On The Ground Insights of State of Supply Chain In China with Eric YangXiang

Greetings from a lockdown in China. Yes, 2 years into Covid, and still in lockdowns. But worry not! The GFA podcast does go on – and we are dialing in a GFAVIP member and supply chain expert, Eric, who has worked in logistics in China for B2B and B2C companies for years to give us great insights on the status of supply chain – ON THE GROUND (he’s not on lockdown like me, yet)

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[00:00:00] So now we’re on episode 371 for our podcast. And on this show, we’re going to talk about the insights are, we’re going to give insight on what’s the current situation in the supply chain in China. Yeah, let’s do this. Welcome to the Global From Asia podcast, where the daunting process of running an international business is broken down, into straight up actionable advice.

[00:00:24] And now your host, Michael Michelini. All right. Aubrey. We’re in different situations. I’m locked down and I can’t leave until March 8th here in Shenzhen. Not every part of Shenzhen, certain buildings or communities, but I’m in a community that’s locked down until March 8th. So you are not though, right? What’s happening with you.

[00:00:46] Yeah. Fortunately, I’m on the other side of things because I’ve already joined, create community building here in our area. And yeah, I’ve joined the empower camp where in we deal with different environmental issues and we come up with a great project for the environment. That’s awesome. And I’m really looking forward for that.

[00:01:08] And I hope you can join us to us that in the future. I hope you can go here in the Philippines as well. I think we’re currently opening the borders.

[00:01:21] Yeah, it’s always more fun in the Philippines right, that’s what they say. So it’s more fun in the Philippines. Yeah, I believe so.

[00:01:31] I, actually, one of my friends is in Ukraine and there’s a, the, the war happening and the bombs are dropping and they’re trying to get to the Philippines. I don’t know why he picked Philippines. He’s a foreigner. He’s, he’s not Ukrainian. He’s from the US. So he he’s picking for some reason, Philippines. He’s trying to get to Philippines.

[00:01:52] So maybe. Maybe you can welcome him if he gets there. It’s really crazy times right now. Sure. I’ve heard about the news and I think it’s quite relevant to our current topic because it will somehow affect the cost in the shipping, right. I know. It’s affecting the cost of oil. Yeah. The oil prices will go high. Good one, Aubrey.

[00:02:16] Yeah. I know oil prices have shot up. I mean, we’re not talking about the Ukraine war. I mean, we’re in Asia. We’re in Asia, maybe kinda Asia. Russia. But we mostly talk about China and the Asia Southeast Asia, but which is a, in today’s show, we got Eric. He is in our GFA VIP members community and he’s really knowledgeable.

[00:02:36] And he does logistics himself for many years and dropship and B2B and air and ocean. And, you know, we’ve had logistics a couple of times on the show, but I think it’s always a popular topic and he shares some numbers and rates. And we talk about some of the history and I think it’s good to just do a little bit of state of the shipping and he gives some recommendations as well.

[00:02:57] So let’s, let’s tune into Eric, now. 

[00:03:00] And thank you to our sponsor. Our returning sponsor mercury.com online bank was a real bank, but you took totally online for US. Our blimp program participants are going through this as well. Thank you, Mercury. Travis is great there. He has been on our show and has been in our events.

[00:03:16] We’re gonna have another event where we will have them attending as well. And if you want to get a little bonus for you and us, if you sign up and do some special circumstances, so you can go to globalfromasia.com/mercury also have video tutorials that we use. Even the BLIMP people use the same exact video to learn how to use it.

[00:03:33] I hope. If you check it out. Totally free. Why not? See you there. All right. Thank you everybody for choosing this, Global From Asia podcast. I think this episode is one that people always, always like is like on the ground insights of what’s happening here in, in China. So I wish I can meet Eric in person. We’ve met in person recently, but I’m locked down.

[00:03:57] I can’t go meet you or we can’t meet. So we’re  doing this online, but it’s great to have you finally on our show here, Eric. Eric is a, you know, in the community. So thanks for being here.

