Q4 Logistics Preparation & Chinese New Year Forecasting For your Ecommerce Empire with Francois Jaffres

What a year we are in! And the talk of the town has been how to predict the future – well who doesn’t want to at any time – but especially for q4 2020. Today’s guest we are talking logistics and supply chain preparation in this uncertain time – in fourth quarter and a bit of third quarter, and also the infamous Chinese New Year “shut down”.

√ Francoi’s VIP Page
√ Noviland’s website
√ Steve Sellikoff’s podcast on GFA on Retail

Thank you Francois, that was an impressive interview. I hope everybody enjoyed it.

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[00:00:00] Episode 326 of Global From Asia podcast. I know a lot of you ask about Q4 logistics. What’s the future. What should we do? We’ll talk about that a little bit today on the logistics in 3PL standpoint. Welcome to the Global From Asia podcast where the daunting process of running an international business is broken down into straight up actionable advice.  And now your host, Michael Michelini.

[00:00:31] Thank you everybody for tuning into a Global From Asia podcast. This is the audio version we’ve been doing more and more video versions. Trying to keep up with the Joneses is, you know, they talk about video video, video, but you know, I still like the podcast audio and the old fashioned way. I hope you do too.

[00:00:49] This is only putting the audio version. The video version doesn’t have this and we’re up 326 shows. Can you believe that I’m a little bit exhausted. We’ve been doing a lot of these. We have our GFAVIP membership and we’re doing our online calls and there’s this, been investing in new, some new technology and some.

[00:01:07] How can I, some of our members and really making things happen, it’s actually been really powerful. One of the positives involves all being stuck home is really getting to know new people from around the world. So if you’re not already checking that out, I’d love to get to know you there. Let’s talk about this week’s show.

[00:01:24] It’s a hot topic and it’s a timely one. We are almost into October now, but I’d snuck this one in, hopefully to help you out, give you some ideas for the fourth quarter, what to do, what’s going to happen. What, what to make of the future here. We think it’s going to be a big fourth quarter for the e-commerce.

[00:01:42] We think, you know, retail, old retail is going to keep going down and all eyes to keep going up. So hopefully you’re tapping into that and this will get you motivated and inspired. Let’s tune into the show. We have our private companies, gfavip.com has a whole bunch of courses inside. I mean, it’s overloaded with scale by outsourcing e-commerce gladiator.

[00:02:05] We have, you know, Hong Kong and Asia business, China business sourcing, but more importantly as a community and we’ve been investing in the community. We really gotten to know our members even more. We have this new, newer services, newer ways to connect with people, and we always think of those people first.

[00:02:21] So if you want to support the show, gfavip.com, one of the best ways. Thanks for even considering that. Okay. Thank you everybody for choosing to listen or view a Global From Asia podcast, we have amazing guests and actually an amazing topic that is very timely. Francois Jaffres from Noviland.

[00:02:41] Thanks so much for joining. Yeah. Thank you for having me. It truly is an amazing topic. It’s something that everyone has to listen to. So yeah, I’m sure I, we were chatting and we’re preparing for the interview and I, you know, I think this is all gonna be talking about preparing for Q4, especially in. You know, I don’t want, I do hope these shows are evergreen, you know, it’s, I don’t want it to be so much just about COVID, but I do think, you know, at this will be with the biggest, I think you also seem to agree that it’s probably gonna be one of the biggest e-commerce Q4 has ever.

[00:03:10] So there’s a lot people should be preparing for. Right, right. And a little bit of background about you. You’re the director of business development at Noviland, and you’ve done industrial engineering at Western University, West Virginia university, and also spent time with Coca Cola before joining in 2016.

[00:03:29] And you’re in Atlanta now. And you also go to Pittsburgh and you share, you know, Like, like we’ve been praying for, to show you, you know, really share a lot with, on podcasts and speaking. So I really, really appreciate you to share with us today. Yeah, yeah, no, you hit the nail on the head with all that, so appreciate ya.

