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Casual Articles - Trade Show Handbook for South African Exporters to the USA
Create Your Own Business Opportunities is way, you will be able to service your customers on an ongoing basis when they wish to re-order. USA customers do not like to wait for months for an order to be fulfilled.Do you approach business conventions with an open mind?Have you ever noticed some businesspeople view a particular business expo as having been “wonderful” while others thought “it wasn’t worth their time?” Do you ever wonder how there can be such two opposing points of view and, more importantly, how you can put yourself in the first category the next time around?Let’s first consider the people who thought the expo was a waste of time and money. Most likely, they walked down the vendor aisles thinking, “That’s not for me, not for me, not for me…” It’s a very easy habit to get oneself into.The other habit of these negative attendees is they stick closely to their friend and do not attempt to meet other businesspeople. Once the negativity sets in, it would be impossible for them to attract others to their service, meet people in the media, take advantage of an interview or connect with speakers to find out how in the future they may become the next businessperson to speak.Your attitude and approach to any business function are of utmost importance. First, like the little engine that could, you have to say to yourself, “I think I can.” Next, you need to say, “I know I can.” From this point onward, creative thinking on how to approach the business functions will catapult o Try and find a rep who will sell your goods. It is preferable to have someone in place all the time, rather than trying to sell from afar. o Your logistics company can arrange the picking, packing and shipping of the order. If you want to take their responsibilities further, they can do your invoicing and collecting of money on your behalf. o As soon as you have an amount of money in your trust account, the logistics company can transfer one bulk sum. This way you can save on bank charges and wire transfer charges. Each wire transfer fee costs approx. $20, with another corresponding fee in South Africa which can run at R200 or more. If you are a wholesaler/representative: o Try and arrange with the manufacturer to let you have consignment stock, which you can hold in a USA warehouse. o You could follow the above scenario as far as logistics are concerned. o Your manufacturer may possibly help you with brochure and advertising costs. AFTER THE TRADE SHOW Once your first trade show is complete, you will have to decide what to do with your booth contents. As advised before, the DTI will not pay for the shipping costs to return your samples. They give you the option of selling the samples and re-couping the money. You could store the samples in a rental warehouse, but you would then have to go to that warehouse at a future date to move the good Franchising and Prohibited Transfers DECIDING HOW MANY SHOWS TO DO PER YEARIn the world of franchising often be franchise outlet or franchisee will wish to sell their rights under the franchise agreement to another party. Since this is a common occurrence amongst franchisees it makes sense to have a clearly defined franchise agreement, which addresses potential or problematic transfers. A franchisor may wish to have a clause in the franchise agreement, which actually prohibits certain types of franchise transfers. And there might be a number of reasons for this. Below is a clause that I put into our franchise agreements all prohibited transfers;5.2.6 Prohibited TransfersFor purposes of this Section 5.2, without limiting the generality of the foregoing, Franchisor’s withholding of consent will be considered reasonable if the proposed sale, assignment, transfer or conveyance is to an individual, company, or business entity that Franchisor deems in Franchisor’s sole opinion to be a competitor of Franchisors or a competitor of any affiliate of Franchisors or a competitor of any sister or co-brand company of Franchisors or a competitor of a vendor of Franchisors, another franchisor, another sub-franchisor, master franchise of another system or a Franchisee of another system which has an affiliate company that is a competitor of Franchisors. Any purported assignment with Depending on whether you are a manufacturer or a wholesaler dependent on a manufacturer, the number of shows that you can do are limited to the amount of product that can be realistically produced per year. If you are depending on the Department of Trade to finance your shows, you will only be able to do 4 per year, and that is only while they have the money allocated for trade shows. If you do 4 shows per year, and are being funded by the DTI, you will have to return to South Africa after every show, and all goods and monies have to emanate from South Africa. They will not consider any claims that are paid for with foreign money, i.e. by agents on your behalf. PLANNING THE BOOTH It is imperative that you take as little equipment with you, because when the show is done, you will either have to dispose of all your furniture/stuff, or place it in storage in the USA if you want to use it again. The DTI gives you an allowance to get your samples and equipment to the USA, but they won’t pay for you to take it back home again, unless you are participating in a Pavilion show, where they will pay all your expenses. It is essential that you decide what you will do with the entire booth once the first show is finished. The DTI will also not pay the costs of warehousing in the USA and the transport of the booth to the second show from that warehouse. If you do want to go that route, you will have to pay for that yourself. A typical charge to get goods to a show is approx. $400, obviously depending on the weight and size