[00:04:11] Yeah. Thanks, Mike. Thanks for inviting and all these topics I’m pretty interested in. I hope that’s my experience and some insights can help you guys know get through this. Can you turn two. For sure, for sure. So, yeah, we’re two years into COVID right now. It’s, we’re recording this right at the end of February.

[00:04:30] I think it will be published early March, 2022. When, you know, I don’t think any of us predicted two years later, it was still be a discussion. And I think it was great to have you on the show, Eric. You, you work many years in logistics for both B2B and B2C, and you have a lot of good insights on the ground here.

[00:04:49] So do you want to just give us a little bit of background about yourself for people to, to understand more? Okay. So we run a company here. We help Chinese sellers and also foreign sellers to ship their product from China to other countries. And so what do we, we are, most of our customers are from like B2B..

[00:05:09] And in terms of shipments’s B2B is the biggest, and also in terms of customer numbers, we see the B2C, we have the, the most of customers in terms of numbers and this customer, are falling into the category, like Amazon, Shopify and drop shipping as well. So, and at some personal customers as well. So this is what with do with the business.

[00:05:31] We help the customer to ship product from China to other countries? Perfect. Yeah. Great. For the topic today. Yeah, thank you for that Eric. And also I remembered, we’re supposed to have you as a guest host instead of being the guest. So thank you so much for always supporting this community. Yeah. Thanks.

[00:05:52] We’ll have Eric as a co-host in future episodes. Honestly, I, I hope I can meet with you and we could even go see some, see some different facilities and things like that. I think that’s going to be something future this year that we were going to do together. Sure. No problem. Perfect. We’ll make it happen, man.

[00:06:10] Always make it happen here. So I think before we get into kind of the status or the state of the supply chain, I think people are familiar in the community, but maybe we just go through some of the different, I call them “buckets” of different logistics services that are most popular from China and export side of a B2B B2C.

[00:06:30] So some people can understand the most common ones that people are using. Okay. So traditionally most of the shipments would  be with B2B. So that means container FCL, FLV, e-commerce voles, or see very traditional terms. Getting away from most of the business, especially the new entrepreneurs. So we are now talking about like, I don’t want any, I don’t want deal with anything else.

[00:07:02] I just want to have this shipment either to my boss or to deliver to my customers. So if let’s say, if you want to, uh, have like bulky shipments or that will be, we will say B2B. So in terms of B2B, in most cases we’ll use like at first of all the most expensive one and the quickest one, or be the international express, like UPS, DHL, FedEx, and also then it is the most expensive and the quickest one.

[00:07:35] And also then falling into categories. Like some customers may, they may not have the knowledge or the resources to do the custom clearance. That will be the DDP. So the DDP can go with air freight. That means we booked the, the flight, uh, space and then deliver to the airport. In, in, for example, USA maybe goes to Los Angeles or New York, and then there’ll be custom clearance agents.

[00:08:03] We’re handling everything and then deliver to the door fronts of the, of the buyers. And if the customer had their own ability to the custom clearance, that will be like the port to port. Let’s say we book a container and then we’ll just get over to the container yard and destination country. And then the buyer will hire a custom clearance agency and also local dealer company to pick it up.

[00:08:27] So it’s pretty easy.So in terms of B2B, so you go with like a express, like DHL, UPS, FedEx, and if you have a very big volume, then you go with the container. And if you have the ability to handle everything, you may hire a custom clearance agents and local local trucking company, which it will save you a lot of the cost.

[00:08:51] And then you have the whole transparency of your cost structure in terms of bringing the product back to your own country. Yeah. So thanks for that, Eric. So how about in China, the to status of the shipping there. Do people still use B2C drop shipping for retail orders to the overseas market? Okay, drop shipping is on the rise.

[00:09:15] They are on the rise. So it’s a dilemma for me. So on my hands, we see that drop shipping is a good business model because the other hand, because you have to deal with a lot of new business owner who ask a lot of questions [00:09:30] and it’s it’s and the whole growth trajectory is very, I mean, it’s very slow.

