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Use Spacegoat’s Amazon Account to Sell in the EU

Anton Hermann is the Co-founder and CMO of SPACEGOATS, a German software company helping you simplify and scale your Amazon business, transporting it into the galactic fast lane. Anton is skilled in e-commerce optimization, self-management, and technical design. He pulls his strong business development drive from his background in mechanical engineering, earning his Master of Science from the University of Stuttgart.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn:

[03:30] Anton Hermann explains why building cars was not the right career track for him — and his beginnings with Amazon
[07:07] How to distribute products across the globe through a single marketplace
[11:43] The effects of cultural differences and its impact on product purchases
[17:17] Anton talks about the importance of product branding to target specific audiences
[22:26] Anton discusses an inconvenient truth about working with compliance and competition
[27:26] An introduction into the VAT laws and guidelines of online selling
[34:15] Anton shares how he solves problems for global clients

In this episode…

How can you scale your brand on Amazon when listings, PPC automation, and thousands of tiny tasks take up all your time? Do you want solutions to the challenges of meeting Amazon compliance so you can stay focused on selling? If you’re looking for a better way to grow, Anton Hermann is here to share how SPACEGOATS can help.

Keeping up the pace in an international market is exhausting — and it might slow your growth within your home borders. Expanding internationally doesn’t need to come with headaches and hassles. Anton has experience working with different market palates. That’s why he helped create a software and service tool to help solve the complexity of branching into new marketplaces. Now you can streamline day-to-day operations without aggravation.

In this episode of the Quiet Light Podcast, Joe Valley sits down with Anton Hermann, Co-founder and CMO of SPACEGOATS, to discuss taking away 90% of the headaches and hassle with compliance. Anton talks about the cultural differences between international marketplaces, branding your products, and overcoming compliance challenges. Stay tuned!

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Sponsor for this episode

This episode brought to you by Quiet Light, a brokerage firm that wants to help you successfully sell your online business.

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Episode Transcript

Intro 0:07

Hi, folks. It’s the Quiet Light Podcast where we share relentlessly honest insights, actionable tips, and entrepreneurial stories that will help founders identify and reach their goals.

Joe Valley 0:18

Hey folks, Joe Valley here, welcome to another episode of the Quiet Light Podcast. Today’s guest is Anton Hermann. And I’m pronouncing it wrong because he is German. And he told me how to pronounce it with a German accent and I failed miserably. So I’m just going to be a good old American and say, Anton Hermann, great guy, engineer by trade. Right? Right, he had the goal of working, you know, Mercedes and BMW factories and helping create great luxury cars. And then realized after school, it really wasn’t for him, he went ahead and sold some products on Etsy and then sold some products on Amazon, Germany and just took off. And he’s created an agency from that. That’s been around for about four years now, that is slightly different than your typical agency. Most agencies that when you think of an agency, they are helping you sell your products and market products and do these different types of things. Over in the EU, what Anton is doing through his company called SPACEGOATS spacegoats.io Is that instead of you setting up your Amazon account in Germany, in Italy, in France, so on and so forth, they’re taking away all of the compliance issues. And you’re working with SPACEGOATS and selling on their accounts. It’s your brand, your product, you’re running your PPC account, or you can let them do it, but you’re running the PPC account, but it’s all through their account. So you’re shipping to the Threepio where they will kit products for you package it and send it out to Amazon in the right European country without having to deal with any of the compliance issues, which takes away 90% of the headaches and hassle. When you’re expanding from the US over to the EU it’s a fascinating concept. He’s a great guy. Got some good stories. Definitely, definitely worth listening to and considering if you’re even if you’re currently selling it over in EU and you’re having some challenges, or if you’re considering expanding so here we go. Anton Hermann from spacegoats.io Anton Welcome to the Quiet Light Podcast. How are you?

Anton Hermann 2:49

Thanks for having me. It’s always good to very excited.

Joe Valley 2:52

Oh, you’re so chill. So low energy. It’s it’s the baby keeping you up at night that’s making you so chill,

Anton Hermann 2:54

right? So yeah, I’m chilled but a good mood. So no worries about me. That will be a good one. Okay.