of the shipment. It’s a good idea to set up the booth beforehand and plan exactly how you want everything to look. Pare it down to the minimum. After all, you are selling goods, not decorations. Use your imagination to exhibit the samples in the most cost effective way. Make sure that you have all the risers and decorations that you envisage. Pack all office needs, i.e. invoices, brochures (very important), staplers and spare staples, pens, etc. etc. Although there are of course many shops around, sometimes the shows are in out of the way places, and it is not easy to get photocopies done and buy forgotten essentials. SHIPPING SAMPLES AND BOOTH EQUIPMENT “The best laid plans of mice and men oft go astray” Allow plenty of time for your samples to arrive at the warehouse so that it doesn’t cost you anything extra by way of drayage. Also, although your shipping agents will give you an idea of how long your goods will take to get there, always allow an extra two weeks, because there can be delays with Customs Clearance and delivery. Make sure that you have clear and precise invoices accompanying the samples, with prices, tariff headings, and clearly marked as Trade Show samples which are duty free. If you are sending any seeds, pods, grasses, make sure that you have fumigation certificates. Leather and animal goods have to have a Wildlife Permit. Try and contain your booth equipment into as small a size as possible. It is easier to move compact equipment around than large, oversize pallets, which cost more because of the volumetric size. BOOTH SET-UP Plan on getting to your destination at least one day before set-up day. If you have not been to the site before hand, go down to the show site and check that your samples have arrived in your booth. Check your directory entry to see that everything is correct, and familiarize yourself with the lay-out of the hall. Make sure of the time that you can start setting up, and be there promptly. If you have to go out to buy anything that you may have forgotten, now is the time to do it. Prepare your “office” so that everything you may need to write orders, give out brochures and price lists is neatly available. Make sure that all your samples are clearly marked with the prices. Once you get busy and have more than one person in the booth, you don’t want to lose a sale because the samples aren’t marked. Customers are happy to browse if you are busy, and will wait patiently if they can see everything clearly. You may also want to bring some see-through netting or other covering with you to tie across the booth at the end of the day. Always be on time in your booth. You will lose valuable sales if you are late coming in, or early going out. TAKING ORDERS, ARRANGING PAYMENT Always give a clear indication when you plan to ship your orders. USA customers usually work with budgets, and may ask you for shipment on a specific date. They also don’t want to have to worry with importing their goods, and won’t deal with Customs, or pay customs duties. They will all ask for shipment from a USA city. The reason for this is that it makes no difference if you are shipping one carton, or one hundred cartons. The clearing charges are the same, and the customer will not happily pay those costs, which can run to $300 per shipment. This is where a logistics company can help you. You can ship your entire trade show orders to one place, and there will be only one Customs Clearance charge for the consolidated shipment. Your logistics company will then strip down the shipment, and send the individual boxes onward to the customers. You will then be charged the cost of the local shipments by common carriers, i.e. UPS or FedEx. However, you can charge your customer the cost of the shipping, which is common practice and they are used to paying the UPS charges. Another problem you will encounter is accepting payment for your orders. The greater percent of your customers pay on their credit cards. Unless you have a USA company, or you have a Dollar Account in South Africa, you will not be able to process cheques or credit card deposits into your South African bank account in US$. You will need a USA based company to process your credit card payments. A similar problem is acceptance of cheques, which carry high bank charges if deposited into a South African bank account. You are also at risk that the cheque may not be good. Once again, your logistics company can arrange the collection of money on your behalf. An ideal situation would be if You are a manufacturer: o Look for a reputable logistics company, and keep a stock holding in their warehouse. In this way, you will be able to service your customers on an ongoing basis when they wish to re-order. USA customers do not like to wait for months for an order to be fulfilled. o Try and find a rep who will sell your goods. It is preferable to have someone in place all the time, rather than trying to sell from afar. o Your logistics company can arrange the picking, packing and shipping of the order. If you want to take their responsibilities further, they can do your invoicing and collecting of money on your behalf. o As soon as you have an amount of money in your trust account, the logistics company can transfer one bulk sum. This way you can save on bank charges and wire transfer charges. Each wire transfer fee costs approx. $20, with another corresponding fee in South Africa which can run at R200 or more. If you are a wholesaler/representative: o Try and arrange with the manufacturer to let you have consignment stock, which you can hold in a USA warehouse. o You could follow the above scenario as far as logistics are concerned. o Your manufacturer may possibly help you with brochure and advertising costs. AFTER THE TRADE SHOW Once your first trade show is complete, you will have to decide what to do with your booth contents. As advised before, the DTI will