[00:09:36] Okay. But in terms of drop shipping, so there are also a few shipments. The quickest one would still be UPS, FedEx, but it’s very expensive. In most cases, I will not suggest because it will add up all your profits. And also there’s one term that’s called the virtual warehouse. That basically means how can we do it?

[00:09:58] It’s basically we use the, a big box of UPS or DHL, and I put a lot of small parcels inside and then we’ll deliver to a local US warehouse. And then, the local US has come to pick it up. So, it takes only five to seven working days. Sometimes if there’s no holiday, it was, everything’s very smooth. It happens in just five to seven days.

[00:10:21] It’s a very quick experience, but this service is only available for the US market. And because US market has now the most variable trading In terms of other countries. There will be a, there will only be like in China, we call it special line. So this kind of special line work was like, let’s say for example, we have all those parcels come to our warehouse and we’ll do the consultation.

[00:10:44] And then we’ll use the cargo sites and shipped to US or shipped to Europe and then there’s customs clearance. And then the local company come to pick it up. And these shipping methods, we can also address the problem of custom clearance. So that means the buyers or the user does not have to deal with the custom clearance.

[00:11:03] And for this kind of shipping matters, used to be in the US and then Europe. Now, we can see that now it goes to South America, it goes to the Middle East. It goes to South America. It’s getting more and more popular, especially for those people who purchase from AliExpress or from other sourcing agents.

[00:11:24] So these is the most common shipping method. Okay. So the total shipping time from China to US. So these can specialized service is around like 12 to 15. And to Europe it’s shorter. It’s not like, uh, 10 days more or less. And to Southern America is something like 15 to 20. And to Southeast Asia it can be quicker.

[00:11:52] Sometimes it’s only seven days, or sometimes it’s like 10 days. It’s not stable, but still in that time of range. So this is  the most, the most common used shipping methods for the drop shipping service. So there are very big service provider, like WindExpress, like the 4PX. And also there are a lot of customer service like us.

[00:12:15] Because the whole approach is not that complicated. So what do you need to do is you have all those parts have come to your own warehouse and do the consultation and send to the best in the country. And then you have good contract with like EUS USBs or two German,and then the whole operation can start to run.

[00:12:35] So these the most mostly use the shipping methods for dropshipping. Awesome. Awesome. Thanks Eric. So I’m wondering just, I know everybody price curious to price, and it might be hard to give an exact price, but maybe like before COVID, after now, like price range, like for a lightweight item to the US. Is there e-pack anymore and e-pack, it’s gone right.?

[00:13:03] e-pack, it’s still going on. Cause it’s, it’s much cheaper. It’s much cheaper. It’s still going on. So let me take an example. Let me just grab one product, maybe. Perfect. Yeah. Examples are the best

[00:13:21] For example this his is gamble. It’s a gamble, but this one is there’s inside that you’re find inside. So let’s say this one is five is 500 kilograms, five, 500 grams. 

[00:13:39] It goes to US. Let me think. Let me do a simple calculation. Yeah, just a range. And we won’t hold you to the court, but.

[00:13:52] So I think it’s around like around like 12 to 13 US dollars. Okay. This one. Got it. Still affordable for those people who did the sellers who have the ability to, to have or who can sell with a higher retail price. I think it’s still profitable. And because of these are guarded in China domestically, it sells around 200 RMB.

[00:14:17] I think for US market or with Europe market, let’s get in the cell, like, 70 US dollars. So there’s still a margin. Okay. That’s great. And then for E-Pack it, you said it’s still, I thought, honestly, I thought it was [00:14:30] going away, but I don’t follow. I’m not too active in this, this type of service. It is still available. For example, some people who sells on a wish or a sell Aliexpress.

[00:14:46] Uh, whereas some people would run their own Shopify or e-commerce store with very low shipping price, it’is still, the e-pack can be available. Alright! Interesting. 