[00:03:49] So you deal a lot with, with logistics. Um, And it’s, I mean, I’m curious maybe before we talk about Q4, like let’s maybe just kind of recap the insanity of a logistics and e-commerce. Obviously that could be a whole show in itself too, but you know, maybe just a little bit of what you’ve been going through the last couple of quarters.

[00:04:11] Yeah. I mean, particularly the past, I would say the past quarter specifically, I mean, obviously through Q1 and Q2, there was a lot of turmoil with, with COVID and you see that in a lot of financial reports where you see obviously the cross border trade and, and international commerce, just sort of plummeting.

[00:04:32] And I think Junglescout had a, had a little white page on it, which I found interesting. But this really is something that is so unprecedented in logistics, where we are seeing prices twice as high as we did last year, the same time last year, where, you know, we might see something $1,800 for a container going to the West coast.

[00:04:56] And now we’re seeing those at like 37, $3,800. So it’s absolutely insane. It’s something that’s not talked about very frequently. And I think it’s something that. Even when it is talked about, the blame tends to be shifted or sort of put on freight forwarders, which I think is unfair. I think it’s very unfair and I think it is 

[00:05:20] Ignorance is the wrong word. I think it’s a lack of available education out there where a freight forwarder, all they are is someone that coordinates between shipping carriers and the shippers. Right. And they essentially just handle all those communications and paperwork. And, so where a lot of our users and just Amazon sellers in general, specifically, they’re seeing these price spikes from freight forwarders, but it’s because of freight forwarders seeing these price spikes from the shipping carriers.

[00:05:48] Right. And that’s all done through general rate increases, GRI, which is another topic can, which can be an entire topic ended up. Sure. I know. I mean, there’s so much to, so, you know, there’s so much to share, so, yeah, I think that that’s, you know, that’s a quick, uh, we’ll focus on the future, you know, preparing people for the next couple quarters, but yeah, I think it’s been just, I do agree with you, you know, people.

[00:06:14] It’s I think even without COVID, I mean, people always kind of blame the logistics. It is an easy, an easy scapegoat, you know, where’s my stuff. It’s stuck in customs. It’s the prices are so high. The oil price is a labor cost. The cost, you know, I feel like the logistics always has to be the delivery of the bad news.

[00:06:33] Usually it’s, you know, logistics is such a, you know, I see, I think, you know, it’s interesting to control all of these moving parts. Right. You know, and especially nowadays there’s even more moving parts and you have to kind of make sure it all, uh, is delivered, communicated to the client, you know, an Amazon seller or whoever.

[00:06:55] And then they, you’re the one delivering this news and they’re like yelling at ear to messenger almost. You know what I mean? So it is a tricky time. Any, I, like you said, prices are going up in Q4, especially prices. You know, we’re in, we’re recording this mid September and the show goes online pretty quickly also in September.

[00:07:16] So, you know, what, what are you noticing? Already happening? People people have to prepare now earlier, people are getting scared. Amillennial will, warehouses are restricted, inbound shipments are, you know, et cetera, et cetera. You know, I, you know, I don’t know what your, you know, Well it’s what are you seeing that, that fluster is exactly what I’m saying.

[00:07:40] Yeah. I mean, sort of translate thing. It’s, it goes all the way down to the, the 3PL warehouses, right. And something that wasn’t necessarily talked about heavily, uh, just a few months ago, because everyone relied on Amazon FBA and having inventory in there. Um, and then sorta, just being hands off.

[00:07:59] Where there’s a lot of freight forwarders that we’re very familiar with. Amazon FBA, obviously. Um, they knew how to ship there. They could drop off their cargo. Um, but now we’re seeing, you know, Amazon throw out these quantities and they really have to focus on where can I store my inventory? How am I going to stay, you know, in stock, especially during the holiday season, which is going to be crazy.

[00:08:20] And so to that point, going with 3PL and then coordinating with the logistics and then seeing the carriers reduce those quantities of containers, even that are able to, to go onto the festivals. And now we’re seeing something that is also crazy, and the articles just started coming out a few days ago.

