Shipping from USA to NZ

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cmys001

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Topic # 150372 20-Jul-2014 14:13

Hello everyone, I am new to this page. and i have been thinking about a business idea of bringing cosmetics from America to NZ. The product although being cheap shipping costs are staggering, so I have now come to a halt. If i go ahead with the shipping then my profit margin will be nill. may even make a loss since i might have to pay duty. so to avoid that i was thinking of doinh drop shipping to avoid duty, but i havent successfully been able to find a cheap reliable shipping company. can anyone please suggest one? thanks in advance :)

timmmay

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Reply # 1092497 20-Jul-2014 14:31

USPS isn't bad. Better still ship to NZ as one package (staying under the duty limit if you can) then reship out from NZ to customers.

Though places like strawberrynet and trademe may already be doing it cheap.

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Rickles

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Reply # 1092521 20-Jul-2014 15:39

Depending on the quantity of goods you wish to import, check with a reputable shipping company because you may get a good deal sharing a sea or air container .. many larger importers have spare room that they like to off-set costs by 'sub-letting' cargo space.

sbiddle

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Reply # 1092523 20-Jul-2014 15:45

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To be brutally honest if your business model can't sustain legitimate costs such as shipping and customs/GST charges then it's probably not a good business to be in.

If you're going to try and bring in small quantities of product to bypass customs and duty you'll have to accept shipping is going to be a significant cost vs bringing in goods in bulk and paying significantly less in shipping.

If you're selling goods for a profit you also need to be fully aware of recent customer law changes.

Jase2985

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Reply # 1092557 20-Jul-2014 17:19

not to mention if they see a sub $400 package every week or so going to the same place, they are going to know something is up and look into it

cmys001

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Reply # 1092629 20-Jul-2014 19:52

Thanks guys lots to think about...I did want to start small initially and once I figure it out was going to order bulk but having said that paying duty may not work out as a profit at all....

richms

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Reply # 1092692 20-Jul-2014 21:26

Generally with items like that, there are already plenty of parallel importers of them so you would be hard pressed to undercut them when you are starting small, unless you are like most small trademe sellers and do not value your own time and investment correctly and sell it at a loss.

Richard rich.ms

KiwiTim

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Reply # 1093512 22-Jul-2014 09:58

I used to live in Honolulu and had to ship all my belongings back to Wellington. I used the following company

http://www.dhx.com/Location/Locations.aspx

They were inexpensive and reliable. They ship via ocean or air. So if you are importing 100s of kilos of product, they would be quite reasonable in terms of cost. Some other company's I got quotes from were 5 times more expensive.

Tim