[00:15:00] But one of the, the thing is more and more sellers are getting away from e-pack because it’s too slow. So given the reality that Facebook or Google is entering, have a very strict policy on these chicken time. So let’s say if a package, you know, cause with the e-pack, you know sometimes, sometimes they need 30 day sometimes 40 days. .

[00:15:25] It’s very unstable. So, it would jeopardize the status of many centers like PayPal, Shopify, or Google accounts. True. You know, just before I left the Philippines at the beginning of coronavirus and March 2020, there was a drop shipper at an event I spoke at and it was a big drop shipper and he says he didn’t know what to do because he had thousands of orders and they were all by Paypal.

[00:15:52] And they were dropship. And you know, like you just said, the biggest danger is your merchant account, right? You’re your payment gateway. And I, I was really scared for him because obviously if you lose your PayPal, it’s, especially if it’s your main channel of sales is it’s really hard. So I don’t know. I hope we made it at that point.

[00:16:14] It was right at the peak of people who market on Google. They shouldl be very careful with their shipping time at the beginning at least. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. Dropshipping is always a, it’s always a little bit, yeah. Saying it takes longer than you expected is better than less, right? Because if somebody doesn’t get it, when they think they’re going to get it, they get upset.

[00:16:37] They call their credit card or PayPal, etc. It can really hurt your destroy your business if you lose that account. Those people who dropshipping from AliExpress should be a very careful. Yeah

[00:16:52] Sellers on AliExpress, they, they cannot have the service from us because the platform control it. So the platform,outsource their shipping service to a third party.

[00:17:06] The whole processing time is much longer than expected. Got it, didn’t know that. Thanks for the insight. Okay. Moving from drop shipping back to B2B, you know, I think a lot of sellers more B2B is of course, like could be private label or, or, you know, they want have their own way, their own stock in the US for faster delivery or more control.

[00:17:25] So, you know, there’s of course, air and ocean, I think Aubrey will talk to you about ocean, but let’s talk, start [00:17:30] with, you know, air freight from China, you know, I know. Oh, this, I think to the US and other places, you know, just maybe we can talk about some rates now and, and, and, you know, cartons of S you know, the feasibility things you’ve been seeing timeframes.

[00:17:44] I’d love, honestly, I’m even maybe need to talk to you about this too, for a new brand. I think I showed you, uh, the Excalibur Brothers. We’re probably gonna need some air B2B cartons soon. So I think people. So, in terms of air freight, so, okay. So the current market is frozen. So we have been seeing the air frieght has been dropping for more than two weeks since the, since the end of the Chinese New Year.

[00:18:09] I still, I think it’ll  keep dropping. So if you have anything want to ship with air freight, do as soon as possible. Because now is the best timing because it’s very cheap.  Wow. That’s good.

[00:18:22] But, in the long run, I think they see that the air freight cost we’’re still or can be on very high position because at the beginning of 2022,a lot of like a logistics company, book, the cargo flight space. The price is very high. So the only reason now that the price keeps dropping is because if there’s no shipments where the factory just started to manufacture.

[00:18:48] Because for example, today, when I, when I went to GFC to, to order my coffee say outside there’s a lot of factory, just put, put a desk down the road to hire more men labor workers, because the one, one more human resource to manufacture. But to manufacture, it takes time.. So now there’s no product to ship. If there is somebody who wants to ship with a low price now. But maybe, I think after March middle, March, the price that will come to pick up and cause noone wants to lose money.

[00:19:24] So when there is, there are, there are no products to ship, so the air freight and the shipping company will raise the price. At least, cause they have a long year, but now there’s the low spots. I understand that. Actually. I wish I had it ready now, but probably it’d be when it gets more expensive because production starting.

[00:19:45] Right. So we’re not ready to ship until at least two or three weeks. So yeah, I mean, We’ll need to send our shipments when it started getting more expensive, I guess. Cause everybody seems like that’s what everybody’s doing, right? I mean, nobody got, nobody has stock right now because Chinese years finished recently and production is getting started.