[00:08:41] I think everyone should start Googling this, but the Chinese ministry of transport, and you might be familiar with this. They just stepped in where typically a government won’t step in, and say, Hey, you know, this is getting ridiculous. We need to keep the prices, you know, fair. You need to open up more capacity on this transpacific route.

[00:09:04] And, and so it’s going to be very interesting to see how that plays out. But with Amazon doing this, I think it is opening a door to other marketplaces and that dependency on 3PL particularly is going to increase. So now you see a ton of freight forwarders trying to, to, to skirmish to find 3PL locations where they can actually deliver the goods because now their truck yards are starting to get filled up.

[00:09:32] And one thing that’s. Very much not discussed is that when a 3PL says no to, to a freight forwarder or to a trucking company, that trucking company is going to charge the freight forwarder and the freight forward is going to charge you. So if you don’t have a good 3PL that you can ship all that to, you’re going to see those last minute charges and where that typically occurs is when you’re using cheap or very low end or some, I call it affordable or economic solutions to freight forwarding.

[00:10:04] It’s not an industry where you just find someone that’s super cheap and they’re going to be the best ever, because they’re cheap. You’re getting what you pay for. If you work with a cheap freight forward, or they’re going to work with cheap trucking companies, you work with cheap trucking companies.

[00:10:17] They’re not going to communicate with their 3PL, you’re not going to have inventory there on time. And then you see those charges later on. That’s also where you see a lot of world cargo, obviously. Okay. Yeah. Thanks for this. Thanks for these insights. So. I think we’re making a little bit of substance.

[00:10:31] I just want to make sure everybody understands, you know, the idea of Amazon, you know, especially in March was like a nightmare. Everybody was, so it was really scary. And then they stopped, they stopped accepting non priority items into their warehouse. And a lot of sellers, you know, myself included a lot of our products were.

[00:10:54] Not in that list. So what does that mean? We have stuff in China or factories or ports or inbound, or if it was already inbound, but if you didn’t put the shipping plan, so people were, so now I think what’s happening is a lot of people are looking at third party warehouses because ABI will just send directly to Amazon.

[00:11:10] But now I think there’s always a strategy, especially for fourth quarter to sense, to have stuff in a third party warehouse already in the U S where maybe at least a way to get it fast to the. At least your market. Let’s not say us, but whatever market, but I think now more than ever people need these third party warehouses.

[00:11:28] Cause if you send everything to Amazon, You know how long it will take for them to receive it. You don’t know, you know, if there’s problems or delays or, or there’s no restrictions on how much you can send or they’re kind of like new sellers can’t send as much in, and they’re trying to forecast. They don’t want to have too much in your warehouse.

[00:11:45] And then they really kill you in fourth quarter because they jack up the rates, you know.  They really increased their cost sometimes times I think Like three times, some sellers don’t even think, or look, you know, there was even a joke I saw on a Facebook group, you know, like Jeff, Jeff Bezos laughing, you know, and he’s like, he’s got the calculator upside out and the numbers, just some random number.

[00:12:06] He’s like, Oh, I think. We made a mistake, calculator, FBA fees. I know people don’t realize they just trust whatever the rate is. Hey, you know, so there’s definitely these reasons to use, you know, other other services or have other services, um, uh, in place so that you could, uh, kind of buffer that risk by having stuff in these third party warehouses or having stuff on standby, especially.

[00:12:33] With costs and these restrictions on receiving items directly on Amazon. Do you think I summarize, is there more, you’d like to say about that or no, I think you really hit the nail on the head there and. Not only it, we talk a lot about Amazon, but there’s also these other marketplaces that are opening up.

[00:12:52] And so third party sellers are really seeing these opportunities that they really didn’t see even a year ago where I know you had Steve Selikoff off on not too long ago. And he was talking about Amazon and how Amazon wasn’t going to slip up again against Walmart. When now we have Walmart plus right now where?

[00:13:12] Yeah. And now we’re, let’s say. 15 years ago, everyone loved to go into the store and start shopping. Just what they do. You know,you also talked about retail therapy. It’s it’s, it’s a huge thing, my girlfriend does it all the time. But now you’re moving on to it platforms like Amazon and your growing dependency on this e-commerce model where I buy everything on Amazon.