Joe Valley 3:01

So for the folks in the audience, can you give a little bit of background on yourself? You know, what you’ve what you’ve done at this point in your career and what you’re doing now?

Anton Hermann 3:11

Yeah, thank you very much for the opportunity. So my name is Anton Hermann, almost perfectly pronounced. I’m originally a mechanical engineer studying here or studying here in Germany in Stuttgart, as Snoop Dogg would call it Ben stone. So here’s the headquarters of Porsche and Mercedes Benz, I thought I will be building great cars. But then I realized maybe it’s not the right track for me and the rest of my life, but I still finished my studies. But during that I already started my e-commerce businesses, so to speak, because in 2013, I had my first Yeah, it was not more than a try all that products or all the T shirts from Thailand and try to sell them on eBay without any clue and anything long time ago, but in 2016, I actually started with Amazon. And it worked out much better because I had some kind of instruction like you’re listening to that kind of podcasts and stuff like that. It was not on the market in 2013. So

Joe Valley 4:10

remember, do you remember which course or program or podcast you were listening to

Anton Hermann 4:14

to help Only Germans during these days? It’s just began with the German content for Amazon FBA and I was like, seeing it randomly because I wanted to do something entrepreneurial. And then I saw this video and I was super excited about the business model and said, okay, yeah, I don’t care I will try it and then I ordered some bamboo toothbrushes from China and so then when Amazon and it was right before the Christmas business, and it worked out so good that there was obviously as most of you guys out of stock the first time and then I did it for a couple of months alone or with my girlfriend, wife, whatever. You want to call it.

Joe Valley 4:56

She your wife now she was your girlfriend then. Yes.

Anton Hermann 5:00

Yes, yes, exactly. And then I realized that this is a business model, I want to focus on the next years. And I met my friends or not met my friends, I told this idea to my friends. And so we raised some money from friends and fools. So, so to speak, but I already knew that this will work out because I already tried it once. And it worked out once. So the friends

Joe Valley 5:28

and foes get their money back. They did they did they the

Anton Hermann 5:30

did, of course with with interest. So with interest, and we bought a five, five brands on Amazon together, and then we had to make a decision to make a decision. Either we go to build up a real brand for me, Justin on Amazon alone. It’s not a real brand. It’s an Amazon brand, maybe, but it’s not a real brand. So the opposite.

Joe Valley 5:55

People would argue with that. People. Yeah, I know. I tend Jordan on here. Yeah, I’ve had him on the podcast. And man, he argues that differently. It’s a brand, you just happen to be selling on Amazon, it’s not an Amazon brand. It’s a brand that you’re selling on Amazon. That’s his argument. Other people argue the other way,

Anton Hermann 6:10

I’m happy for to talk to him. So in my opinion, it’s not a brand if it’s only on Amazon alone. And so we had to make the decision. Either we go for a real brand and offline, retail, different, your own online shop, stuff like that. Or we build some tool or solution for others, where we share our piece of knowledge and do a service or two. And what we what we decided on obviously, is a tool and a service. We call it software with a service and the software with a service software with a service because it’s not only a software, but it’s also not only a service. So it’s a combination of both. So what would what do we do we

Joe Valley 6:56

were we as we as Speights? Go spacegoats.io?

Anton Hermann 7:00

Yes, exactly. Me and my co founders, we had the idea to sell products for other companies, through Amazon, all over Europe. The now you have to say in UK as well, back then it was the part of the European Union. And also since now in since a couple of weeks in the USA. And that was like the vision that we bring your product all over the world, on Amazon, and then the future also to other marketplaces to your own online shop to the offline retail, whatever. So basically a one stop shop for your distribution. That was the idea. That’s what we’re doing now. Okay,

Joe Valley 7:40

so the original brands and curious you sold? I’m assuming you sold in Amazon, Germany? is where you started? Probably right. Exactly. Yes, we

Anton Hermann 7:50

sold them in Germany.