not pay for the shipping costs to return your samples. They give you the option of selling the samples and re-couping the money. You could store the samples in a rental warehouse, but you would then have to go to that warehouse at a future date to move the goods Associations Must Either Partner or Perish eight and size of the shipment.The reason for any professional or trade association to exist is for the purpose of synergistic and mutual improvement of the persons and organizations involved is a particular industry or profession. I believe an association to be a gathering of people with similar interests and goals. This gathering must be a multi-faceted partnering alliance between members (including associate or supplier members), officers and paid staff.In every association with which I currently hold membership or have held membership, I've have experienced a class structure. While I believe this class structure is generally unintentional, it is none-the-less destructive and at cross-purposes to the associations’ stated mission. The officers usually make policy and the rules for all to follow. The staff works hard to serve the officers, more so than the membership. This is because they believe, or have the perception, that they hold their jobs at the pleasure of the board of directors. While operational staff generally works under, and is hired by, an executive director or executive vice president, the staff people see their jobs as being at risk when they inform board members on things the board members do not want to hear.Elected officers try to do their best to run the association so it will best serve the membership, It’s a good idea to set up the booth beforehand and plan exactly how you want everything to look. Pare it down to the minimum. After all, you are selling goods, not decorations. Use your imagination to exhibit the samples in the most cost effective way. Make sure that you have all the risers and decorations that you envisage. Pack all office needs, i.e. invoices, brochures (very important), staplers and spare staples, pens, etc. etc. Although there are of course many shops around, sometimes the shows are in out of the way places, and it is not easy to get photocopies done and buy forgotten essentials. SHIPPING SAMPLES AND BOOTH EQUIPMENT “The best laid plans of mice and men oft go astray” Allow plenty of time for your samples to arrive at the warehouse so that it doesn’t cost you anything extra by way of drayage. Also, although your shipping agents will give you an idea of how long your goods will take to get there, always allow an extra two weeks, because there can be delays with Customs Clearance and delivery. Make sure that you have clear and precise invoices accompanying the samples, with prices, tariff headings, and clearly marked as Trade Show samples which are duty free. If you are sending any seeds, pods, grasses, make sure that you have fumigation certificates. Leather and animal goods have to have a Wildlife Permit. Try and contain your booth equipment into as small a size as possible. It is easier to move compact equipment around than large, oversize pallets, which cost more because of the volumetric size. BOOTH SET-UP Plan on getting to your destination at least one day before set-up day. If you have not been to the site before hand, go down to the show site and check that your samples have arrived in your booth. Check your directory entry to see that everything is correct, and familiarize yourself with the lay-out of the hall. Make sure of the time that you can start setting up, and be there promptly. If you have to go out to buy anything that you may have forgotten, now is the time to do it. Prepare your “office” so that everything you may need to write orders, give out brochures and price lists is neatly available. Make sure that all your samples are clearly marked with the prices. Once you get busy and have more than one person in the booth, you don’t want to lose a sale because the samples aren’t marked. Customers are happy to browse if you are busy, and will wait patiently if they can see everything clearly. You may also want to bring some see-through netting or other covering with you to tie across the booth at the end of the day. Always be on time in your booth. You will lose valuable sales if you are late coming in, or early going out. TAKING ORDERS, ARRANGING PAYMENT Always give a clear indication when you plan to ship your orders. USA customers usually work with budgets, and may ask you for shipment on a specific date. They also don’t want to have to worry with importing their goods, and won’t deal with Customs, or pay customs duties. They will all ask for shipment from a USA city. The reason for this is that it makes no difference if you are shipping one carton, or one hundred cartons. The clearing charges are the same, and the customer will not happily pay those costs, which can run to $300 per shipment. This is where a logistics company can help you. You can ship your entire trade show orders to one place, and there will be only one Customs Clearance charge for the consolidated shipment. Your logistics company will then strip down the shipment, and send the individual boxes onward to the customers. You will then be charged the cost of the local shipments by common carriers, i.e. UPS or FedEx. However, you can charge your customer the cost of the shipping, which is common practice and they are used to paying the UPS charges. Another problem you will encounter is accepting payment for your orders. The greater percent of your customers pay on their credit cards. Unless you have a USA company, or you have a Dollar Account in South Africa, you will not be able to process cheques or credit card deposits into your South African bank account in US$. You will need a USA based company to process your credit card payments. A similar problem is acceptance of cheques, which