Chicken or egg?

This issue always arises when I'm working with this friend. Its probably not easy on his side.. as well. Ok so we decide to do a little trading. He has some contacts and asks me if I'm interested to sell some stuff. I went ahead and sought dealers or customers and eventually.. now here comes the problem. When we are the small guys the suppliers' price to us is usually based on volume. When we do not command volume, they do not ewant to entertain us. So we do notk ow our margin when we quote the customers but how can we get a good gauge how to price our goods? I think we lack experience still. But basically, without a definite price no customers commit, without customers committing, we do not get a definite price from the supliers. Feel a little frustrated with the lack of bargaining power on either side. Oh well... whoever said it was easy anyway. Haha...