Joe Valley 7:51

Am I remembering correctly that you know, sold a number of brands that primarily sold on Amazon in Germany? Is that the strongest Amazon Marketplace? In the EU? Is it Germany? Or would it be

Anton Hermann 8:06

It’s the second in the world after user after USA? Yeah, thoughts?

Joe Valley 8:09

So that would mean that if someone in the US wants to expand over to the EU, should they focus? Go? Alright, let’s go to every country or should they focus in on Germany? First, in your opinion?

Anton Hermann 8:22

Great question. So before that, I would say like before the Brexit I would say, start in the UK, because you know, the language are easier to get and then spread to the other marketplace. But now I would not to recommend this because you can steal part of the European Union anymore. So you basically are in a separated market. So if you want to get the full potential of the Amazon Europe market, I will start in Germany because it’s by far the biggest of the leftover once the UK is out there, and then expand to the other marketplace. In the second step. That would be my recommendation, because you need to focus, you need to take care of the marketplace, you need to invest money, you need to invest money for marketing, you need to invest money for stock, you need to bring your compliance in shape, you need translations, and so on and so forth. So just for the focus, I would start in Germany and expand afterwards to the other marketplaces.

Joe Valley 9:20

What’s the size of the Germany market compared to the US market in specifically talking about Amazon?

Anton Hermann 9:27

So the German market is around 35 billion revenue, like Cloud Plus minus a couple of billions and I guess, USS 150 or something like that. Okay, am I am I correct? So, one 1/5 Or one six,

Joe Valley 9:43

okay, I know that when people say you know, they expand the first place from the US Canada because it’s easy, right? It’s easier

Anton Hermann 9:50

because it’s easy of course if we when we expand from Germany we also go to France first although USA is insanely huge. It’s easier because similar legislation, similar culture.

Joe Valley 10:03

Yeah. Okay. Yeah, that makes a whole lot of sense. I’m just, I’m just thinking from a standpoint of someone selling in the US, it seems like Canada is an easy enough thing. But sometimes people say it’s, there’s just not enough bang for the buck, right? Because it’s such a small population. And then going over to Germany is the time and effort energy worth it. And it sounds like you may get a 20% bump in total revenues by going to Germany, assuming assuming that the sell through rate is the same, and your product would be interesting and valuable to the German population, as opposed to the US population, because they’re different people with different mindsets

Anton Hermann 10:45

100% As we go vice versa right now. So bringing Germans to USA, we know that there is a huge difference.

Joe Valley 10:52

So what is what are the differences between, you know, the German tastes and population versus the US? And don’t Don’t? Don’t Don’t tell us? We’re all obese and like potato chips and french fries? Because, because that’s just true. But what’s the difference?

Anton Hermann 11:11

Why that’s not the main difference. So. So once before, you have a smaller market, but you have also less competition, like much less competition, if someone or the Germany or other Europe or the USA want to start selling on Amazon, which market would you pick? Would you pick obviously, the biggest one because it’s yeah, it’s the same, it’s that same complexity for non european non American entity to do it. So that’s why the competition in the USA is much stronger. And already, the market is more saturated. So that’s, I would say that’s like the biggest the biggest difference. But now, a bit more in detail about the cultural differences. Germans are also different to Italians, or to French people, or to Spanish people. They are super critical. They’re super critical. And they’re their reviews. Yeah, generating reviews here. It’s much harder from our experience than in the USA. Because if you generate reviews, mostly you get if your product is not perfect, you get bad reviews, because we have like a German saying here. If you’re not shout shouting, then you then you how you can translate translated properly. If you’re not shouting in someone that’s already some, then it’s already good enough. Something like that. Did you get it? Not at all? Not shouting at someone is appreciation enough. Okay. So if you if you don’t say anything, then it’s a good product. But if you say anything, then it’s a bad product.

