import and distribute or only distribute?

[Martina C.]

Hi everyone,

 

I am working on the business plan for a company I hopefully will open soon.

I will be selling online, via my own web shop food and beverages (including wines and beers) from a selection of producers from other EU countries.

Since I will handpick the producers myself, initially I thought I would just import myself the products. The producers are mainly really small, so I do not expect them to export themselves.

But as I'm digging in all the regulations and documentation I start wondering if it wouldn't be more practical to hire an importer for that.

 

My questions here are:

- can an importer be hired to import really specific products (even if the volumes are small)? 

- does anyone have a similar business and wants to share their experience and tips on why to import yourself vs hire an importer?

 

Thank you very much!

 

Regards,

Martina

[Norbert Bakker]

Hi Martina, considering that the producers are also situated within the EU, what regulations and documentation do you refer to? 

 

The EU should provide "free movement of goods and freedom to provide services" without too much barriers, so the only regulation and documentation needed should be about product-safety, VAT and Alcohol Excise tax?

 

5 uur geleden, Martina C. zei:

can an importer be hired to import really specific products (even if the volumes are small)? 

 

Undoubtedly, but at wat costs? Better check that first and ask offers. 

 

And perhaps a good bookkeeper could also support you with VAT and Alcohol Excise tax? 

[Bert.]

You  don't "hire" an importer. Further, importing products into the Netherlands is not "import" but intra-community delivery. Obviously wit wine and beer you have to be compliant to excise regulations.

 

Getting the products from your suppliers looks like the least of your challenges. Selling wine and beer via a webshop is generally considered as very difficult due to regulations  such as age check and paying excise duty.

 

Bol punt com, one of the Dutch biggest webshops already stopped selling beer online years ago because they couldn't handle the age verification.

[Martina C.]

Thank you both Norbert and Bert for your answers.

 

Speaking about the regulations I was mainly referring to the Excise taxes. The rest indeed looked quite straight forward. As suggested I will check with an accountant, which will probably make my job easier.

 

Also, thanks for pointing out the topic of the age check. I just thought it was enough to put a mandatory selection for the customer to declare that they are older than 18 as I have seen in multiple webshops, but I'll dig deeper.

 

[Bert.]

If you find an accoutant aks if he can tell you more about the implementation of the Horizontal Excise Directive and version 4.1 of EMCS (13-02-2023). If he can't, look for someone else.....

[Martina C.]

On 26/01/2024 at 11:11, Bert. said:

If you find an accoutant aks if he can tell you more about the implementation of the Horizontal Excise Directive and version 4.1 of EMCS (13-02-2023). If he can't, look for someone else.....

Thank you for your tip :)