My name is Brendan Cheng and I am an experienced Amazon seller. In 2016, I am on track to reach over $1 million in sales… and I started less than a year ago. Here is my story.
My life before Amazon wasn’t that exciting. Like most people, I got sucked into the 9 to 5 grind. I graduated university with a degree in pharmacy. I enjoyed my work and life in the early years of my career, but eventually the routine and mundane tasks of my job got to me. Like any other business, corporate pharmacies were all about the profit and I didn’t feel like a health care professional; instead, I felt like a pill pusher constantly trying to meet sales targets. My potential was restricted and my career destiny was in the hands of people whom I’d never even met.
Even though I made a comfortable salary from my job, I wasn’t satisfied with my life and where it was heading. I was bored, unmotivated, and lost. Every morning, I dreaded waking up because I knew that I had to endure 8 long hours of work in which I was no longer interested. I needed more mental stimulation, I needed a challenge, I needed to find something about which I was passionate, and – most importantly – I needed to control my own destiny and career fate. However, I put that dream on hold – partly because I was scared of change and the unknown, partly because of family and peers, and partly because I just wasn’t ready at the time.
In December 2014, I finally decided to quit my career in pursuit of building my own business. Why the sudden change of heart? I was getting married in 6 months and we were moving cities (because of my wife following her dreams). With all these changes imminent, I knew that it was now or never to try something new. With a limited budget, I needed to find a business with a low start-up cost. After a month of searching online, I accidentally stumbled upon a podcast episode by the famous Pat Flynn. He interviewed an Amazon seller who generated $1 million in 12 months. I was super excited by this promising opportunity and was instantly hooked. I joined as many Facebook groups as I could find and Googled as many websites related to the Amazon private label business as possible. The learning process was long, and I spent the next 2 months collecting random bits of information I found across the Internet. I was like a sponge, absorbing everything. In April 2015, still without a product selected, I took a leap of faith and flew to China to visit the biggest trade fair in the world – the Canton Fair.
The trip wasn’t cheap, but it was worth every penny. I was able to discover and source my very first physical product – the product that got me to where I am today. It wasn’t a revolutionary product or something that no one had ever seen before. I didn’t even create the product myself! I simply discovered it in a catalog that I had picked up while walking through the trade fair. Talk about being in the right place at the right time! The product had a new design and also offered some improvements over existing models that were offered on Amazon at the time. I saw a golden opportunity and I gladly took it.
I was able to generate a healthy profit within the first week of launch. In just the first 30 days, I made $10,000 in sales. Using the exact same process, I launched a second product two months later. Not long after, I was launching my third product, my fourth product, and I just kept going! Currently, I have over 15 active products selling over $100,000 per month. My profit margin is around 35%, so I am technically taking home over $35,000 per month. Not bad for only 8 months of work, right?
What’s my secret? Hard work and dedication. When I first started, I was devoting around 10 to 12 hours a day to my business. I outworked everyone around me, but I also worked smart. I learned a lot from trial and error – from the mistakes that I made. I also hung out with a few like-minded people for accountability, motivation and encouragement. It’s TRUE when they say you are the average of the 5 people with whom you surround yourself. By surrounding myself with winners, action-takers, and people I was inspired to be like, I was able to achieve exceptional results.
I hope that my story can inspire some of you because, honestly, anything is possible. I wasn’t a creative virtuoso like Steve Jobs or a market genius like Warren Buffet – I was just a regular guy with a regular job… but I always believed that if someone else can do it, then I could too!
Thank you for taking the time to read my story. You can find me at AMZ Ninja Facebook Group or you can directly message me at hello@amzninja.com. If you want to learn more about selling Private Label Products on Amazon, check out my site at www.amzninja.com