[00:13:38] But now there’s a new competitor Walmart plus, and they’re charging, I think, half the price or yeah. It’s about half the price of what Amazon prime is charging and who knows what else they have to offer. Yeah. I know they’re getting more competitive with, you know, one day shipping and two day shipping.

[00:13:55] But a big part of that is also growing dependency on 3PL warehouses. Yep. So you might be selling on Walmart. Amazon, Amazon might throw out of your inventory. Now you have to go through through FBM instead of FBA. So that, that itself just creates a dependency on 3PL and then when you factor in Target, trying to get into third party sellers and all these other platforms, you have touch a modern, if you can get on Wayfair, Home Depot, Lowe’s any of these other marketplaces, it really grows.

[00:14:24] More and more of a dependency. And I think this is really going to be the prize 3PL and everyone’s going to be trying to get into this market soon. Agreed, agreed. Yeah. So, uh, just to also, I kind of sometimes simplify or, you know, rehash that, but basically, yeah. I mean, I always been, I started a lot of early sellers were eBay sellers, you know, I think.

[00:14:46] Yeah. I had a website, you know, I got in about 2003 and I was doing eBay and website Amazon. I don’t, I mean, I knew by Amazon, but they’re definitely, I think they opened it up 2006 or so, but, I think Steve was one of our earlier ones. I was also messing around with it too then. And. It was never a big, significant channel, but now there’s so many pure, a hundred percent FBA sellers only, you know, like just sending everything directly to Amazon from say China factory or wherever.

[00:15:13] But now, like I think what the trend you’re seeing and we’re all seeing more and more people are talking about Walmart and these groups I’m hearing in the community and. And there’s just more and more opportunity now, but it’s also a better business model for the seller. I mean, we want more competition, you know, we want, we don’t want to just have this huge gorilla of Amazon.

[00:15:32] That’s just crushing sellers. And, uh, you know, um, if by having diversification, you’re, you’re, you’re stronger business model, you know, it’s a better, better, it’s obviously more difficult, but that means it’s also more. It’s difficult for everybody. And there’s more opportunity if you can do it the right way.

[00:15:50] So, right. And, and from that, I mean, competition itself really drives innovation. And I think that’s what we need particularly now, when you do see these sellers as being a single market seller and having all these eggs in one basket, they don’t really see that risk associated with it because everyone’s talking about how easy it is.

[00:16:10] And we’re seeing numbers like over 3000 new sellers a day. So it’s, you really have to diversify that. Otherwise it’s, it’s just going to keep growing and eventually you’re going to grow dependency and if that fails, then everyone’s going to fail. Yup. Agreed. Agreed. So I think I forgot who canceled Black Friday, but some of these retail stores or even canceling, or I don’t know if it’s because of covert or because of what you know, or whatever, but.

[00:16:38] I guess Cyber Monday is going to be really taking over, you know, um, I think we’re all bracing for impact. You know, and then the biggest, the most, the biggest, I think the hardest thing about eCommerce for me at least is forecasting your sales forecasting, your inventory, especially fourth quarter, especially now.

[00:16:55] Cause we’re all assuming it’s gonna be a humongous Q4. So I guess one is obviously I think Cyber Monday, or maybe it’ll just be normal black Friday. There’ll be online, but. What’s your crystal ball seeing, I guess there’s this going to be a massive spike, right? I mean, across every channel, Walmart, Walmart, probably Walmart plus.

[00:17:16] Okay. Yeah. Program Amazon everywhere. You know, everything online. Well, I we’ve already been seeing order sizes increase from a lot of our users, uh, and that’s from all the way from new sellers to establish sellers. And one big thing is that they are trying to get on these different platforms. So we’re, we might’ve seen sellers.

[00:17:35] Purchase five, $6,000 worth of inventory. Now, the place in $20,000 orders and et cetera, shipping to FBA, they’re shipping to a 3PL yeah. And so you can see everyone getting ready for this, and it’s going to be one of those things where if you’re just, if you’re not in it, you’re not going to win. If you don’t have inventory particularly, and you don’t have enough inventory to last through those holidays, you’re not going to win.