[00:20:06] So probably will need it when it gets more expensive. But I don’t know. I know it’s tricky to say exact numbers and rates, but can you give us a little bit of an idea over the last couple of years to graph like vision, you know, verbally like costs for these things? Or I know we talked a lot when there was the PPE craze, I guess people are still doing probably PPE. I’m not involved in that anymore, but you know, there was the PPE craze when it started.

[00:20:32] That was insane. Right? Like the costs of air was maybe at the highest or am I wrong? I mean, you’re in this more than I am. It hits, it  increases, I think around April or May, 2020. And it’s tripled.

[00:20:55] Compared to before the pandemic, so the price still, I think still doubled. Okay. That’s helpful. That’s helpful. Yeah. And I think, let me, let me have a look. Oh, I think air freight, I think it’s around like currently it’s 8, 8 or $9 per kilogram. That would include text. Alright! Thanks for sharing that. Yeah. From, from April or from March, I think we’ll go around.

[00:21:30] Say it will be 30% more. All right. How about on the ocean freight, from China to USA and other countries. How about the rates of containers? Do you, can you give us the brief summary of the rates right now? The container, the price of container is still very high, but the LCL is the price has been dropping. The logic is there.

[00:22:00] The LCL price is, is, is coming from. Let’s say, for example, Mike booked quite many containers, right? So the, the container cost will be on Mike. So in order to make money, he wants to, he will have more goods to come to the container and then shipped to other countries. So those, that means that that will be the stock on Mike’s tent.

[00:22:25] So in order to have less loss, so you have to drop the price to collect more goods. But for the, for the container, it is still controlled by the carrier. So the carrier for  a short term, they will not lower the price of the container.

[00:22:48] Yeah, they’re making so much, so much money. I can share some of my re my memories of numbers before, but I think, yeah, like a 40 foot container from like Shenzhen to LA before COVID was like $800, a thousand dollarsUS? Yeah, that was around a thousand dollars. And now, I don’t even want to ask, but I know, uh, I mean, I remember it was up to $20,000.

[00:23:15] I hope it’s lower now. I dunno. I know you maybe don’t want to share exact numbers cause it’s changing all the time, at least a 12 thousand dollars per container, at least. Crazy. Yeah. So in the short term this year as for now, the LCL price is dropping due to less shipments, but in terms of container, the price still remain high because it is a control by the carrier.

[00:23:44] The LCL container is, was booked previously by the fly forwarder. So you can order to have less loss. They will drop their LCL price. Got it. Which kind of leads to the next question. And actually Evergreen is one, right? Like is that a carrier? And they’re really

[00:24:10] popular. They’re so rich, right? Like they’re so rich because they have the ships and they make so much money. I mean, I heard they gave so much bonus to their team. I don’t know if I know it’s not in our outline, but I don’t know. It was crazy. Like how much money they. I’ll show you a personal insight. My uncle

[00:24:29] He was very young and very young uncle. So they are very, uh, traditional, uh, booking agents. So they have very long, they have long-term contract. They have around like, so their prices are on a, 7,000 US dollars, a 40 foot container. So their, by their company policies, you should not sell less than one 13,000.

[00:24:56] Okay, so you just lay down and then make the money. Yeah, it’s unbelievable. It’s really unbelievable. I mean, and I guess they’re getting used to it, right? So that’s why we think prices more come down. They just, they just can, can enjoy that. Enjoy is a bad word, but enjoy so, okay. So. I think we kind of went through some of the numbers and the basics.

[00:25:18] I think we can switch now a little bit. Perfect. Perfect. So some have long term contract with ocean freight companies. right?

[00:25:29] Okay. So in long-term. The file folder since the pandemic, the five folder will not able to have the so-called long term contract because the carrier know exactly how much money you make. So the carrier  wants to make more money as well. So first, the freight forwarder will not able to have a long-term contract rates anymore.