carry high bank charges if deposited into a South African bank account. You are also at risk that the cheque may not be good. Once again, your logistics company can arrange the collection of money on your behalf. An ideal situation would be if You are a manufacturer: o Look for a reputable logistics company, and keep a stock holding in their warehouse. In this way, you will be able to service your customers on an ongoing basis when they wish to re-order. USA customers do not like to wait for months for an order to be fulfilled. o Try and find a rep who will sell your goods. It is preferable to have someone in place all the time, rather than trying to sell from afar. o Your logistics company can arrange the picking, packing and shipping of the order. If you want to take their responsibilities further, they can do your invoicing and collecting of money on your behalf. o As soon as you have an amount of money in your trust account, the logistics company can transfer one bulk sum. This way you can save on bank charges and wire transfer charges. Each wire transfer fee costs approx. $20, with another corresponding fee in South Africa which can run at R200 or more. If you are a wholesaler/representative: o Try and arrange with the manufacturer to let you have consignment stock, which you can hold in a USA warehouse. o You could follow the above scenario as far as logistics are concerned. o Your manufacturer may possibly help you with brochure and advertising costs. AFTER THE TRADE SHOW Once your first trade show is complete, you will have to decide what to do with your booth contents. As advised before, the DTI will not pay for the shipping costs to return your samples. They give you the option of selling the samples and re-couping the money. You could store the samples in a rental warehouse, but you would then have to go to that warehouse at a future date to move the good Making Your Profits Soar with Fundraising Sales of the volumetric size.Fundraising is an every day occurrence for so many churches today. There are a variety of different types of church fundraisers available today with the selling of products being one of the most popular. What you sell is only a portion of what is important when you are having a fundraiser. The way you sell is equally as important if not more to make your profits soar with a sales type fundraiser.The first objective of a successful fundraiser is to set up a goal for each volunteer. This gives your volunteer the opportunity to meet and exceed their goal. When your volunteer has a measurable goal for the fundraiser you will find that it is easier for them to achieve.Secondly you must have a clear cut start and end date for your fundraiser. A fundraiser that just goes and goes is a waste of time. Your givers will get tired of hearing about how you need this or that, they will tune you out. Have your start and end dates selected and stick to it.Third and often one of the easily overlooked aspects to fundraising is lead time. It is imperative to your success that you plan and plan well. If you launch into a fundraiser with poor planning and unclear goals you are setting your self up for failure. As your grandpa used to say ‘measure twice and cut once’. These are words to live buy. BOOTH SET-UP Plan on getting to your destination at least one day before set-up day. If you have not been to the site before hand, go down to the show site and check that your samples have arrived in your booth. Check your directory entry to see that everything is correct, and familiarize yourself with the lay-out of the hall. Make sure of the time that you can start setting up, and be there promptly. If you have to go out to buy anything that you may have forgotten, now is the time to do it. Prepare your “office” so that everything you may need to write orders, give out brochures and price lists is neatly available. Make sure that all your samples are clearly marked with the prices. Once you get busy and have more than one person in the booth, you don’t want to lose a sale because the samples aren’t marked. Customers are happy to browse if you are busy, and will wait patiently if they can see everything clearly. You may also want to bring some see-through netting or other covering with you to tie across the booth at the end of the day. Always be on time in your booth. You will lose valuable sales if you are late coming in, or early going out. TAKING ORDERS, ARRANGING PAYMENT Always give a clear indication when you plan to ship your orders. USA customers usually work with budgets, and may ask you for shipment on a specific date. They also don’t want to have to worry with importing their goods, and won’t deal with Customs, or pay customs duties. They will all ask for shipment from a USA city. The reason for this is that it makes no difference if you are shipping one carton, or one hundred cartons. The clearing charges are the same, and the customer will not happily pay those costs, which can run to $300 per shipment. This is where a logistics company can help you. You can ship your entire trade show orders to one place, and there will be only one Customs Clearance charge for the consolidated shipment. Your logistics company will then strip down the shipment, and send the individual boxes onward to the customers. You will then be charged the cost of the local shipments by common carriers, i.e. UPS or FedEx. However, you can charge your customer the cost of the shipping, which is common practice and they are used to paying the UPS charges. Another problem you will encounter is accepting payment for your orders. The greater percent of your customers pay on their credit cards. Unless you have a USA company, or you have a Dollar Account in South Africa, you will not be able to process cheques or credit card deposits into your South African bank account in US$. You will need a USA based company to process your