how to start an import/export business

Thanksgiving shopping in an Aiko dress over a grey shirt

While shopping in Chicago with an old friend and proclaiming it my new go-to City for my once a year spree, (replacing NYC,) she sighed with the words, "Paris, New York, here, it doesn't really matter anymore, everywhere they have have the same stuff." With the world growing smaller and smaller, it's hard to find something special to send to friends and family that isn't already being imported in on a mass scale. There was a time in my family when Nutella was only enjoyed overseas, when german gingerbread, lebkuchen, had to be shipped in from loved ones in decorative tins , and when my mother, to the custom officers dismay, brought home heaps of Herbs de Provence for the Cleveland Ballet's Christmas market. "You say these bags are filled with herb, ma'am?!"

BUT when a package filled with Cleveland's own Great Lakes Brewing Company Christmas Ale arrived at my beach villa all the way out in Southern California, I knew I was wrong. There are still things that you can't get everywhere. That cannot be ordered online. That are limited to a time and place. It is still a special and fortunate thing to have thoughtful friends who know your tastes and passions scattered across the globe thinking of you. You are extra lucky if they are willing to deal with their postal service and partake in the old fashioned form of importing and exporting. The best way to get these friends, is to be one of them yourself. Anytime you think "x would love y" ACT upon that impetus. Thinking about something is not the same as actually doing it. This also holds true for being thankful. Always say or pen, don't just think, your thanks.... THANK YOU!!!

Happy Thanksgiving