[00:25:53] So only those very big trading company, or very big factory. They may, they may able to have this kind of very low rates. Let’s say, for example, if you, if, for example, the, the, the shipping rates of apple or Foxconn, right. They have a very low like long-term contract. So if, if, and if anybody has a very good relation with this very big trading company, if they are able to share the price, Um, that would be also money printing issue.

[00:26:29] So, I mean, I, I, all I could ask, like, I know some aggregators and I heard, they said they pay $3,000 for a container because they got a long-term contract and they they’re still paying that now. Yes. So I was asking them, could I ship, could I use your contract? Could they do that? I mean, it could, I, for my, if I’m like a separate seller, I mean, I could pay them extra, but I mean, they weren’t sure cause it’s their contract with their, their logistics provider, but is there any hack that they can let me use their, their contract?

[00:27:04] Okay. It is possible. Uh, but it does depend on the relationship and also how you guys can smartly. use their system.  They’re, I think there is some, there, there are some hacks for sure. Yeah. Yeah. They don’t seem so willing to share their rates, honestly, but I will try to get. Come on them. They want to make the money.

[00:27:30] So I use the, oh, maybe I paid a bit more to you. Yeah. Yeah. How about another, is there a way like people in the community could share money, share, save money by like sharing shipments, you know, as a group like smaller sellers, there is. So there is, you know, in, in logistics. So the, the, the very simple or roots of logic is the more you ship, the less cost that you will have.

[00:27:58] So, but this can only be done to a certain country. For example, we have around 10 buyers from the US. So, what we can do is we’ll book a container and put all the goods in one container and then ship to a assigned address in the US. And then, the buyers then send their own trucks, or they’re local pickup company.

[00:28:25] And to, to do this, to do the thing. So this is how we can, you know, you know, break it down the cost. That’s pretty cool. So then just to follow up on that, and Aubrey has a question, but would one importer though, right? Just 1, 1, 1 customer. Yeah. What does that mean? We, here we in China will work. It was one exporter in the us.

[00:28:49] There’ll be one importer. Yeah. Yeah. So there’s a little bit of trust on that from the, you box on it. But, you know, given all of those, given all the facts of international trading, who does not trust will not have their own business. Yeah. It’s all trust. Yeah. It’s true. That’s why it’s great to have, you know, relationships and, and, you know, community.

[00:29:19] Yeah. So we’re really thankful for all the insights Eric. And of course there are some other ways that people can defend themselves in these challenging times. Right?  We believe on that. And maybe you can also provide some other insights where in the Amazon and e-commerce seller right now on how they can protect themselves from the increasing costs and other risks.

[00:29:41] So, anyway, let me share the recent markets situation here in China. Sure, please. So most of the Amazon sellers here in China feel a little bit less confident because they see the others are dropping. Let’s say the cost  are rising and more and more sellers are flooding into the Amazon marketplace. So as far as I can, I can think out of the box, maybe, especially for people outside China, if they can work on, you know, work more on the marketing side to do customization and to have a better supply chain control.

[00:30:26] That’s, this in general, I think they can have some chance to win. But still, if it still goes, it goes to a sourcing agent, you want to buy this or buy that you follow the common path. There’s little chance to win over these very saturated marketplace. Yeah, I would agree.

[00:30:52] So that means you should be very good at marketing to let, like, let’s say US buyer to feel that, okay, this is a US company, a US made product or US designed product. So this is a real USA person. American is behind this brand. And also you can provide them good service, good product with a good price.

[00:31:17] I think that you can, can add up the winning chance. But if you just go on, go through still a normal, you would outsource from AliExpress, Alibaba, you will enter my funding. I’ll get this probably has already been [00:31:30] sold by others. Agreed. Yeah. And also, and find a longtime partner here in China who can provide you some updates, marketing information, and also who can help you to really protect your

[00:31:48] trade secrets, design, factories, those. Otherwise, you know, the more you sell, you will see that you have more competitors, you know, just following behind. Agreed. Yeah. Cause you know, I’m not saying Chinese are bad, but because China is so big, there’s 1.4 billion people. You know, there are always people that do not follow the rules.