Joe Valley 12:57

Okay. Anything it’s gonna say it’s gonna be negative? Yeah, exactly. That

Anton Hermann 13:01

that’s kind of in credit card, of course, is super critical. Of course, you cannot say it off about all the German people. But I would, I would say there is a taste into this direction. So there’s also some when you’re talking about Texas strategies, one strategy I develop, we develop this, that you launch, first, in Italy, if you want to sell in Europe, and afterwards in Germany, because Italian people are super kind and super nice. And everything is always bueno, and good and blah, blah, blah, and then you get good reviews and then expand to Germany, because they are more critical. And then you go into the with a better conversion rate into the market. It’s, it’s, it’s a product, which launched from scratch. If you take an us product, you can transfer the reverse anyhow to Europe, which is nice. And then you go into the market with the high quantity of reviews, and hopefully a good average

Joe Valley 13:52

ID or the US reviews that transfer over. Are they translated to Germany? German? Yeah, they’re

Anton Hermann 13:58

automatically translated as I know. And then the people can read but you have to click a small Flack, American amazon.com review, but it’s okay. If the people see the average reviews and the quality of the reviews, not many go down to the ribs and really dig deep into it.

Joe Valley 14:18

It’s interesting what you’re saying about the culture. You know, my last transaction I did with a German citizen, the gentleman named Max incredibly smart, sharp, and he was an engineer as well. But man, he was tough. He was tough. I you know, if we were having a conversation he was he was he was yelling at me most of the time. Not literally like in the top your voice but it was always so strong and so direct. Especially if we got to the contract aspect of it. I’m not his attorney yet. The details in the asset purchase agreement, that little minutia, and the language and the punctuation, all of it all of it was just crazy detail. No. And, of course his attorney was German as well, which it was. It was tough, but we got through it and we sold his business and he ended up working. I think he ended up working for an aggregator. Afterwards, he ended up going to an aggregator grab one out of Miami, of all places. So, okay, so the cultural differences is very interesting. I have

Anton Hermann 15:21

a nice metaphor. What is what does it tell here in Germany, difference between Americans and Germans. There are 100 Americans and 100 Germans, which will not climb up a mountain 99 Germans will do that. When can we’ll make it 99 Germans will make it somehow they will make it. But the first one will always be the American. Because we are here, we planned the trip for months and years and whatever, we get all the equipment and blah, blah, blah, Americans, they just, they just run they just run and try to be the first and that’s where they get first, but half of them will die on the way but the first one will be American. That’s the type of wheel wheel telling you about the difference.

Joe Valley 16:00

I’m gonna have to check with my mark marks. Sounds like he’s got some German in him. He plans and you know, gets every detail oriented before he even starts. Yep. And that jackass, it’s just kind of okay, let’s go.

Anton Hermann 16:13

Yeah, but you need both. You need both? To be honest. To be fair, you need both. That’s one who’s who’s running and one who’s taking care of a slowdown. And we need to figure this

Joe Valley 16:23

out. That’s why we’re good business partners. That works. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. All right. So lots of different cultural differences. What What kind of American products that are sold here in the States? Just would you say please don’t even attempt to sell them in Germany? Because the people of Germany just don’t want it. Get through about one or two.

Anton Hermann 16:47

Yeah, so first of all, you need to think about the luck situation as you have a different plaque here in Europe, in Germany, than in the USA for electronical products. So they’re like, general barriers, I would say, which you need to overcome, but not now back to back to a question, I guess, technical devices, which we have as big brands here in Europe as well, for example, you know, probably Siemens, you know, Mila that are like huge brands for household products, like movements and stuff like that. If so we don’t have a good meaning about American household products here in Europe. So made in the USA is not a selling point, because we are in all this mechanical engineer thing here super strong, and really trust in our brands with Okay, need to pick something.

Joe Valley 17:42

Alright, so no made in the USA proudly made in the USA is not going to fly in Germany.

Anton Hermann 17:47

stock products, probably yes, like candies and stuff like that. But not I mean, not electrical, or engineering, mechanical engineering product, iPhone or something else. But it’s not.

