Finding agents, representatives and importers for America

Participating in trade shows alone often yields limited results when attempting to sell in the United States. Once the event concludes and initial interest wanes, challenges such as following up with potential clients, managing order shipments, and identifying new customers arise. Therefore, it's essential to develop a sales network comprising importers, distributors, or sales agents and representatives who can promote your product to U.S. retailers.

Our approach to identifying suitable importers, sgents, and representatives for your products in the U.S.

• Analyze your company and products.
• Conduct market research to position your product relative to competitors in the U.S., assessing factors like pricing, distribution, positioning, and segmentation.
• Select agents, distributors, and importers based on the desired geographical coverage in the U.S. and product type.
• Contact potential importers, agents, and distributors to present your company's product.
• Present interested agents and distributors to your company and assist in selecting the best candidates to initiate sales in the U.S.
• Organize meetings with importers and representatives interested in your product.
• Draft contracts with chosen importers, agents, and representatives, ensuring clarity that we operate in the interest of the company.
• Facilitate the introduction between the foreign company and selected agents to commence operations, acting as intermediaries to ease the initiation of activities in the U.S.
• Alternatively, we can recruit a Sales Manager who, under the original company's directives, will manage the sales network in the U.S.
• Another solution to maintain commercial momentum in the U.S. post-trade show is utilizing ExportUSA's commercial representation office services in New York.

Evolution of distribution in the United States: from traditional importers to distributors

In the U.S., agents and representatives are typically compensated solely through commission upon achieving results. These are often sales agencies specializing by geographic area, product type, and distribution channel. For more structured entities like distributors or sales agencies, it's common to pay a monthly fee in addition to commissions to cover promotional expenses and participation in industry trade shows.

It's crucial to recognize that the market has evolved, and traditional importers—those who order, pay for, and import goods—have largely disappeared. Distribution in the U.S. is increasingly shifting towards entities we can define as distributors, which are sales organizations managing a sales network across the United States.

Distributors visit clients and place orders, after which the producer is responsible for shipping and delivering the goods. Consequently, having your own logistics structure in the U.S. is essential, as distributors rarely handle merchandise storage beyond samples.

Another important aspect that distributors in the U.S. often require from companies aiming to sell in America is payment. To facilitate transactions, a bank account with a U.S. bank is necessary, as payments in the U.S. are still predominantly made via regular checks sent by mail.