Shannon,
You are SO gracious to mention this. I am continually amazed at how wonderful the ladies on this board are. We appreciate each and every one of you!
Currently our HOD guides are offered in many, many places. We originally chose for our business to function in this manner, because we were not set up to handle business on a large scale. Our children were very young when we began HOD, and we were unsure as to how far up we would write our guides.
As we've continued to write guides, however, it has become increasingly difficult for other retailers to carry all of the resources recommended in our guides, and even more difficult for them to give accurate placement information. This is due to the fact that placement varies depending on where children are at developmentally, what each family's philosophy of education is, and whether or not the family wishes to combine their children within a program. Since, a one-size-fits-all placement is not what we do at HOD, it is difficult for retailers to take all needed areas into account when offering placement.
While we have been very grateful for each and every one of our retailers, and we have enjoyed an excellent relationship with them, we do feel it is time for HOD to become a sole-source company sometime in 2009. We desire for those using HOD to be able to be accurately placed within our programs by receiving placement help directly from HOD. We also want families to know exactly what resources are needed for each guide and to be able to decide, based on how our packages are put together, what resources we consider to be most important. As we look at the path that companies such as Sonlight, Winter's Promise, and My Father's World have taken, we realize that we can serve our HOD customers better by helping them directly rather than passing that job off to another retailer to do.
Now that our plan is in place to write HOD guides through grade 8, we also have our warehouse, our work force, our phone systems, our catalog, our website, and our board in place as well. We have competitive package pricing in place that will save you money on each package that you purchase from us. We are now a fully functioning business ready to serve all of your needs.
We will have more freedom to offer our own promotions by keeping the business in house.
We have also discovered that even when HOD guides are shown by other companies at conventions, it is most often without the corresponding resources and without accurate placement and program understanding. So, while we do not plan to travel to book conventions extensively, we do plan to provide personal assistance by phone, email, and on the board for all who wish to look at HOD. We provide the entire first week and introductions of all of our guides on our website for viewing as well, so customers have a trial week to print and ponder.
It is always exciting for us to see the orders come in from those people we have personally helped. We are grateful for your business and appreciate your vote of confidence when you buy from HOD.
Blessings,
Carrie
, but in another place on this board this very discussion took place and Carrie indicated that her revenues from vendors are not as rewarding as if you purchased from her directly, which is why many curriculum writers only sell directly.