International Inventory Optimization with Burak Yolga, Forceget

[00:00:00] I think now it's becoming very crucial for businesses to track their international shipments.

[00:00:05] Speak to their suppliers, manage all the inventory management of their inventory and

[00:00:11] cash flow under the same platform where they can have better visibility and data is

[00:00:15] so important.

[00:00:16] You have no idea how many big brands we're talking and probably one of the departments

[00:00:21] they care the least was international shipping and inventory management.

[00:00:26] Not there like, oh my god we have to find a solution to that.

[00:00:30] We need to hire an expert.

[00:00:32] Hello and welcome to the Next Level Supply Chain with GS1 US, a podcast in which we explore

[00:00:37] the mind-bending world of global supply chains covering topics such as automation,

[00:00:42] innovation, unique identity and more.

[00:00:45] I'm your co-host Reed and I'm Liz.

[00:00:48] And welcome to the show.

[00:00:51] Hello everyone.

[00:00:52] I hope that you're having a great day.

[00:00:54] Our guest is Barack Yolga and he's the co-founder of Force Get.

[00:00:59] And today we talk about logistics, international freight, online selling, physical warehousing,

[00:01:07] efficiencies, logistics problems and solutions and everything in between.

[00:01:12] I thoroughly enjoyed this conversation and I hope that you do too.

[00:01:16] Let's jump right into the episode.

[00:01:18] Barack, welcome to the show.

[00:01:21] Thank you for having me.

[00:01:22] So glad you can squeeze us in and your busy days here, but before we jump into this inventory

[00:01:27] management and FBA world and everything like that, can you just furliss?

[00:01:32] And it just gives quick background on yourself.

[00:01:35] Absolutely.

[00:01:36] First of all, I want to thank to my mom and her friends who subscribe my YouTube channel.

[00:01:41] We've been on for a little while.

[00:01:42] 30 seconds is going to be the most listened to podcast yet because we finally have humans

[00:01:47] talking about their moms.

[00:01:48] We'd be nowhere without their moms.

[00:01:50] Absolutely.

[00:01:51] And almost 45% of our company is woman, so they are so driven.

[00:01:56] They're so amazing.

[00:01:57] Our marketing team.

[00:01:59] We have some great ladies in our operation team.

[00:02:01] Our China team has six ladies.

[00:02:03] That's a great thing to share the life as well as the business difficulties and challenges.

[00:02:09] So that's why the moms are very important.

[00:02:10] Wives, girlfriends, very important.

[00:02:13] So your background, how did you get started with this?

[00:02:16] Who is Force Get?

[00:02:18] So I'm originally from Istanbul, Turkey.

[00:02:19] I did my bachelor degrees international business in Istanbul, Turkey and then I did my MBA

[00:02:25] in France, close to Paris, it said business school called Shiptico.

[00:02:29] That's when I was like 22 years old.

[00:02:30] First time I left Istanbul.

[00:02:31] That was my first time traveling abroad.

[00:02:33] Didn't really speak good English.

[00:02:35] And that's where I realized that the world has no borders.

[00:02:38] I met so many cool people, international background, 45-foot difference students.

[00:02:43] And everyone back then they had a dream to travel to US and get a summer job and etc.

[00:02:49] And I had a dream to go to Asia.

[00:02:50] Like China was something that I really wanted to travel.

[00:02:53] So I find an internship in the world's largest Gulf resort.

[00:02:58] I had a customer service background back in Turkey and there were like 14,000 people working

[00:03:04] in that hotel.

[00:03:05] I was going to stay like for six months and come back to do a couple of months backpack,

[00:03:09] trip and Southeast Asia, go back to Turkey, get a job in a corporate company.

[00:03:13] And at the end of the third month in the internship, you know, I want to start doing something

[00:03:17] by myself in China.

[00:03:18] I got a job in a Chinese American company and a sales department.

[00:03:21] I started working there a couple of years and then I met a lot of people in the events,

[00:03:26] trade shows.

[00:03:27] That's why I read a lot living in China back then.

[00:03:30] China GDP was great.

[00:03:31] Like I'm talking about 2013, 14, 15, you know, double digit every year growth.

[00:03:36] The world economy is booming.

[00:03:37] Oil and gas prices are very high.

[00:03:39] All the countries like Russia, Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar.

[00:03:43] They have billions of dollars of projects worldwide, includes Africa and stuff.

