Questions, answered without the sales voice
Grouped by where the question comes up. If yours is not here, ask it at the bottom of the page and a person will answer it.
Starting out
What the first conversation looks like and what it costs you.
The product or products you want to sell, the markets you sell into, and the platform your store runs on. That is enough for us to say whether we are a fit and to quote. You do not need a company structure abroad, a freight forwarder or existing stock.
No, but be aware of what changes. An established store has order history, so volumes and packaging decisions are grounded. A brand-new store is guessing, and the honest advice is to keep the first run small and the packaging cheap until the product proves itself.
There is an agreement, because the important terms — who pays for what when something goes wrong, how billing works, how notice is given — need to be written down rather than remembered. What it does not do is lock you into a volume you have not tested.
If you ship a handful of parcels a month, a marketplace app is cheaper and simpler. If your model needs goods to clear customs on a declaration that is not true, we will decline. And if the only thing you are optimising is the lowest line on a spreadsheet, someone will always undercut us.
Fulfillment
Stock, orders, exceptions and returns.
Yes. Inbound stock goes through the same receiving check as anything we source: counted, sampled, photographed, then made sellable. If a shipment arrives short or damaged, you hear it from us with the photos rather than discovering it in a stock count later.
Stock levels sync back to your store, and you can ask for a count at any time. The figure we show is what is on the shelf and sellable — reserved, damaged and quarantined units are not counted as available, because that is the number that causes oversells.
No. We ship blind by default: nothing in or on the parcel points at us. If you add custom packaging, the parcel carries your brand only.
Damage caused in our building or during packing is ours to absorb. Carrier loss and transit damage are claimed against the carrier, and we file the claim rather than handing you a tracking number. The split is written into the agreement before you ship anything.
Usually yes — kitting, bundling and light assembly are normal work, priced as handling because they take time per order. Tell us the steps in advance so the pack instruction is written down instead of improvised at the bench.
Sourcing and packaging
Finding the product, and what the parcel looks like.
Yes. Hiding the supplier is how an agent protects a margin you cannot see; it also leaves you unable to verify anything about how your product is made. You get to know who makes it.
Yes, and plenty of sellers do. We receive from your supplier, inspect on arrival and handle everything downstream. You keep the relationship and we keep the standard.
It depends on the item — printed tape and cards are fast, rigid boxes are not — so we quote the timeline with the item rather than as a blanket figure. What we can say is that the clock starts when you approve the proof, and that most delays come from artwork, not from the press.
That is the recommended order. Ship plain, confirm the product sells, then invest in packaging. Sellers who print first usually end up with a stock of mailers for a product they stopped selling.
Billing, customs and compliance
The parts that decide whether the model works on paper.
Per line, per period. Product, packaging, handling and freight are billed separately so a freight increase cannot hide inside a handling fee. Adjustments such as returns and write-offs appear as their own lines instead of being netted off inside a total.
It depends on the market and on whether duty is prepaid or collected from the buyer, and it has real consequences for your tax obligations. This is settled in writing before you launch a market, not assumed — and it is one of the few questions where we will suggest you take local advice.
The commercial and transport documents the route requires, prepared with the declaration matching the goods. Where a category needs certificates or test reports, those are collected at the sourcing stage — a document you go looking for after a parcel is held is a document that arrives late.
No. If a product needs an approval we do not hold, we say so and stop, rather than routing it around the rule and letting the risk land on you at the border. That is what compliance-first means in practice: it is a set of orders we turn down.
Still not answered?
Send the question with your product and your markets, and you will get a specific answer rather than a brochure.