Customs Brokers Can Introduce Your Business to the International Market

In this day and era, your marketplace is as big as you're willing to make it. As a small business located in Florida, you can reach customers all over the world. A decision to enter the international marketplace will expand your brand and may even boost your revenue earnings by as much as 80 percent.

A customs broker can help you enter the world stage successfully. Learn just how a broker can help your small business.

The international shipping process is both vast and complex. In addition to regulations imposed by the shipping company, the country that you send the shipment to will have their own guidelines for the shipment receipts. If the shipment is traveling by ocean freight, the port will also have its own set of requirements.

An attempt to navigate this web of confusion on your own opens the door to several time-busting mistakes, as even one incorrectly filled-out form can stall a shipment for days and maybe even weeks. Customs brokers don't just understand these complexities, but they have experience with them. It doesn't matter if you are shipping to another business or directly to a consumer, a broker will help you get your shipments into the hands of your customers as quickly as possible. Not only will this partnership give you greater confidence in your shipments, but faster service will give your customers greater confidence in you.

This increase in confidence strengthens your business and its reputation.

International shipments have the potential to be just as costly as they are complex, but a customs broker can help increase your profits by keeping your shipping costs lower. International shipments come along with various unavoidable expenses, such as customs duties and inland delivery charges. However, some fees are avoidable.

Take a demurrage fee, for example, which is somewhat of an extended storage cost. All receiving ports have a maximum number of days for which a shipment can remain on hold for free. To highlight just how costly this can be, consider a port with a five-day policy and a $100 daily fee.

If you had four containers at the port for eight days, you would be looking at a demurrage fee of $1,200. The ability to avoid this fee is all about knowing the demurrage policy for the destination port and logistical planning to get your shipment processed and moved from the port as quickly as possible.

Just as the day-to-day needs of your business vary from those of your neighbors and competitors, your international shipment needs also require a level of customization. Customs brokers create relationships with small businesses like yours by learning about the types of products you ship, your brand goals, the needs of your customers and your cost constraints.

This information allows a broker to establish a true sense of what your business needs and is then used to create a shipment plan aimed at exceeding your expectations in each of these areas. This tailoring of service is especially helpful for small businesses with a low volume of shipments.

Generic, one-size-fits-all solutions typically miss the mark by offering and forcing small companies to pay for services they won't benefit from. Customs brokers use their knowledge and network to create shipment plans that only include what you need and not what you don't.