[00:03:48] So I started sourcing products.

[00:03:49] That was my first business one-man show.

[00:03:52] And I started a B2B brand back in China 2015, 2016.

[00:03:58] And then 2017, my client started asking me, hey, you're doing a great job for us for

[00:04:02] the sourcing.

[00:04:03] Can you also help us with international ship?

[00:04:04] I'm, I said, sure, why not?

[00:04:06] That's where I started the 4SK international logistics in Hong Kong and China.

[00:04:10] And five years ago, I decided to move to US.

[00:04:14] My name is Florida now.

[00:04:15] That's where I'm based out of last three years.

[00:04:16] My sister became my co-founder and she's in charge of software and finance.

[00:04:22] Mostly I'm more in the sales marketing operation.

[00:04:24] So we were running the 4SK international supply channel logistics last three years together.

[00:04:29] We grew like almost 300% in last two years.

[00:04:32] You have such a cool background all over the world.

[00:04:35] It's just really cool.

[00:04:36] So getting into the guts of it, I want to talk to you about inventory management and in

[00:04:42] all of the work that you do with shipping.

[00:04:44] Why is inventory management so important?

[00:04:47] Like what are the key components of that?

[00:04:50] And is there a play for businesses to have like a more streamlined inventory management

[00:04:57] program because there's so many costs.

[00:04:59] There's so many things that businesses could be focusing on.

[00:05:03] Why or why not is inventory management one of them?

[00:05:06] If we were having this conversation in 2021-22, we would be talking about only revenues.

[00:05:11] Everybody was like selling a lot of products online.

[00:05:13] The business grew really fast for e-commerce Amazon sellers.

[00:05:16] People start bringing a lot of inventory.

[00:05:18] We had all that supply chain issues and stuff.

[00:05:21] But at the end of the day, no one really cared about the profit because everybody was making

[00:05:25] a lot of money.

[00:05:27] And last year with the inflation and seeing the decrease in the demand, a lot of companies

[00:05:31] start focusing on profit and how they can optimize their cash flow because of the inflation

[00:05:37] interest rates got higher as well as borrowing money was much harder.

[00:05:43] So that's why a lot of companies, especially towards the end of the year, last year, in

[00:05:46] 23, I'm not an economist but I'm talking to our customers pretty much every day, our

[00:05:52] sales team every day.

[00:05:53] We're doing a lot of demo with new potential customers.

[00:05:56] We're onboarding it.

[00:05:57] Most of the question they're asking about how they can optimize their cash flow which is

[00:06:01] directly relevant to their supply chain.

[00:06:04] Everything is related.

[00:06:05] It's an entire life cycle which was two years ago, almost nine days to manufacture a full

[00:06:11] container product in China, shipping to the US, selling, getting the money back from Amazon

[00:06:16] or Walmart, Shopify, any other online platform.

[00:06:19] Now it's almost like 150 to 180 days.

[00:06:22] And until three months ago, things were better with the transit time with the international logistics

[00:06:27] with what's going on in the red sea right now.

[00:06:29] We see a lot of problems with the departure dates roughly 10 to 12 days delays.

[00:06:35] The transit times, container prices went up almost 100 to 150 percent depending on the

[00:06:40] destination there actually shipping the products and UK Europe is the one affected the most.

[00:06:45] US is still better but then we had the Panama channel so I think now it's becoming very

[00:06:50] crucial for businesses to track their international shipments, speak to their suppliers, manage

[00:06:57] all the inventory management of managed their inventory and cash fund under the same platform

[00:07:02] where they can have better visibility and data is so important.

[00:07:06] And last one year a lot of companies are talking about AI where they can actually use the

[00:07:11] AI in the forecasting which they need to connect the manufacturing time, the shipping time.

[00:07:16] If you're selling Amazon I'm sure something that you realized is the checking times are

[00:07:21] extremely longer compared to two years ago.

[00:07:24] So whenever you deliver a full-con third Amazon normally it would take them 7 to 10 days

[00:07:28] fully checking that entire inventory now it can take up to 40 to 45 days.

[00:07:32] So if your inventory does not become available then you can't basically sell it.

[00:07:38] If you can't sell it, you can't get your money from Amazon so you can't order.

[00:07:42] So everything is connected to each other and a lot of companies they don't consider that

[00:07:47] and you have no idea how many big brands we're talking and probably one of the departments

[00:07:53] they care the least was international shipping and inventory management.