Joe Valley 18:00

That’s not even made here in the US. It’s, at least for now. We’ll see if it gets over to India and Mexico to that nature. Well, over the years, you’ve had hundreds and hundreds of clients that you’ve helped sell all over the EU and now in the US as well. What are some of the biggest pitfalls, mistakes, obstacles that you see people encounter that you help them overcome? Yeah,

Anton Hermann 18:24

the number one by far number one is compliance. It’s like compliance, compliance, product compliance, that takes compliance, all that extended product responsibility, you might have heard about it, it’s a special thing here in Europe, everything related to compliance is a huge pain for if you don’t have to comply with the European compliance mindset, we can we can split it up into labeling, for example, we can go into certifications, where you need all the VAT numbers upfront before you can actually start selling in America, it’s at the other way around, you can just start selling trickier thresholds. And as soon as you reach the thresholds, you just get there and your VAT numbers you need to have everything in place right before and Amazon, not Amazon, the European Union made made it even stricter, there is something called the Digital markets Act, which is implemented over the time, so not everything at the same time, but over the time. And what it says is that the marketplace the products are sold on the it’s like split into different tiers. But Amazon has, obviously the biggest, the highest tier for sure. And the marketplace is responsible for the products which are sold on the marketplace. What means Amazon is super careful. And as soon as a claim comes in, they pursue it and then ask basically they take off your product and then they asked for documents and all that stuff. And I guess that is something people don’t like to think about because it’s not really interesting or exciting to think about rules, and some of them are really stupid laws and blah, blah, blah. But if you don’t do that, you might lose a couple of weeks or months of revenue. And this is something you should definitely consider before you go into.

Joe Valley 20:15

How quickly does Amazon Germany respond to? You know, if if the listing has been taken down, and you have all the proper compliance paperwork? How quickly are you able to reach them communicate and get your listing back up? On average?

Anton Hermann 20:30

Best case? I’d say three to seven days worst case, never. Something something in between. Yeah, but getting a listing block, that’s super fast. And people asking me, Hey, but who else who will know that? Who will? Who will find it out? And not Amazon? Not the government will find it out the competition, the competition will just order their businesses services, just just do that they all org competitive products, and they check the products is the right. hazard warning is the hazard the right size has the right color, is the right information is the information translated and then they just go to Amazon and tell them this guy’s not compliant this guy, this guy, this guy, this guy, and then Amazon takes them off immediately. And that’s why you should be careful that everything is compliant upfront. And people are telling me yeah, I’ve been selling since two years, and never anything happened. And I just can say, then you’re still too small. Because when you read some some dangerous size for your competition, they will go for it. They will go for it.

Joe Valley 21:40

And you said did you say there are companies that actually people hired to just order all the competitive products and then complain on Amazon, that they’re not in compliance?

Anton Hermann 21:49

That’s the inconvenient truth. Unfortunately, I don’t like that kind of business model at all. And I will not drop a name because I don’t support that. But I know people which do only that. So you go to them and say like, Hey, I want to get rid of this for Chinese guys in my, in my list here. Oh, my competition. And you. Maybe, even if you’re if you are compliant, you can find some little detail and at least you will be off for a couple of days or something like that. Or you can make things up and Amazon will still block you and then you have to prove that you’re that you are correct. It’s like when you when they were killing the witches. She’s a witch. No, I’m not proof that you’re not a witch. And that’s at least not here. You have some kind of

Joe Valley 22:38

the only way to prove you’re not a witch is actually to die at the steak. Burning.

Anton Hermann 22:44

Exactly. Exactly.

Joe Valley 22:46

Yeah. Okay. So compliance is one of the biggest things, any other things that come to mind in terms of people that might be moving in selling over in Germany where they totally screw up?

Anton Hermann 22:57

Yeah. So lots of product compliance. And then we see compliance maybe is the second part already. already

Joe Valley 23:06

covered. Yeah, you mentioned that but just just covered here in the US, we pay VAT as a tax folks. And here in the US, we pay it as a percentage of the total sale over in the EU. It’s built into the listing price.

