venture I would probably sell through my e-bay store and on a separate website.

Click to expand...

Then I apologize for the assumptions I made previously, best of luck.