[00:07:57] Not there like, oh my god we have to find a solution today.

[00:08:01] We need to hire an expert.

[00:08:03] Isn't it funny though how everything is connected and you're talking to people and you're

[00:08:07] seeing trends happen.

[00:08:09] I remember when I was much younger back in the 90s and the dot com boom was going on

[00:08:15] and I was selling IT solutions and it was seven days a week.

[00:08:18] You could work 100 days a week if they'd allow you.

[00:08:21] It was just so much and then all of a sudden one day I walked into work and my boss

[00:08:25] was like hey, how you doing?

[00:08:26] And as you're going well and I'm like it's over.

[00:08:27] So what are you talking about?

[00:08:28] Like there's no more VC lunchions, there's no more venture capital lunchions.

[00:08:32] The money is all dried up.

[00:08:33] It was my first time getting exposed to this stuff right but that's what you're kind of

[00:08:36] talking about with we had the pandemic and all of a sudden everything went gangbusters

[00:08:40] and money was cheap.

[00:08:41] I mean we're talking about 2% loans at the time right.

[00:08:45] And get now start paying a year later.

[00:08:47] Yeah yeah like don't even worry about it.

[00:08:49] You're going to make money hand over fist and now everyone's like oh my gosh, interest

[00:08:53] rates are so high.

[00:08:54] Seven and eight percent.

[00:08:55] I'm like seven eight percent.

[00:08:56] I've seen it go to 12 percent but when you're used to two and three percent, seven

[00:09:01] and eight percent is more than a hundred percent increase.

[00:09:04] Your costs literally double.

[00:09:05] We had a conversation with my kids and I there's starting to become drivers and they're

[00:09:09] like oh I want to buy this car and dad what about that car?

[00:09:12] And like well when I looked at that car the financing was 3% and I can afford the payment.

[00:09:15] Now the financing is 7%.

[00:09:16] I'm not spending $1,500 a month on a car but that's what you're at.

[00:09:21] And you're talking about international.

[00:09:23] I feel that it was always a microcosm or just a niche field in space in the past and

[00:09:30] now we're all realizing like it's a small world.

[00:09:34] We're all interconnected like there's a lot going on.

[00:09:37] So I said a lot.

[00:09:38] I got on my soapbox Liz thank you so much.

[00:09:40] I appreciate it.

[00:09:41] Only one rolling of the eye there that I saw.

[00:09:44] Let's get back to Barack you and your experience and trying to help out our listeners here.

[00:09:50] When it comes to inventory management especially with this international aspect of it.

[00:09:55] What are some of the common challenges that all companies are facing and it could be

[00:10:00] just a simple like once they start focusing on it it changes their world or things that

[00:10:05] sneaks up like just some common trends that you see day in and day out and maybe you're

[00:10:10] trying to try it maybe you're not.

[00:10:11] I think one thing is I actually start to read a book.

[00:10:14] I was always telling like I'm really busy.

[00:10:16] I don't have time to read the books.

[00:10:17] Now I'm kind of prioritizing that and then what I realize is like you need to really

[00:10:21] break down it's called Atomic Heavids.

[00:10:23] I'm sure people heard about that.

[00:10:25] Yeah.

[00:10:26] So it's really great because when you look at a big picture it's very hard to understand

[00:10:31] like where this actual cost coming in.

[00:10:33] It's very hard to save that cost right.

[00:10:35] You look and you're importing a nightstand.

[00:10:38] The landing cost is $25 and then you're selling on Amazon for like $125.

[00:10:43] It's 40% is FBA fees and at the end after the PPs and everything you have $35 and then

[00:10:48] you are like okay I used to make 100%.

[00:10:50] Now I can only make 50%.

[00:10:52] So how do I save money?

[00:10:53] How do I manage my inventory better?

[00:10:56] I think everything is looking at the profit side and then profit side comes from breaking down

[00:11:00] the entire process and really actually it's funny because two years ago I think inventory

[00:11:06] management or supply chain was not even a part of the conversation everybody is talking

[00:11:10] about the PPC everybody's talking about the fancy stuff, affiliate marketing.

[00:11:15] Amazon was coming out with a lot of new programs or new announcement about the marketing side.

