Event Report: Exporting Green, Brighton

Exporting experts UKTI and two local business case studies spoke at a seminar in Brighton focused on exporting as part of the Green Growth Platform events programme.

Terry Enga, International Trade Advisor for UK Trade & Investment South East spoke about the different options businesses can take to sell overseas. He discussed how companies may first want to look at ‘small and easy’ markets such as Ireland which share similar customs and business practices as the UK. Alternatively ‘large and hard’ markets such as China require greater effort to enter, but can provide sizeable reward.

UKTI is able to provide support and assistance to companies including overseas trade missions to meet potential partners and buyers and workshops covering everything from international culture to developing a web presence.

Jo Godden from Rubymoon spoke about how on-line marketing and blog writing have opened up international markets for the ethical swimwear company. She explained that while targeting a niche market can be a limiting factor if you sell in just one country, by selling to that market in several different countries opportunities multiply.

Rubymoon currently sells directly to international customers predominantly in Scandinavia and New Zealand through their e-commerce site and on-line market places such as Etsy and Amazon. They have recently begun working with UKTI to explore the possibility of exporting to America. They are translating their website in to German and other languages to attract more foreign customers.

Michael Yeoman from Powerdiverter who has recently returned from Australia where the company is soon to launch, shared the company’s successful export strategy. Michael has worked with UKTI to target the Australian solar market for Powerdiverter, a product which uses excess energy produced by solar PV to heat hot water. They are working with an Australian distributor to manage sales. Due to subsidy changes in the UK market, expanding to a foreign market will provide more security for the business than relying solely on the UK market.

Presentations from the morning can be downloaded here.