[00:17:59] I think what a lot of sellers could do is actually capitalize on this moment and particularly if they’re newer sellers, they wait until these businesses or these other brands or their competitors run out of inventory. Boost all their ads get on things like, you know, Amazon live get on Amazon posts, utilize all these different, new marketing tactics that these other businesses won’t be doing because they have no inventory.

[00:18:23] So again, you know, this competition is really going to breed more innovation. Uh, so looking into the crystal ball, I think it’s going to be one of the craziest Q4. So. That we’ve ever seen for eCommerce. And I think we’ve already been seeing that, with just, just with COVID alone. So I think 2020 is going to be a huge e-commerce year.

[00:18:42] So let’s let you kinda, you know, let’s just dig in a little bit more of the tactic you’re seeing. So a hundred percent from like, say, I guess the typical steel is Chinese factory trade war, not COVID or not Chinese factory to like West coast, usually. I guess you still think West coast, LA lax, maybe, correct me if I’m wrong or give me some insights of where are you thinking or Long Beach.

[00:19:07] And then into a, into a warehouse, a third party warehouse, 3PL, third party logistics, and then into the Amazon, but are they prepping it in China? Are they prepping, you know, already labeling it? Maybe give us some strategies, I guess now, if you’re not all you would do your shipping plan from the U S now and then send it into a, some of it.

[00:19:29] And I keep some of it, maybe at this third party warehouse that can also be ready for Walmart can be ready for, you know, a website sales, your Shopify or shopping cart, um, keeping it there and then. Like you said new seller could just be waiting and hoping that he’s competitive, get out of stock and then he can, then he can pump in a whole bunch more into Amazon from the third party warehouse, say and say in November, he got lucky.

[00:19:55] He sees his competitors run out of stock. He starts sending in, he has hundreds in a third party warehouse, so he’s not, he saves them money on the fourth quarter shipping fees. I mean storage fees of Amazon, sending them in really quick and he’s hitting it hard to try to just make it, summarize that. And then, like you said, he’s going into the Amazon live Amazon, you know, content posts or PPC to really try to maximize that.

[00:20:18] But I think maybe give us some like tactics or strategies, sending it all into a third party warehouse, then splitting out and setting some into Amazon. Yeah. So a lot of the FBA prep, particularly for all the Novi land users, they have everything prepped in China, whether it’s at our consolidation warehouse or having labels put on at the factory itself.

[00:20:40] You know, as you know, factories. Well, almost never charged for putting leaves, hold on, because it’s such a, it’s such an easy task for them. And so they will have all the FSQ labels put on. They will have the MasterCard and labels still be labeled. Um, but they might not have a palletized to be FDA compliant.

[00:21:00] So they might be able to maximize actually more of the use of that pallet in the container and when you’re doing that, obviously your cost per unit is going to go down. What we see a lot of them doing now is just looking for alternatives to Amazon FBA, whether that is on the West coast or on the East coast.

[00:21:16] Now, one important conversation that we have with a lot of them is don’t think that shipping to the West coast 3PL is going to be your cheapest solution because in the short term, when you’re looking at the vessel itself, going to the West coast, Maybe, maybe it was just a little bit cheaper, but then when you see the shipping costs associated with a 3PLto go to, you know, to Atlanta or to go to Pittsburgh or to be shipped to Massachusetts, that’s where you really eating up a lot of costs.

[00:21:45] So we see them diversifying really where they’re leaving in that supply, both on the West coast and on the East coast. So they might have it. No fast track to the West coast and they’ll have half their time.  a cross dock to the, toan East coast location. And then they’ll just ship out from there. And whichever location obviously makes sense for the, whoever the end buyer is.

[00:22:07] That’s where they ship out from now. That’s what a lot of the conversations that we have tend to be is just, Hey, how competitive are your shipping costs? Not necessarily how competitive are your inventory storage costs or your handling costs? It really comes down to the shipping from the 3PLs.