[00:11:21] Now accelerate 2023 was the year the main screen, the main stage was talking about supply

[00:11:27] chain because that's what Amazon was and Amazon invested billions of dollars.

[00:11:31] Oh yeah.

[00:11:32] They're supply chain the other day we were supposed to deliver a full container to

[00:11:36] a Memphis as Memphis one.

[00:11:39] So we received an email that they're shutting down the entire warehouse, they're closing

[00:11:42] permanently and then they like they need to reroute the container and we are like why

[00:11:46] they didn't tell us that like a month ago.

[00:11:49] So a lot of companies they invested in a lot of money to other things but now it's time

[00:11:55] to like break down where the main cost coming is it the sourcing cost?

[00:11:59] Is it the import tariffs and tax?

[00:12:01] How much DT are you paying?

[00:12:03] Can you define, can you redefine your product maybe material.

[00:12:08] We had a client they are ordering a lot of large amount of bamboo laundry basket and

[00:12:14] that product has 25% of duty because made in China so they were asking us hey how can

[00:12:21] we avoid the tax where like you cannot you have two options number one you need to change

[00:12:25] the material of the product or you need to look for a different country to manufacture it

[00:12:30] right?

[00:12:31] They're like okay they want to look at Thailand Malaysia because it doesn't have the

[00:12:34] China tariff and they're like no we are very happy with our supplier but look you know

[00:12:38] what we decided we're going to change that from bamboo to cotton because it's even let's

[00:12:43] say descend that.

[00:12:44] So we're like okay that's great so there's so many actually things that you can break

[00:12:48] down all the way from what is your import export HTS code what is the product the made of

[00:12:56] you know if you're selling an Amazon a lot of companies they don't really look at

[00:13:00] the aged inventory charges or they don't look at their product is in which tier of the

[00:13:06] FBFIs if you can actually reduce the size of your box like maybe half inch maybe you'll

[00:13:12] be paying 15% less so these are something that we're always like trying to educate companies

[00:13:18] be telling people and imagine if you could save literally like 78% from a product FBFIs

[00:13:25] then if you have 50 product in your catalog let's say 10 of them or 20 of them are eligible

[00:13:31] to resizing that you could be saving more than $10,000 for like 20 products sometimes

[00:13:37] you see those like Instagram and Facebook post save thousands of dollars I'm not doing

[00:13:42] that but it's literally correct so you need to really break down where is your main

[00:13:46] cost coming from is it the full FBFIs is it the FBA we have so many clients that they are

[00:13:52] half offering FBA and half FBM so they need to test so when it comes to managing inventory

[00:14:00] it's not actually how many products you order so it has a lot of connections so you need

[00:14:04] to look at the big picture first you need to get closer break down everything your supplier

[00:14:10] relationship how much you are paying to them are you paying them 30% can you do 10% deposit

[00:14:16] down or 15 do you need to pay the balance payment before the shipment or you can pay it against

[00:14:21] bill of lading so it gives you 30 days to pay the remaining part maybe you could negotiate and

[00:14:26] ask them to increase the price 3% but you pay them 30 days later so it's actually smarter than

[00:14:32] going borrow from the bank money they really need to sit down and talk to their team and have

[00:14:37] the full visibility in their entire supply chain because managing inventory is very difficult right now

[00:14:43] but I think if you're looking at the correct things if you break down and see where your main

[00:14:49] pain point then I think it's sort of fixable you started by saying you need to break down that

[00:14:55] whole process and there's so many variables in that whole process and really trying to understand

[00:15:00] where your lovers are in each one and then put that puzzle together it sounds like it can be

[00:15:05] super daunting but also have a lot of benefit on the other side yeah people also can start seeing

[00:15:11] where did they overpaid in the past was it the employee maybe mistake or like the workers maybe

[00:15:16] mistake the factory maybe supplier and you know it's very interesting because the other day we were

[00:15:21] doing this research if you sell an Amazon and I know that most of listeners are probably selling

[00:15:26] Amazon here you download the brand analytics reports in your category you can see how many percent

[00:15:33] of the sellers are from China how many percent of them from the US and registered and you can really

[00:15:38] see the competition and you can see if your supplier is one of the direct sellers or not there's a

[00:15:43] way to do that actually so you can see if it's a good supplier for you to work or not I've seen so many

[00:15:48] cases that the supplier see that the customer starts selling really good on Amazon they start selling

