From Day 1, BorderX Lab’s Mission has been to bring American and European lifestyle to the Chinese middle class. China’s e-commerce consumer market is the largest in the world and Chinese consumers are eager to explore American and European lifestyle products. In the last five years, we have collaborated with iconic retailers such as Macy’s, Saks, and Harrods, and smaller boutiques like PatMcGrath and SSence to reach our target Chinese consumers through our flagship mobile app: Beyond. I would say Beyond is THE most merchant-friendly platform in the world, allowing American and European merchants to reach Chinese consumers with ease. We handle all the cross-border challenges that merchants face (localization, marketing, duty calculation, payment, currency exchange, logistics, customer care, return, etc) and can get a new merchant up and running on our platform in just two weeks. Profits start from Day 1! So far, our only limitation was how many merchants we can serve.
In the post-COVID-19 world, small and medium (SME) merchants need better support and platform than ever to reach more consumers and grow their sales. It would be a huge loss if these merchants who have poured their passion into creating their high-quality products could not share their crafts with the world. As such, we have decided to loosen our integration restrictions by introducing the Beyond Global Marketplace (BGM) so we can serve more quality SME merchants. We strive to make BGM a platform that allows a significant amount of high-quality ambitious and passionate SMEs to reach a new level of growth with our support.
Upon launching BGM in late May, we very quickly saw a strong interest in our platform. A sneaker merchant in Oregon, USA and a fashion and lifestyle merchant in Italy were among the first to join us and reap the benefits of expanding into China. BGM is just as merchant friendly as how our app Beyond serves big merchants, assuring new merchants that they do not need to worry about global and cross-border business transactions and logistics. Merchants can rely on our expertise honed out of hard work and learned lessons from past mistakes. We want to help SMEs avoid such mistakes, which can prove costly.
One of the many advantages of BGM for our American and European SME merchants is the flexibility and risk reduction. We do not require merchants to stockpile their products in warehouses in free trade zones, a.k.a bonded warehouses, of foreign countries before there is any sales. Instead, when an order is received, we will assist the merchant in shipping the product from their original location to the doorstep of the consumer, anywhere in the world. It is our “just-in-time logistics”, which has proven to be much more flexible, and significantly reduces risk. This advantage is especially powerful when merchants have a large set of high-quality SKUs and want all of them to be presented to the global consumers.
Currently, our top 5 category products are: Fashion, Beauty, Sneaker and Streetwear, Mom and Baby, and Health and Wellness. If your brand falls under these categories, fantastic! We would love to serve you. If your brand doesn’t fall under one of these categories but you still want to reach the global Chinese, fantastic! We would still be eager to connect and expand our offerings on BGM. Products offered as services for example, online tutoring, are also categories we will explore as our mission is to serve merchants to the best of our ability and promote cross border relations.
We strive to empower our merchants to achieve great success through their hard work and innovation. We will be there to support and assist in any way possible and make our partnerships extremely fruitful for everyone!
~Albert Shen, BorderX Lab Cofounder and CEO