Commercial Service + Corporate Partners = U.S. Export Success!
August 3, 2009(This post contains external links. Please review our external linking policy.)
Greg Briscoe has been a Commercial Officer for eight years. He currently serves the U.S. and Foreign Commercial Service in Memphis, Tennessee and is responsible for managing cooperation under the Commercial Service-FedEx Corporate Partnership. Prior to coming to Memphis, Greg served in Tokyo, Japan and Paris, France.
I just completed another great phone call with a small U.S. company expanding its exporting profile as a direct result of cooperation between the U.S. Commercial Service and FedEx, a Commerce Service corporate partner. I’ve been following up with the 12 small- medium-sized FedEx clients that participated in the November 2008 FedEx Trade Mission to India that was certified by the Commercial Service. A few comments I’ve been hearing:
- “You did in one week in India what it took me two years to do on my own in finding a suitable, trusted representative in India. This will increase our sales in India by three fold!”
- “The trade mission gave us the courage and perspective necessary to pursue the business success we are now experiencing in India, which will total 15% to 20% of our revenues over the next several years.”
Needless to say, these have been very satisfying calls to take. But FedEx isn’t the only corporate partner working with us to help U.S. small- and medium-sized companies raise their export profiles.
Members of the FedEx Trade Mission to India Take Time to Pose for a Photo in Mumbai, India. (U.S. Department of Commerce photo)
My colleagues and I also work with Baker & McKenzie, City National Bank, Comerica Bank, M&T Bank, PNC, TD Bank, the U.S. Postal Service, eBay, Google, UPS and Zions Bank to help increase U.S. exports. These are not the only private companies we work with, but this group of companies competed for a no-cost contract to become our promotional partners. They were awarded the contract to help promote the U.S. Commercial Service and increase the number of firms who export. In fact – we’re looking for additional partners now – look for it on fedbizopps.gov.
Together, by using webinars, seminars, and publications (such as “The Basic Guide to Exporting,” “Getting Paid by Your Latin American Buyer,” and “The Trade Finance Guide”) we educate companies on the “how to’s” of exporting. I think we are only scratching the surface of what we, the U.S. Commercial Service and our private sector partners, can do together. I look forward to many more calls with U.S. companies reporting on their successes overseas resulting from these very successful public/private partnerships. FedEx’s next trade mission is to Turkey this November. Join us!
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