[00:15:54] them directly they start increasing the customers price slowly so they can have the leverage on

[00:16:00] Amazon directly so I've seen so many different things so I think that's why you really need to

[00:16:05] manage the relationship with your supplier maybe you might have an exclusivity maybe you might

[00:16:09] have face-to-face meetings I don't know that's the break-in-part point I think where do you see

[00:16:15] any senior business and focus on that yeah Liz before you jump onto the next question

[00:16:20] you mentioned it just as a hint and I don't know if folks picked up on it but you talked about so

[00:16:25] many things to save and you said it's not looking at your inventory size right like quantity of

[00:16:33] products like I got X number of this and Y number of that maybe I should reduce this a little bit

[00:16:40] you talked about all these other things looking at different suppliers different locations different

[00:16:44] materials different product sizes and I just really think that a lot of times folks we just

[00:16:51] go into the macro level stuff but you're saying that there's exponential layering of things

[00:16:57] that can get you this and even that 3% on the lighting and this is very creative so thank you for

[00:17:04] sharing all right no problem I think it's daily challenges that we are having our customers and

[00:17:09] we need to be flexible that's where we're trying to have our mindset in the company like whenever

[00:17:14] we have a challenge every day we're going to have a challenge every day the bigger company gets

[00:17:18] we have more challenges but we want to be like practical to help people eventually I really think

[00:17:23] that these people they have savings they may be saved money they get blown from the bank and

[00:17:30] they need to like optimize things and how they can optimize we always like to give companies

[00:17:35] our friends customers options if you do this option this is the result if you use this option

[00:17:41] maybe you have longer transit time but you have a cheaper option like what is your priority I think

[00:17:45] people need to focus on their priority whether it is saving time expanding to a new marketplace

[00:17:52] share selling on amazon you have you ever consider about selling on canada you change Germany

[00:17:57] you could use the leverage of having the same supplier same product you could increase the number

[00:18:02] of product that you ordering you can decrease the price you can negotiate but you can start selling

[00:18:06] in different marketplaces and it's literally transferring the reviews you're rating the ppc

[00:18:13] causes much cheaper in the uk and canada maybe the demand is lower but what's your priority do you

[00:18:18] want to sell 5,000 units in a month or you want to sell additional 1,000 units but maybe you make as

[00:18:25] much as profit you're making with the 4,000 out of 5,000 units that's why profit is the important

[00:18:31] word I think today's word we would be remiss if we didn't bring standards into the conversation

[00:18:37] so how to standards from your perspective coming to play an inventory management

[00:18:42] do they improve the inventory management process at all from your view yeah absolutely I mean

[00:18:47] every company needs are very different and I think suppliers are also learning this a lot

[00:18:53] I got so many questions like hey is China changing should we look for a different marketplace

[00:18:58] should we start from Vietnam should we start from South America Mexico you know when we had the

[00:19:03] covid times it was two years ago and a lot of companies they tried to switch the suppliers in

[00:19:08] Mexico and other closer places but then they realized that exporting from Mexico is very complicated

[00:19:14] compared to China so even the transportation cost from Mexico by truck to consult is like $8,000

[00:19:21] versus 6 months ago from China to consoles was like $5,000 so I think companies need to understand

[00:19:29] what they are going through and then if it is their full focus is the inventory management

[00:19:35] and standardizing those processes the product quality labeling the barcode could be anything

[00:19:44] I think this year is the important year to either make themselves differentiated in the different

[00:19:51] marketplaces or in their focus location or maybe they'll be like okay this year is going to be

[00:19:57] like very challenging I think this year is very open for improvements especially beginning of

[00:20:02] the year we are facing a lot of challenges with the international logistics supply chain I think

[00:20:07] managing the inventory this could be a great opportunity for the growth for a lot of companies

[00:20:13] maybe adding new products expanded to new marketplaces especially within Amazon there are

[00:20:18] a lot of opportunities yeah I really appreciate your perspective on this you're getting me thinking

[00:20:22] about in good times you plan for bad and bad times you plan for good and times are always changing

[00:20:27] you know you stated it right from the very beginning that a couple years ago was a lot different

[00:20:31] and it's amazing to me how fast these things move like all you know that'll never happen like

[00:20:36] okay I've been through five recessions so ready and another one will come again and it's just

[00:20:41] circle of life type of scenario yeah you know actually when we had this container prices went from