credit card payments. A similar problem is acceptance of cheques, which carry high bank charges if deposited into a South African bank account. You are also at risk that the cheque may not be good. Once again, your logistics company can arrange the collection of money on your behalf. An ideal situation would be if You are a manufacturer: o Look for a reputable logistics company, and keep a stock holding in their warehouse. In this way, you will be able to service your customers on an ongoing basis when they wish to re-order. USA customers do not like to wait for months for an order to be fulfilled. o Try and find a rep who will sell your goods. It is preferable to have someone in place all the time, rather than trying to sell from afar. o Your logistics company can arrange the picking, packing and shipping of the order. If you want to take their responsibilities further, they can do your invoicing and collecting of money on your behalf. o As soon as you have an amount of money in your trust account, the logistics company can transfer one bulk sum. This way you can save on bank charges and wire transfer charges. Each wire transfer fee costs approx. $20, with another corresponding fee in South Africa which can run at R200 or more. If you are a wholesaler/representative: o Try and arrange with the manufacturer to let you have consignment stock, which you can hold in a USA warehouse. o You could follow the above scenario as far as logistics are concerned. o Your manufacturer may possibly help you with brochure and advertising costs. AFTER THE TRADE SHOW Once your first trade show is complete, you will have to decide what to do with your booth contents. As advised before, the DTI will not pay for the shipping costs to return your samples. They give you the option of selling the samples and re-couping the money. You could store the samples in a rental warehouse, but you would then have to go to that warehouse at a future date to move the good The Importance of Employment History Verification he reason for this is that it makes no difference if you are shipping one carton, or one hundred cartons. The clearing charges are the same, and the customer will not happily pay those costs, which can run to $300 per shipment.Employment history verification is essential for many reasons. Job applicants may lie on their resume to cover up previous employment problems, and even periods of imprisonment that they obviously do not want to reveal in an application for a new job. You are obliged not only by law, but morally, to make as sure as you possibly can that your employees are not harmed through your employment of an unsuitable candidate.Your verification procedure should detect any false dates of employment provided, any exaggeration of positions or responsibilities held and the possibility of fictitious employers being named. Why does this happen? Why do some candidates feel it necessary to fabricate their resumes or CVs in this way? It is, in fact, not all that uncommon, and there have been some prominent cases reported in the press. Let’s examine some reasons why people do this.A very common reason for stating false periods of employment with specific companies is to hide dismissal for inappropriate behavior, violence to other employees or theft. Any one of these could provide a good reason for finding an employer guilty of negligible hiring, and this itself introduces a problem. While it is essential that you identify these applicants, the previous employers might be loathe to provide details to you that c This is where a logistics company can help you. You can ship your entire trade show orders to one place, and there will be only one Customs Clearance charge for the consolidated shipment. Your logistics company will then strip down the shipment, and send the individual boxes onward to the customers. You will then be charged the cost of the local shipments by common carriers, i.e. UPS or FedEx. However, you can charge your customer the cost of the shipping, which is common practice and they are used to paying the UPS charges. Another problem you will encounter is accepting payment for your orders. The greater percent of your customers pay on their credit cards. Unless you have a USA company, or you have a Dollar Account in South Africa, you will not be able to process cheques or credit card deposits into your South African bank account in US$. You will need a USA based company to process your credit card payments. A similar problem is acceptance of cheques, which carry high bank charges if deposited into a South African bank account. You are also at risk that the cheque may not be good. Once again, your logistics company can arrange the collection of money on your behalf. An ideal situation would be if You are a manufacturer: o Look for a reputable logistics company, and keep a stock holding in their warehouse. In this way, you will be able to service your customers on an ongoing basis when they wish to re-order. USA customers do not like to wait for months for an order to be fulfilled. o Try and find a rep who will sell your goods. It is preferable to have someone in place all the time, rather than trying to sell from afar. o Your logistics company can arrange the picking, packing and shipping of the order. If you want to take their responsibilities further, they can do your invoicing and collecting of money on your behalf. o As soon as you have an amount of money in your trust account, the logistics company can transfer one bulk sum. This way you can save on bank charges and wire transfer charges. Each wire transfer fee costs approx. $20, with another corresponding fee in South Africa which can run at R200 or more. If you are a wholesaler/representative: o Try and arrange with the manufacturer to let you have consignment stock, which you can hold in a USA warehouse. o You could follow the above scenario as far as