My name is Jack. I met Mike, a British customer, at the beginning of 2016. It was introduced by my friend Anna, who is engaged in foreign trade in clothing. The first time I communicated with Mike online, he told me that there were about a dozen boxes of clothes to be shipped from Guangzhou to Liverpool, UK.
My judgment at the time was that clothing is fast-moving consumer goods, and the overseas market may need to catch up with new ones. Besides, there were not many goods, and air transportation may be more suitable, so I sent Mike the cost of air shipping and sea shipping to Liverpool and the time it took to ship, and introduced the notes and documents of air transportation, including packaging requirements, customs declaration and clearance documents, time efficiency for direct flight and connecting flight, airlines with good service to the UK, and connecting with foreign customs clearance agents, approximate taxes, etc.
At that time Mike did not immediately agree to hand it to me. After about a week or so, he told me that the clothes were ready to ship, but they were very urgent and had to be delivered to Liverpool within 3 days.
I checked immediately the frequency of direct flights and the specific landing time when the plane arrives at LHR Airport, as well as communicating with our UK agent about the feasibility of delivering the goods on the same day after the flight lands, combined with the goods ready date of the manufacturer (Fortunately not on Thursday or Friday, otherwise arriving abroad on weekends will increase the difficulty and transportation cost), I made a transportation plan and shipping budget for arriving in Liverpool in 3 days and sent it to Mike. Although there were some small episodes in dealing with the factory, documents, and overseas delivery appointments, we were lucky enough to finally deliver the goods to Liverpool within 3 days, which left an initial impression on Mike.
Later, Mike asked me to ship goods one after another, sometimes only once every two months or a quarter, and the volume of each time was not large. At that time, I did not maintain him as a key customer, but occasionally asked him about his recent life and shipping plans. Back then, the air freight rates to LHR still were not that expensive. With the impact of the pandemic in the past three years and the reshuffle of the aviation industry, air freight rates have doubled now.
The turning point came in the middle of 2017. First, Anna approached me and said that she and Mike have opened a clothing company in Guangzhou. There were only two of them, and they were too busy with many things. It happened that they were going to move to the new office the next day and she asked me if I have time to help with that.
After all, it was the client who asked, and Guangzhou is not far from Shenzhen, so I agreed. I didn't have a car at the time, so I rented a car online the next day and drove to Guangzhou, costing more than 100 yuan a day. I found out that their office, integration of industry and trade, is on the fifth floor when I arrived, then I asked how to move the goods down when shipping cargo. Anna said that they needed to buy a small elevator and a generator to lift the goods from the fifth floor (The office rent is cheap), so I needed to go to the market to buy elevators and some fabrics later with them.
It was really busy, and the moving work was pretty hard. I spent two days between the Haizhu Fabric Wholesale Market and the office on the 5th floor. I promised to stay and help the next day if I couldn’t finish it, and Mike came over the next day. Yes, that was my first meeting with Anna and Mike, and I've earned some impression points.
In this way, Mike and their headquarters in UK are responsible for design, operation, sales, and scheduling. The domestic company in Guangzhou is responsible for the mass production of OEM clothing. After two years of production accumulation in 2017 and 2018, as well as the expansion of workers and equipment, it has now begun to take shape.
The factory has moved to Panyu District. There are a total of more than a dozen OEM order cooperative factories from Guangzhou to Yiwu. The annual shipment volume from 140 tons in 2018, 300 tons in 2019, 490 tons in 2020 to almost 700 tons in 2022, from air freight, sea freight to express delivery, with the sincerity of Senghor Logistics, professional international freight service and luck, I also became the exclusive freight forwarder of Mike's company.
Correspondingly, a variety of transportation solutions and costs are given to customers to choose from.
1. Over the years, we have also signed different airline boards with various airlines to help customers achieve the most economical transportation costs;
2. In terms of communication and connection, we have established a customer service team with four members, respectively communicating with each domestic factory to arrange pick-up and warehousing;
3. Goods warehousing, labeling, security inspection, boarding, data output, and flight arrangement; preparation of customs clearance documents, verification and inspection of packing lists and invoice;
4. And connecting with local agents on customs clearance matters and delivery warehouse warehousing plans, so as to realize the visualization of the entire freight process and timely feedback the current freight status of each shipment to the customer.
Our customers’ companies grow gradually from small to big, and Senghor Logistics has become more and more professional, growing and becoming stronger with customers, mutually beneficial and prosperous together.
Post time: Mar-17-2023