[00:20:47] $2,000 to $2,000 to $2,000 two years ago which was really expensive insane that's one of the reason

[00:20:53] why the lending cost got very expensive maybe even part of the reason why we had such a high inflation

[00:20:59] but same time when it went down everybody was like oh it will never go back to $5,000 to $6,000

[00:21:04] and then in one month it did and I really think that companies need to be ready for anything

[00:21:10] right now and they should always have plan B plan C so if you want to source a different

[00:21:16] product from different marketplace yes you should have a ready plan and there's a good saying don't

[00:21:20] put all your eggs in the same basket it's extremely important for the managing inventories

[00:21:26] managing the supply chain managing the international logistics tracking the transit times I know when

[00:21:32] we were talking about breaking down the production time or your entire supply chain really a lot of

[00:21:39] people avoiding to understand the transit times the checking times the full film times last mile

[00:21:46] delivery eventually if your customer receives the product in a good condition on time they have

[00:21:54] so many options right now it's just very hard to please the client I mean imagine you when

[00:21:58] was the last time you order something you open an own you're like this is not good limit returns

[00:22:03] or you order something you love that I'm sure when you love it you go and tell people hey look

[00:22:08] between the conversation and it could be suddenly growing so fast so that's why things change

[00:22:13] very fast and we had a client that they actually had this amazing tiktok which I'm not in tiktok

[00:22:19] the virus the three are the one and then they sold out like 200 thousand units in like

[00:22:26] I was listening to the Wall Street Journal podcast earlier last week and they were talking about

[00:22:32] the Stanley Mugs and it was a tiktok piece two of them this company in 2020 their revenues were

[00:22:40] $75 million in 2023 there were $750 million from viral changes and a couple little directional

[00:22:49] changes but this company's been around for a hundred years I know yeah it's just well don't you think

[00:22:53] that's also reaching that $700 million it's a success of supply chain managing the inventory cash flows

[00:23:01] it's incredible I mean if you want to like double your revenue it's very hard and imagine

[00:23:05] these companies are like sometimes doubling five times that's very very impressive listen

[00:23:10] out we're talking and we wanted to kind of get your opinion on the digitization or digitalization

[00:23:16] that was in mother word that used to be used I've been hearing about digitization since the 90s

[00:23:22] people a little bit older than me have probably been hearing it since the 60s you know it's like one of

[00:23:26] these things it just kind of keeps happening but what's the advice you give companies today because

[00:23:32] very candidly I've seen digitization be from hey I'm writing on this piece of paper to putting

[00:23:39] it in an Excel spreadsheet it's in digital form well guess what it's just in digital form it's the

[00:23:44] exact same process you know so not a big big shift a little bit easier to search on then

[00:23:50] hard files and the basement capital it's hard to change people's habits don't you think so

[00:23:56] but there's a fact that only the supply chain international logistics in 2020 received almost

[00:24:02] 55 to 60 billion dollars investment for digitization I'm talking about companies like DHL UPS

[00:24:10] even emesting into electric distribution trucks like Amazon made a deal with VPN which is

[00:24:19] probably California based EV company that they start producing EVs for like Amazon as well as AT&T

[00:24:27] so I think now you can it's a tangible thing it's like you can touch that recently you can see

[00:24:33] what is going on and then last year I was in NRF National Retail Federation show in New York all

[00:24:39] the brands and facings that are companies are coming they spent so much money to make sure that

[00:24:44] people order teams in fashion industry that it's decreasing their return rates because they

[00:24:51] could save millions of dollars if they could drop their return rates like 1% to 2% it's one of

[00:24:57] the biggest expense that they have so they start making the mirrors that you can treat you fit your

[00:25:04] dress or I don't know what are your buying so I think like digitalization has two points one

[00:25:11] from the consumer side so the companies necessarily from standing they have a point how they can

[00:25:16] actually promote the product they can sell more but then how they can manage their supply chain

[00:25:20] more digital and companies like Merseq companies like DHL FedEx they emesting literally billions of

[00:25:27] dollars to have a better tracking for the customers better visibility for their own team so in force

[00:25:34] yet we created a software where people can track their shipments online we connect the seller's

[00:25:38] central account we're going to give them full visibility of the production international shipments

[00:25:43] reimbursements returns basically the entire cycle of the cash flow in the Amazon world and I really

[00:25:50] whenever we have a call with our customers the biggest issue they have what they're facing is

