Article 2
Article 2
International Trade
16th September 2009
Many of our clients have asked us to help them expand overseas. Some are UK based companies going into Europe and others are US companies coming to the UK. The good thing in our mind is that this is still in the minds of many companies at the moment, even though we are focussing all our efforts to keep "business as usual".
Now is a good time to look. No company should just move into a new territory on a whim. Personally, I think we're all a little more focussed now to make sure all of the decisions we make have a value and ongoing return to our business.
It might take between 6 and 12 months to plan for the entry. There are plenty of legal and financial hurdles to overcome before you can really start to push your operations in a new market. You must also scope out the market and your potential customer base.
Starting small is always good. If you have an ecommerce site the first thing to do is enable it for more than one currency and allow people from other countries to order. If it's just the odd parcel here and there then you don't need to worry about import duties (there are levels, so speak to an expert to be sure). Try it and see what happens, you'll certainly learn a thing or two!