Anton Hermann 23:19

Exact that’s so huge that that difference. If you get here, the surprise is negative. And we go when we go to the US and it’s a positive surprise, because the prices you see there are the net price in Europe, it’s like that in any supermarket anywhere you go. Except like b2b supermarkets, like b2b like Metro, maybe you’d have it as well, where the grocery stores go and buy things. You have Gross, gross prices everywhere. And the gross price is also displayed on the listing, it’s mandatory. You’re not allowed to show an ad price. And in every country, in Europe, where you actually store the products, you need a VAT number upfront, and you need to do your fillings, pilings, fillings, by monthly basis filings on a monthly basis.

Joe Valley 24:09

Filling a filling is something we put in our teeth. If you have a cavity file you don’t want to filings and filings.

Anton Hermann 24:17

And this costs money. It does cost time and if you but Amazon makes it super easy for you to just spread your products everywhere. And they don’t care if you get like problems that the local tax entities so it’s not a problem. So problem and but the button is super highlighted, go to all the European marketplace and if you just click the button Amazon, they will do that. And then you need to prove that you have the VAT numbers.

Joe Valley 24:46

The EU is for part of your services and SPACEGOATS. Is VAT compliance, something you guys help with or do you recommend folks

Anton Hermann 24:57

not not at all We basically take the competitive VAT compliance part out of the equation, that’s what we do. Because we are the actual seller. On the marketplace, we write the invoice the invoice to the end customer, we are responsible for the local VAT payments to the local

Joe Valley 25:18

authorities. So, if I’m an A seller here in the US and I want to sell over in Germany and the EU, or you are setting up everything for me and running the campaigns for me, or am I setting up then you are doing the marketing and the management of it?

Anton Hermann 25:37

Okay, that once that once that before, we have to kind of services,

Joe Valley 25:43

I just want to point out that the audience understands that I keep jumping way ahead. And you and your German engineering precision want to pull me back a step and do it right. It’s kind of funny.

Anton Hermann 25:54

Okay. So normally, it’s a modular system, you get access to a PPC tool, so you can run your own ads. But we run the account, it’s our account, we are registered area tax wise, we are also registered everywhere for the extended product responsibility like packaging, trace, registration, electronic address, registration, all that stuff,

Joe Valley 26:13

your it’s your Amazon account.

Anton Hermann 26:16

Exactly. That’s our Amazon account. That’s a huge difference. And because it’s our animals account, you’re not responsible for VAT issues in the different countries at all. The only thing what you would need to work with us at the current moment is at one VAT number in any European country, just one and only for the important purpose. And because we buy your products and European ground, we need to be at number otherwise, you would pay the VAT to some local entity and they will not pay it back to you because you don’t have the ID number, you’re not allowed to receive the money back.

Joe Valley 26:46

So if I’ve got, you know, 10,000 units that I want to ship over and sell. And we’re selling them through your Amazon account all over Europe. are you earning a percentage of the transaction? Are you paying me for the inventory, how’s it work,

Anton Hermann 27:05

we earn a percentage of the transaction, but illegally we buy the products with the payment goal as soon as we sold it. So basically, it’s kind of a commission. But it’s technically not a commission, because otherwise wouldn’t be allowed to sell internationally. It’s from the European VAT law not possible to make an international coalition setup. So we buy the products, there isn’t the invoice, and then we sell the products through our Amazon account, and then we pay out for everything we generated on Amazon minus our cut. That’s an easy word. So both both works.

Joe Valley 27:41

And as far as paying for PPC and things of that nature, is it set up with my credit card or your credit card that’s coming out of the data.

Anton Hermann 27:55

It’s with all credit card, but you can run it, but you can control it. That’s the good part two, we will pay it and then we’ll charge it afterwards.

Joe Valley 28:03

You have an incredible amount of points or cashback money coming from the credit cards.