[00:25:56] they have a team in China Philippines let's say Pakistan Europe US in New Jersey in California by

[00:26:02] the time one of the office wakes up the other one is sleeping so they cannot really make a decision

[00:26:07] in the New Jersey office 4 p.m you're having an important meeting with your marketing team you're

[00:26:12] talking about your PPC budget but you don't really know when your shipments going to check in so you

[00:26:16] cannot really increase your PPC budget you're bidding you cannot deactivate or activate your coupon

[00:26:23] and these all less digital handling or this less digital operation is actually causing you millions

[00:26:31] of dollars or maybe thousands of dollars the pound size because you think that your shipment is

[00:26:37] going to come to the port in four days but you actually did not talk to your freight for the lost

[00:26:43] three days and they did forget to tell you that your shipment delay like 10 days due to the weather

[00:26:48] conditions in China and boom are they closed the warehouse that you were at? Oh yeah or that

[00:26:53] and you didn't know until you asked I mean you cannot ask your freight for every day and basically

[00:26:58] you decide to increase your PPC budget because you think that you're going to have inventory in

[00:27:03] three days because you want to boost your sales because you have all new inventory is coming and the

[00:27:07] holiday season is coming but eventually three days later after you increase your budget you're

[00:27:13] ranking you need to turn off your PPC Amazon algorithm is hmm what is going on this seller looks confused

[00:27:19] let's put their BSR lower than what they were three days ago so I think companies these are like

[00:27:24] real stories and companies I think being more aware of this because more and more news more

[00:27:30] and more news social media channels are talking about this and I think companies are becoming more

[00:27:35] interesting in hearing about the options but again it's hard to change their habits and

[00:27:40] are they going to ever leave that in some point yes but I think new generation is kind of more

[00:27:45] aware of these issues it's very true you mentioned the electric truck is there anything else like

[00:27:53] up and coming wise from your perspective in shipping that you see all right and that's kind of fun

[00:27:58] like we we see that a solar panel powered container vessel that's a prototype but I think that could

[00:28:06] be something I think they have like both I'm not an expert I can't really remember it but I

[00:28:10] remember that they have like a maybe hydrogen fuel not like actual oil they are doing a lot

[00:28:16] of innovation so when I'm talking about this 55 to 60 billion dollar it's not only software it's

[00:28:22] also hardware because eventually these companies they are getting more and more pressure from the

[00:28:28] governments especially in European Union to be more emission free they are becoming like more green

[00:28:34] friendly which I think that America is a little bit full of in the Europe in that side but I think

[00:28:41] companies will be spending more money on that part which is a great thing because we really need

[00:28:45] to protect our environment and this fast consumption this fast-moving world is damaging the nature

[00:28:53] damage in the world and I think it's very important to be aware of that one of the biggest actually

[00:28:59] there's a really great event in Las Vegas I go every year it's called Manifest it's about digital

[00:29:04] freight they talk about all these innovations and a lot of multinational billion dollar of

[00:29:09] companies like Intel or DHL like both vendor and suppliers they're coming to that event and they

[00:29:15] all talking about how they can work together with their suppliers their vendors their customers to

[00:29:21] optimize the shipment times the shipping prices as well as the carbon emission free maybe world

[00:29:28] obviously there's a cost for that and if you only want to focus on cheap service or maybe cheap

[00:29:35] solutions I think some of the companies like in the past disappeared I think companies need

[00:29:41] to understand the importance of the new era new world and everything is extremely related I'm

[00:29:48] really hoping that people don't think that I'm talking very disconnected but I'm dealing with this

[00:29:52] every day 10 hours 12 hours of my day and in some point some of the conversations we start even like

[00:29:59] today as you know started from my mom and my youtube channel how we end up in the carbon free I don't

[00:30:06] ask our panel container vessel but the conversations start in one point and in some point companies

[00:30:14] are aware of they have responsibility but they're sometimes afraid to start acting so I think

[00:30:21] in some point every company will need to do more for both their business and for the nature

[00:30:26] and the environment I'm very happy to be part of this generation that we're trying to do something

[00:30:31] favorable for the digital supply chain international logistics we really appreciate you sharing

[00:30:36] this with us and we've touched a lot of different things here with international shipping and logistics

[00:30:41] and inventory management you mentioned the solar powered container vessels I did see that

[00:30:47] I was doing some research a couple weeks back and was on youtube seeing some things and like

[00:30:52] we're putting sales back on ships because the cost of the gas if you got a 3% increase of efficiencies

[00:30:58] you're saving like 40 million 50 million you mentioned earlier in the program as we were talking

[00:31:05] like if you're going through the red sea and you're cutting through one of the shortcuts or if you

[00:31:09] have to go around the corner of Africa you might have just doubled the price of your product you've

[00:31:14] already done the whole you know if you paid up front or if you're paying on the back end it could

[00:31:19] have a massive impact you could go from making 100% profit to being in the whole 10 to 20%.