[00:22:23] Okay. And just to clarify, maybe just to dig in a little bit more. See shipments or air. I mean, I guess it depends on obviously the, how heavy the products are, but probably still do two ocean shipments, one to like the West coast one. So the East coast, like, like here in Atlanta and then, and then distribute, I guess also depends on how heavier bulkier products are and also how much volume you’re sending.

[00:22:46] Totally. Right. If you’re a new seller, it’s still not gonna, you don’t want to split shipments on small, small. Yeah. I mean, if you’re paying the. If you’re paying the flat fees on both of them, there’s no point, I mean, a lot of new sellers, they might be doing one to two cubic meters, which really isn’t that much.

[00:23:02] That’s about a pallet, maybe a pallet and a half. You don’t want to split that up on a teacher for vessels. You’re paying those flat fees of what? Seven, $800 each. Yeah. It probably makes more sense just to ship to the West coast or just to the East coast and then ship the rest of it via rail or, actually rail is just going to be the cheapest option now, of course.

[00:23:22] Express air its own beast. Those prices were ridiculous, particularly because of covid. Yeah. When they had to ground a lot of those, there was no commercial flight. Exactly. What now, interestingly enough, I’m not sure if you saw too much of this, but containers, 40 foot high cube containers. That is a resource that the industry is lacking because.

[00:23:47] China, isn’t receiving enough imports and they’re just exporting like crazy. And so I think what everyone needs to know is that they should be working with their freight forwarders to see what equipment is available. And if they make these suggestions to use a different type of 40 foot container it’s for a reason, it could be to get it there faster.

[00:24:05] It could be because it’s cheaper. Obviously if it’s shortened supply, it’s going to be high demand. Price is going to go up. Yeah. Yeah. Makes sense. So there’s yeah, I guess I’m just wondering if we can give any forecast, like double mean people are wondering, do I double what I ordered last year? I mean, I dunno if you have some kind of Chris, you know, insights from what you, maybe some of your.

[00:24:33] Your users are doing, but I mean, it’s always a, it’s a risk. I mean, that’s, that’s, that’s the game of, uh, especially retail. I think people are just going to have to, uh, to gamble. Cause you’re, you know, it’s kind of, it’s gambling. Its business is a risk. Right. But you will try to calculate the risk and try to forecast how much more, but it’s the game, right?

[00:24:53] You don’t want to run out of stock, but you also don’t want to like overstock, you know? So I don’t know if you would have any, either something you’re seeing or, um, or any insights. I think that’s a very interesting point that, that you brought up that it is a risk. But with every risk you can manage it.

[00:25:13] However you like. So a big trend with sellers and particularly with, you know, gurus, they say how easy it is, right. How easy it is to source from Ali Baba, how easy it is to sell on Amazon. It’s not, I mean, you get what you put in. And so if you’re willing to constantly check up on your competitors, see what sort of keywords you can, can really optimize your listing, see what they’re doing wrong, and look at their one star reviews and improve your product.

[00:25:40] And at the same time, having the inventory to fulfill that, um, and having the right partners, whether it’s 3PL or logistics, or just general supply chain, it’s all about the work that you put in. And that’s what you’re going to take out. Yeah. Now, if you do absolutely nothing different than what you did two quarters ago for Q4, you’re not going to succeed.

[00:26:02] I mean, that’s just, I don’t have to tell you, that’s the reality of it. You have to put in so much more work Q4 and it’s so much more planning but I can’t emphasize enough that it is what you make of it. If you, if you make it your full time job, then. You’re going to get paid. Like it’s your full time job.

[00:26:20] If it’s your side gig, then you’re going to get side gig money. Yeah. I mean, I think just a little insight. That’s why Chinese people say Chinese sellers do better than what, you know, Western selves. A lot of the West Westerners, you know, we do this as like a side hustle. We don’t treat it like a full time thing.

[00:26:36] You know, we’re like trying to just make some extra cash, but like, uh, you know, Chinese sellers is there a business. So what, I don’t want to separate those people, but. Anybody, if this is your business, this is a business decision. You know, I know this could be a whole topic in itself, but maybe we’ll just do one quick one about Chinese new year.

