from the BRAND side

Most brands negotiate a distribution agreement as if the supply price were the decision. It isn't. Supply price is a single number that both sides model correctly and argue about honestly.The line that actually determines your first two years is the one both sides tend to leave vague: who funds the market, in what proportion, and against what.I have sat on the brand side of that table for a long..

The fifth in a series on appointing and managing distribution partners, written from the brand side of the table.Two markets. The same decision in both: stop selling through importers and run the brand through a local entity.One of them collapsed. Two and a half years after launch the market operation was wound down. The other started from an inherited loss so large that leadership had already d..

The fourth in a series on appointing and managing distribution partners, written from the brand side of the table.Two markets. The same brand. The same period. The same argument about price.In one, we asked the partner for an increase and the business ended. In the other, the partner asked us for a decrease, we refused, and the business is still running and performing well.Nothing about the nego..

The third in a series on appointing and managing distribution partners, written from the brand side of the table.The question usually arrives as a binary. Online or offline? Cross-border or local entity? Marketplace or distributor?It is not a binary. It is a question of sequence, and getting the sequence right is worth more than getting the channel right.Go in light. Wait until the market answer..

The second in a series on appointing and managing distribution partners, written from the brand side of the table.The request always comes, and it almost always comes early — often in the first serious meeting, before either side has proved anything to the other.We'll need exclusivity.It is a reasonable request. It is also the single term in a distribution agreement that is hardest to reverse, a..

A brand-side checklist from 22 years of appointing, contracting with, and occasionally replacing distributors across Asian markets.Most brands approach distributor selection as a ranking problem. Two or three candidates come in, each with a deck, and the brand tries to work out which company is better.It is the wrong question, and it usually produces a stalemate. Good distributors are good in di..