Australia – 6 Reasons Why Direct Importing with Amazon is a Game Changing Strategy for Brands

If your brand is selling on Amazon, then you’re probably familiar with the concept of Direct Importing (DI) through Amazon’s Global Logistics Network. However, not all brands qualify for DI as it is only available if your products are manufactured in or imported from overseas. The choice brands who do import to the U.S. from overseas is simple:  use Amazon’s network and resources to distribute your products, removing multiple steps and costs from the supply chain, or to use your own supply chain.

Sounds compelling, right?  But also sounds scary since you are giving up a lot of control and process to Amazon rather than keeping it in-house. As a global ecommerce accelerator, Pattern knows how to leverage DI, maintain control of your brand, and find new ways to improve logistics through Amazon’s Global Logistics Network. Pattern, an ecommerce accelerator and one of the top Amazon sellers, understands the unique challenges brands face getting products from international production facilities to consumers’ doorsteps and manages the entire process for brands.

And although DI is not the right strategy for every brand, we know the potential savings and customer benefits you can experience through DI make it an option that’s worth exploring.

6 Brand Benefits of Direct Importing

Fewer Touchpoints in the Supply Chain

The most profound benefit you can experience through DI is massively reducing your supply chain touchpoints—when your products go straight to Amazon’s fulfillment centers, the ripple effect in your cost savings is powerful. For one thing, you save a significant amount of money by not paying for the processes you’d normally need to in order to get your products to domestic warehouses.

Once your items get to their shipping containers, Amazon takes over, freeing you from the responsibility of getting the product from its origin port to the U.S. to your warehouses, then re-packaging and labeling to ship into Amazon fulfillment centers, and finally to customers—with all of the associated processes and costs. Less handoffs also means less opportunity and responsibility for incurred damages, which is something that pays off in both the short-term, by avoiding replacement costs, and long-term, in customer satisfaction.

Lower Container Rates

As probably the biggest U.S. marketplace in the ecommerce space, one of Amazon’s perks is lower container rates. They have negotiated prices that are considerably lower than a brand would pay as a traditional importer. So, it’s likely that, however you’re importing your products into the U.S. today, it’ll be cheaper to get your products to your customers using Direct Importing.

No Additional Brokering Fees

By leveraging Direct Importing, you eliminate the need to pay tariffs and duties as your inventory arrives in the U.S.. This generates significant cost savings for many brands—whatever you pay to ship your products with Amazon includes the brokering fees instead of adding to costs for you.

Advance Forecasting

When a brand ships all of its orders to Amazon Fulfillment instead of your domestic warehouses, the process generally takes longer. This additional time allows brands and ecommerce accelerators to plan inventory months in advance, rather than a week or two. For instance, rather than guessing on the amount of inventory you’ll need to ship to Amazon in two weeks, you’d be able to plan much further ahead with purchase orders, as far as months in advance. Typically, this advanced planning gives brands a leg up in leveraging their supply chain to advance order what they need.

Reduced Reliance on Domestic Fulfillment

Direct Importing also removes your dependency on your domestic fulfillment teams for the manpower needed to get products from their port of origin to your warehouses. Removing these processes allows you to save both the money and the time it takes to unpack, repack, and label your items. Instead, all of those tasks are taken care of at a lower cost at the origin port. In addition to eliminating time and manpower spent packaging and labeling, you also remove the need to store product domestically, meaning you can save domestic warehouse space and reduce the amount of time spent fulfilling domestic orders.

Faster Speed to Market

As your teams eliminate the extra steps in the fulfillment process, you’re able to free up precious time in getting your products directly to Amazon customers. What would you be able to accomplish in getting 2-3 weeks back from your current speed to market model? As you get products into your customers’ hands faster, you can stay more competitive as shipping times continue to shrink across the globe.

The Power of Pattern and Direct Importing

As the benefits of DI start to build upon each other, the savings can be significant for brands and the momentum for any brand to achieve new sales potential is truly powerful.  Brands that partner with Pattern know they are getting premier resources in logistics and fulfillment as well as the competitive advantage of working with a top seller on Amazon. Since brands sell their products to Pattern months in advance, they avoid freight, shipping, port, packaging, labeling and other costs associated with their inventory coming from overseas. Additionally, brands who partner with Pattern can also take advantage of time and cost savings as part of their access to our fulfillment resources while, at the same time, experiencing multiple other ways we’re able to accelerate their products on Amazon. Accelerate your brand on Amazon, starting at the port of origin. Contact Pattern.