[00:26:53] I mean the worst, you know, sometimes overstocking and Christmas, maybe you’ll, it’s a blessing in disguise. Cause you know, Chinese new year, I know we had, you know, most share holder in a bigger Amazon company called alpha rock. And we had, sometimes we overstocked or we felt like we were overstocked, but then covert happened and then we were just so happy.

[00:27:13] Because we were overstocked because we could, uh, you know, survive or stay in stock when, when there was delays on inbound shipments or to COVID issues. So, you know, well, how do you normally see transitioning  and Chinese new year? You know, like sad. Well, yeah, if you’re trying to get into the game now, I would probably say it’s a little too late to get through any of the holidays.

[00:27:40] It’s it’s way too late to get into the holidays. Now, it’s also interesting that you say. You say the word overstock. Right. But when I hear overstock, I think opportunity because there are all these new marketplaces. Right. And it’s all about what you make of that. So where you might have too many products that won’t sell on Amazon.

[00:28:00] Well, Hey, you have Walmart, you have the eBay, you know, you can go down to the mom and pop shops like you were talking about not too long ago. And you could, you could try to sell those master cases. So, I mean, it’s, it’s really what you make of it. Again, if you treat it like a full time job, you’ll get paid.

[00:28:15] Like it’s a full time job. Um, but. You know, historically businesses do see a lot of, uh, you know, excess sales and in Q4, depending on how they market their product force depends on how saturated that market is, how competitive their pricing is, what added values they have to it but ultimately it again, it is what you make of it.

[00:28:37] Yeah. Then one strategy. I like to tell people, if you use the 3PL is you could easily rebundle or PA or upsell, you could throw in a freebie, you could, um, you know, you could, you’re more nimble because once you’re an Amazon, you can’t really take it. It could of course take it off. I’ve done it, but it’s a nightmare and it’s expensive, but you know, you can adjust your, your, especially in Q4, you could maybe give away some extra stuff.

[00:29:00] You know, you could have a Christmas pack or a holiday pack. Um, so there’s more flexibility to when you’re doing, uh, more just in time shipping into Amazon. And then of course you can also get these new marketplaces and do giveaways and yeah, I mean, worst case, if you are, like I said, overstocked, you could, you could just try new channels or you could try, you know, if liquidating could be just some marketing strategy, you know, in a way of course, Sounds scary, but you know, you could also do that to boost your other markets.

[00:29:30] So yeah, this has been really, really, uh, thanks for sharing. Um, we haven’t even really gotten to dig into what you and your company do. So I would love to, I’d love to hear more about Noviland and, and what you guys have been up to. Yeah. So, uh, that’s a full end to end sourcing purchasing and logistics solution.

[00:29:50] We handle everywhere from initial requests for quotes, finding the right factories for our users. Of course, managing samples and consolidating them, shipping them to, to the end users, placing orders, handling localized contracts, uh, as you know, you know, International contracts could be a nightmare.

[00:30:11] So we do have offices in China that handle all of that. But as well as production oversight, quality control inspection reports, shipping to wherever it may be three, 3PL or Amazon, or we’ve shipped to apartments before where new sellers just want to get it. They want to see their baby and it’s completely understandable.

[00:30:29] But yeah, I mean, after that, we also handled the, obviously we have 3PLs. We have 3PLs along the East coast, as well as in LA. So, so we really try to simplify and, make the supply chain safer, in a very antiquated, I guess industry where things have, have improved. So. Minister, I guess, in a minuscule way where it’s small improvements, like, you know, marketplaces like Alibaba, which I say miniscule is humongous, but it’s a minuscule way to solve a supply chain problem.

[00:31:09] Right? It’s, it’s a very open pay to play. Anyone could get on, who knows who’s on the other side of the screen sort of thing. So it presents all these risks. And so we try to mitigate those, uh, and that’s for new sellers established sellers. Retail chains, you name it, construction companies. Um, and so that entire supply chain management really helps.