Anton Hermann 28:08

We go for cashback Whoo, I used to have the MX but we found the cashback solution 0.5 for one person, so it’s nice. It’s cool. We injured? But no. Because it’s our account, we are charged

Joe Valley 28:25

that’s okay. That’s just such a different model. How did you determine that that’s the model you wanted to come up with as opposed to a good friend of mine here in the States, Steven Pope runs My Amazon Guy. And really it’s a it’s a It’s your typical agency with lots of services versus what you’re doing, which is it’s just your Amazon accounts.

Anton Hermann 28:51

How many agencies do you know which do PPC and content and

Joe Valley 28:56

I couldn’t count and there’s probably so many how

Anton Hermann 29:00

many companies which do what we do do you know?

Joe Valley 29:04

None one

Anton Hermann 29:05

So that was 111 thing we didn’t want to be a me too thing or didn’t do didn’t want to make me two things. So we wanted to make something unique, which we didn’t see on the market at that point. That was in 2018. And so we we tried it the business model out the response was great. And the problem we were solving these days was not that you run your PPC campaigns that we run your PPC campaigns or your content in the beginning we had only customers which were ever able to do that themselves. But they wanted to get rid of all this compliance VAT compliance product compliance nonsense here in Europe and just basically leased our account but run rent the business themselves. Okay, that’s the it’s like a remote on our Amazon account. And you don’t need this bureaucracy stuff. That’s that’s where we actually come from. And that’s also how we came up with this idea because we set up the European Union network or VAT registration stuff for us on business. And we said, like, not everybody should go to the cell. And that’s why we said like, we will do it for others, and then they don’t need to go through the cell. So there are like services, which automate, for example, Texas, and we automate distribution, that’s kind of marketing. Blah, blah.

Joe Valley 30:27

Yeah, marketing, blah, blah. Yes, that’s German speak for marketing. Technique. Fascinating, really, truly fascinating. So, again, going back to if I’m shipping over 10,000 units of my brand, is it going to a three PL that lease or is it going to, you know, Amazon’s fulfillment centers,

Anton Hermann 30:51

we put the three first because if you’re shipping 10,000 units, and most likely they will not be sold in two months or so. So what we always want to have on our account, also, because of the inventory performance index, like our KPI, Amazon account KPIs, we want an inventory of two to three months mix. And that’s why we store the rest in some GPL, which we cannot, we can arrange everything we ship from the three PL then to Amazon as soon as the sockets low. But in general, we import the products on your name, then we get them because your name because it’s part of the business model, as I explained, we have to buy the products in the European ground. And then we ship them to our Amazon warehouse. And as soon as they are sold, or soon the stock reaches some threshold, we restock the product. And then with the three PR stock reach some threshold, we tell you to send us more stuff to them. 3pm

Joe Valley 31:48

are you doing any kidding? packaging? So if I’ve got seven different components to my product coming from seven different countries, can I ship it to three PL and your packaging

Anton Hermann 31:57

will represent? Yeah, yeah, we have different repeals, which for different customer types, and we will pick the right one for you. Yeah, that’s no problem at all.

Joe Valley 32:08

You’re just taking all the light like that mark here. My my business partner, he’s the CEO of Quiet Light. And I say often that he gets all the shit work, any, any any work that is just very detail oriented. It’s just, it’s to me, it’s awful, right? He’s really good at it. And that’s all on his plate. It sounds like that’s what you’re doing exactly what Amazon seller.

Anton Hermann 32:37

If you’re employed one for one person as one person, then it’s horrible if you do it for so one person for 10,000 people, then it’s scalable. It’s fun again, you know, so yeah, we have this problem with the VAT, but we haven’t once, we don’t have it for every customer at once. And every it’s horrible, maybe, but just once and we can sell it for more money to our customers. So they don’t need to go through the same thing as we did.

Joe Valley 33:07

But the amount of experience you must have dealing with so many different customers and so many different compliance issues and challenges and obstacles. It’s just your learning curve is not steep at all. You know this stuff?

Anton Hermann 33:19

Fortunately, or unfortunately, who knows? Yeah, well,

Joe Valley 33:23

fortunately for your clients, unfortunately for you. But that’s that’s what you chose. Sorry.

Anton Hermann 33:30

I never complained. I never complain. Yeah, and never regret everything is called.