[00:31:26] There's a lot to consider well we're getting close to the end here

[00:31:30] Liz and I always have two questions and again I just want to thank you for your time and

[00:31:34] yeah for having me you've jumped over so much and you started this off so great with just giving

[00:31:39] a shout out to your mom and her friends which it's just warmed my heart because I lost my mom a

[00:31:43] few years back and just so thankful for everything she's done for me and you reminded me of it so thank

[00:31:49] you for that but what's your favorite technology that you're leveraging today in your life could be

[00:31:54] for work could be for personal but what's your favorite technology today? I'm trying to disconnect as

[00:32:00] much as possible because I'm really attached to everything I have like three screens in front of me

[00:32:05] you know the phone we are very lucky to contact our offices and etc. in the same minutes sometimes

[00:32:12] within seconds so we can apply our customers and I'm trying almost two, three hours a day without

[00:32:17] phone and I'm walking my dog but I recently got like a smart watch which I like to track my walk

[00:32:23] I'm trying to walk three or four miles a day that's a good thing so I can leave my phone home

[00:32:28] so you know nobody really disturbs me they don't call me I'm trying to not turn on my phone first

[00:32:34] 45 minutes to 50 minutes in the morning and I lost 30 minutes and I might dog somehow gain some

[00:32:39] weights and make him lose weight so that's why I start like counting so it's not work related

[00:32:46] it's more like activities related but I think I like my watch right now. I think it's awesome

[00:32:51] you're almost doing reverse technology right? It's kind of a conflict what I was talking about 10

[00:32:57] minutes ago but that's work. The second question that we ask everyone is you know there's lots of

[00:33:02] trends out there has there been something in your past personal or work that has just blown your

[00:33:09] mind to kind of change the way that you think of things moving forward. It could be like a very

[00:33:14] general answer but I think traveling I would say when I was seven eight years old our teacher

[00:33:20] would have asked us like an essay who would know better like the person travels more or to

[00:33:25] a person who reads more I'm very lucky to travel more than maybe 50 to 60 countries so far and

[00:33:32] I think that is the one thing that really changed my life and I think I am becoming more open-minded

[00:33:40] I'm trying every day because we have a team of people like probably 10 different nationality 15

[00:33:46] different languages a lot of religion language I think it's important being open-minded especially

[00:33:53] today's world. I think travel did change me a lot and I'm trying to touch people around me trying

[00:34:02] to be good leader and helping people to achieve their dreams I think traveling helped me a lot with

[00:34:07] my life and being more open-minded you know I was thinking two years old very different I was like

[00:34:12] oh I'm the best you know when I start traveling I'm like I don't know anything in the world so

[00:34:17] I think that was very very impressive for me to see how world is amazing and you know sitting down with

[00:34:23] people on a beach that I don't speak any language it happened in Philippines and these guys like

[00:34:28] offered us like coconuts and cooked banana and that was like a great experience I could never do that

[00:34:34] without traveling. Cheese this is like the best podcast of having my own. I know where it's from.

[00:34:39] I'm not expecting the others but I hope you're not saying that today everyone out.

[00:34:43] Oh! I feel bad for the people.

[00:34:45] Yes, this has been a bright spot in my week Baraka.

[00:34:49] I'm really so much.

[00:34:50] I'm really so much.

[00:34:51] Same.

[00:34:51] Same.

[00:34:52] I really enjoy my afternoon.

[00:34:53] Thank you so much for having me.

[00:34:55] Yeah well we hope to talk with you again soon.

[00:34:57] Thanks again.

[00:34:57] Absolutely thank you so much for having me.

[00:34:59] Thank you for joining us on this episode of the next level supply chain with GS1 US.

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[00:35:15] Thanks again and we'll see you next time.