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Assessing export readiness

Exporting your products to foreign markets and reaching new customers can provide a number of diverse business opportunities and benefits to your Victorian operation, however proper planning needs to be undertaken to reduce risks and maximise results. Pathways to Export recommends reviewing your current business processes and evaluating how well developed they are in terms of:

• production system optimisation (best use of land, capital and labour assets)
• supply-chain efficiency and scalability (sourcing ingredients, manufacturing methodology, transport & logistics)
• product lines (range, best performers, innovation & development)
• sales (growth, marketing, customer demographics, selling proposition)
• market segments (retail, food service, eCommerce)
• financial and people resources use.

Export Plan fundamentals

Once you’ve assessed your operations and have validated your intentions to begin exporting, it’s time to put together an Export Plan that will become a key foundational document, guiding initial actions both domestically and in-market. Your Export Plan needs to be targeted and also dynamic, enabling you to focus on key markets and customers but also flexible to take into consideration changing marketplace dynamics. Pathways to Export recommends following these key themes to develop your Export Plan:

• research your market(s), key customers and existing competitors
• analyse the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) associated to your product entry in a specified marketplace
• pricing your product(s)
• positioning your brand and marketing to targeted customers
• channel entry (retail, food service, eCommerce)
• in-market partners (use of consolidators and distributors)
• resourcing – available financial and people resources to support a sustained export programme
• export licensing, food safety and market compliance requirements
• trademarks, intellectual property, brand and legal protection
• freight options, insurance and payment terms

Further information

To find out more about becoming export ready, contact the Pathways to Export team, or sign up to the newsletter.