logistics are concerned. o Your manufacturer may possibly help you with brochure and advertising costs. AFTER THE TRADE SHOW Once your first trade show is complete, you will have to decide what to do with your booth contents. As advised before, the DTI will not pay for the shipping costs to return your samples. They give you the option of selling the samples and re-couping the money. You could store the samples in a rental warehouse, but you would then have to go to that warehouse at a future date to move the good Are You In Or Are You Out? is way, you will be able to service your customers on an ongoing basis when they wish to re-order. USA customers do not like to wait for months for an order to be fulfilled.One of the most important points I learned, when building my first business as a Health and Energy Coach, was I needed to make myself stand out and FAST. At least this is what I realized for myself, but I then soon came to understand this is the case for all solo-entrepreneurs. We are our business and there are A LOT of us. Standing out is EVERYTHING. If you try to fit in, you’ll blend in. (This isn’t good when it comes to connecting with clients and building an EnergyRICH™ business, by the way.)The question then becomes, ‘How can we each stand out when we’re all trying to do the same thing?’ The answer is easy; the action is what’s challenging to most. The answer is—nobody else can be you! The challenge is—most of us are afraid to be who we are in our business. We are caught in what Dan Kennedy refers to as “marketing incest,” a.k.a doing what everyone else is already doing. I recently had a prospect say to me, “but aren’t all the good marketing ideas taken?” to which I responded, “Is there anyone else out there that’s you?” The only thing you’ll get by imitating what’s out there is lost in the shuffle. To stand out you’ve got to be willing to be bold.One thing you can do is always look for ways to improve incrementally. Ask yourself, “How can I make my service better? How o Try and find a rep who will sell your goods. It is preferable to have someone in place all the time, rather than trying to sell from afar. o Your logistics company can arrange the picking, packing and shipping of the order. If you want to take their responsibilities further, they can do your invoicing and collecting of money on your behalf. o As soon as you have an amount of money in your trust account, the logistics company can transfer one bulk sum. This way you can save on bank charges and wire transfer charges. Each wire transfer fee costs approx. $20, with another corresponding fee in South Africa which can run at R200 or more. If you are a wholesaler/representative: o Try and arrange with the manufacturer to let you have consignment stock, which you can hold in a USA warehouse. o You could follow the above scenario as far as logistics are concerned. o Your manufacturer may possibly help you with brochure and advertising costs. AFTER THE TRADE SHOW Once your first trade show is complete, you will have to decide what to do with your booth contents. As advised before, the DTI will not pay for the shipping costs to return your samples. They give you the option of selling the samples and re-couping the money. You could store the samples in a rental warehouse, but you would then have to go to that warehouse at a future date to move the goods. You could warehouse the samples with a logistics company. When you next need them, you can arrange with the logistics company to forward the samples to the next trade show. You will not, however, be reimbursed by the DTI for that cost. You could abandon the samples and booth equipment. That would be costly, because you would have to replace those samples for future shows. LOGISTICS IN THE USA When you supply goods into the USA market, you need to have good packaging. Each item needs to be in its own box and clearly labeled. Packaging is a very important part of merchandising. If you are going to use a logistics company, again, each item needs to be in its own box (unless you sell, say, a dozen items per box), and they need to have clear codes and labels. You will also have to let the logistics company know the price of each item so that packing lists can be generated for the orders. If your goods are fragile, packaging is vitally important. They should be securely packed in bubble wrap, and wedged into their boxes so that there is no movement when the boxes are shipped locally. All common carriers here recommend that your goods pass “the drop test” : If a box is dropped from a height, no damage will be done to the contents. They are notorious for throwing the boxes around. The same applies to airfreight consignments. You should make sure that your boxes are packed securely onto pallets and then shrink wrapped so that they don’t move. That will also ensure that your consignments are not split up en route, causing delays in deliveries. Always allow two extra weeks for delays in Customs Clearance, air delays, etc. Your goods will never arrive at its destination when your agents tell you they will. TRAVEL ARRANGEMENTS It is important that you plan your travel to the USA very carefully. The weather plays an important part in planning your trip, as it is not uncommon for flights to be delayed or cancelled altogether due to inclement weather, either snow or rain or wind, etc. This can play havoc if you haven’t left yourself enough time to arrive at your destination in order to set up your booth. It is preferable to allow an extra day earlier than the show set up day, so that you don’t have to panic if there is a delay. TAKE A VACATION Once your trade show is over, take an extra day or two to visit the city. You won’t have much time when the show is on, and you may as well take a breather before the hard work starts to supply the goods. HAVE FUN !!
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