Joe Valley 33:34

This is fascinating eco hack, you’re gonna say some,

Anton Hermann 33:37

if I would roll everything back if I if I would know, the unknown before, maybe we would do something else. But we just said like, Okay, we sell for us. Okay, let’s try. And I moved my first business. That’s our first customer basically, to our main business, and then we just started and then we excuse Oh, my God, you need this. You need to cover that and, and everyday, can some something you today.

Joe Valley 33:59

Yeah. The majority of your clients today, are they European sellers, or they

Anton Hermann 34:06

do Germans, the Germans actually, most of our customers are Germans, because we come from Germany. And we have here a nice brand already. So if you’re in the Amazon field, I’m very frustrated if you did not hear our name before. So here we have a good brand. That’s where we have many customers from Germany. And right now we are trying to get our foot into the door and the USA. Yeah, yeah.

Joe Valley 34:31

Yeah, it’s not because German, you know, German clients, because that’s your target market client base. It’s just that you’re well known there. Exactly. Yeah. But it sounds like really, your ideal client, your service is going to be great for us people because of all the challenges of selling overseas. Because the worst thing is, is is like when I’m talking to somebody that’s doing let’s say 5 million a year in revenue and they want to expand Nobody Europe, the last thing I want them to do is expand over to Europe at the expense of not continuing the same growth here in the States, right? They take their eye off the ball, because they only got so much time. And they try to grow that 20% over in Europe, but then their growth slows in the US. So if they can keep the pace up in the US and expand to Europe, exactly, without all the headaches and hassles. And it’s not just all the compliance issues and headaches and hassles, it’s the people, right? When this is one of the challenges we’ve had here a quiet light. As you know, 2021 was just a record year in m&a. And we grew as well. We grew 85% in 2021 55%, on average for the last five years. And with that wonderful, right, it’s awesome, it’s great, but you get headaches and hassles, because you got you’ve got to have support staff to then grow further and have to have that support staff over that understands the European marketplace. Very challenging. I guess what I’m saying is good on you, man. This sounds like a great concept, a great idea and a great service for people that are trying to stay focused on the beast of Amazon US and doing really well. But they want to capture that other 20% Actually, it’s more than 20% if you count all of Europe, right? If you count all of Europe and all the countries that you will sell in how what percentage? Is it of the US? Is it 30 40 50% of the US capacity,

Anton Hermann 36:30

something like that, I guess 40 or something like that volume 3040 yet more more like 4010 30. But the numbers are changing quite quite often. Yeah, something but but thank thanks for the feedback and the problem you experienced you notice it perfectly. The problem we are solving for non European customers, it’s much bigger than the problem we are solving for European customers. Because when you’re already in Europe, you know the drawl, more or less. But if you’re not from Europe, this to get this mindset, it’s insanely difficult. And I guess you’re you’re, you’re right.

Joe Valley 37:09

I like it. I like it. All right, we’re just about out of time here and how to folks, learn about your company. How do they reach out to you how to get started and just you know, communicate with you folks to see if it’s a good fit.

Anton Hermann 37:20

Thanks. Yeah, you already said that. spacegoats.io is our main website. You can also drop me an email [email protected] We have a link. I’m pretty active on LinkedIn, Anton Herrmann or you can also find us on YouTube. Facebook, we reduced a bit Instagram also, but

Joe Valley 37:43

there’s plenty spacegoats.io. Check it out, folks. I think if you want to expand to Europe and you want to do it with a lot less hassle and headaches, it sounds like a great way to go. Anton, thanks for your time today. Appreciate you joining the live podcast. We’ll talk to you again soon.

Anton Hermann 37:56

Thank you very much. Have a good one, everyone. Bye.

Outro 37:58

Today’s podcast was produced by Rise25 And the Quiet Light content team. If you have a suggestion for a future podcast, subject or guest, email us at [email protected] Be sure to follow us on YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram and subscribe to the show wherever you get your podcasts. Thanks for listening. We’ll see you next week.