[00:31:32] Businesses and people really focus on their business instead of working in it, which, which can be a challenge, especially when you’re trying to scale. Awesome. Well, thanks for these insights and it’s, it’s what’s some ways to find, I think we will link it up on the show notes. I think you guys are on all the channels, but, noviland.com is probably the best place for.

[00:31:53] Yeah. Yeah, definitely noviland.com. You can check us out on Facebook. We’re going to be bidding out a bunch of Chinese new year content, particularly as it’s coming up and Instagram, we’re pretty active there. Shoot us DMs, ask questions, whatever the case may be. Okay. First of all, thank you so much for sharing with us and, yeah, let’s switch them off all this, everybody.

[00:32:12] Good luck. And, I think, I think it was gonna be a good year for anybody on doing anything online. Right. And, let’s, let’s rock. Thanks again. Yeah, thank you. When people say we’re not going to have an offline event until 2022, what do you think? Do you think 2021 is no in person events? I don’t know, but we have been investing more and more in his online software is online technology and we are working on events for the end of this year.

[00:32:41] Cross-border matchmaker brand is what I’ve decided to use, and it will be an action packed online events, dates to be as determined, but we’re looking at mid to late, late December, stay tuned for more. Thank you. Well, thank you. Thank you for that. That was an impressive interview. I hope everybody enjoyed that.

[00:33:01] I hope he gets some insights. Seems like we also talked about this in our membership at GFAVIP. Some people were asking, you know, Amazon’s restricting how many you can send in there sometimes, either not allowing you to send stuff in or there, you know, other issues. So it just seems like an insurance policy also seems like, you know, try new sales channels, maybe Amazon’s slip ups in some ways, of course there is the, what the britches company in the world at a one off, you know, but use as an excuse use as a reason to diversify and, have a more strong business.

[00:33:39] You know, having a single sales channel is always dangerous, whether it’s selling online or offline or service businesses or anybody, you know, you want to have diversification. So I hope you can make that part of your new year’s resolution because it might be too hard if you’re not doing it already into fourth quarter.

[00:33:55] And I do wish you all making lots of money growing your businesses and to, and having a great rest of the year. It’s been a wild one and I hope we all end it as best we can. It’s an election year. I talked to some friends and everybody’s kind of freaking out. I mean, there’s always feeling like it’s the end of the world, but I’ll guess we gotta say this last year, but even the trade Wars, the HK, you know, Uprising or whatever you want to call that.

[00:34:26] And a virus and pandemic and elections and the end of the world, but the world keeps going. So I got to stay positive. I think if you think positively, positive things will happen. I have to admit, I have had some nightmares. I got to stop reading the news. Some of my friends stopped reading the news, but those top lists need to Global from Asia, but try not to get, you know, there’s things we can’t control.

[00:34:50] We can’t control these things. And we, that’s why I liked to be a business owner. That’s why I like to have a little bit, my little world that I somewhat have some kind of control, although we never have full control, but some control of our destiny, but yeah, reading the news about the world economics and.

[00:35:10] It’s very stressful. And that’s why I even came to Asia so long ago. I didn’t really want, I was sick of reading about the news and reading, you know, other people and what they’re doing and how’s it gonna affect me and my business. It’s actually part of what Global from Asia is about. If you look at the logo, it’s the G, but it’s like a man or a person going up to the right with the city on his shoulders.

[00:35:34] Borrowed from the Atlas shrugged concept and throwing it off of his shoulders and continuing to live. So I’m throwing that off of my shoulders. And I believe that’s what we all need to do. You know, of course, business and politics seem to be more, more intertwined. And then the printing of money and the regulations and tariffs and blocking of websites and blocking of apps.

[00:36:02] It’s a sad, sad world. I’m more of a free and open world, but the way world’s going the opposite direction, it seems. But you are smart because you’re listening here and you have an open mind and you’re hopefully doing your own business or you’re doing something you have control over. And I, I support you and I hope you continue to grow and we need more people like you.

[00:36:25] Thanks for listening. See you next week. 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.