[00:32:14] So you’ve got to, so you’ve got to find someone here who can protect you from the roots, especially in terms of the supply chain and physical products. I would agree for sure. Thanks so much, Eric. It’s great to have you on the show and I, you know what, I’ll do this in person next soon when I get out of here March 8th, but we can do some future shows together, you know, show some facilities, like I think print on demand, right?

[00:32:42] Or any, like you just said, customization to differentiate print on demand. And also some manufacturers who are able to accept like not a very big MOQ. So I think this can all have your own product will be the key because you will see more and more Chinese sellers getting on a way to make their own brand from really, or modify the product to making a very good brand image.

[00:33:11] So that will be the future. And I think Chinese sellers are also learning fast in terms of marketing. So we all have to work hard. Great. Thanks so much, Eric. So. There, this is a fascinating discussion. And what are some good ways people could find you or your business online? And I will link it up, join the community.

[00:33:33] You’ll find me, right. Yeah, sure. Yeah. You’re in our community. And also, GFA VIP. So it’s great. And we also see more on future shows. So thanks. Thanks again, Eric. Yeah, you’re welcome. Okay. Yeah. Have a good day! Well, thank you, Eric, for sharing. That was really insightful. What’d you think Aubrey? Yeah. And I think even though I’m not really on that space, 

[00:33:59] I can understand what he’s talking about. So it’s really insightful. Yeah. So we’re always thinking, preparing for the launch of the Excalibur Brothers brand on Amazon and the BLIMP method program. So I think we’ve said it before we have four, four in our beta program that were accepted and we are putting them through the system now.

[00:34:21] So what’s happening is a. I wish, like you said an interview. I wish we could ship right now, but we’re still not ready to ship. Production still getting started, you know, we’ll go through production samples right now. So they’re receiving here in my quarantine apartments. Luciano is locked in with us. I didn’t say that he’s locked in with us, so it’s kinda good.

[00:34:43] We’ll be working even harder together. We’re talking about it all the time, Aubrey. At dinner and breakfast. And so that’s a positive from lockdown, but you know, hopefully we’ll get the production started in a week or two for these different products. And then of course,  I ship it out. But Eric did say after the recording.

[00:35:03] To have some by air and some by sea, right? So you get some there right away and some slower. So you don’t delay the launch or the selling or run out of stock, which is a good strategy, right? You send by air and by sea, of course it makes more complicated, but it also allows you to maybe maximize your price,

[00:35:23] savings because air’s going to cost more than sea, but you can get some speed in there and then maybe even send more by air in the future. If you run out of stock and you need to get there fast, and the ocean is a little bit trickier. There are so many stories. Honestly, we’re trying to launch a brand in Thailand in the US I think you know about that one.

[00:35:43] Didn’t share too much here, but that’s been delayed for over a year over. Almost over a year and a half because the ocean shipment from Thailand to the US is out of control expensive in 20,000 plus USD per container. So just waiting for that on a long-term basis. But, but yeah, we will, we’ll have another blimp call next week. Yeah. So we will have our 2nd monthly blimp 

[00:36:13] participants call. I think we’ve already scheduled it every first Wednesday of the week, of the month, rather. We are excited to hear about their progress and their business as well. And of  course, to share what’s the progress on our side. Awesome. Yeah. Yeah. We always keep things moving and we’ll also have update podcasts probably soon.

[00:36:37] Maybe with Luciano stuck here with me, we can just sit next to each other and then this room with Aubrey and talk about it in the future. All right. I think that’s it for this week’s show. Thank you. Thank you all. And of course, show notes. I think with the URL is a little bit long this time, but global commission.com/podcast is always a good one to go to, to, to see.

[00:36:58] So thank you everyone, and enjoy listening or viewing. Bye bye. Bye bye. To get more info about running an international business, please visit our website at www.globalfromasia.com. That’s www.globalfromasia.com. Also be sure to subscribe to our iTunes feed. Thanks for tuning in.