Ready to make a storming international market entry debut for your food & beverage brand? Are you following the right strategy though?

Launching your food and beverage brand internationally is a big deal and there are various factors to consider. Hence, going barbaric will not be of any great help. In this blog, we will recommend 10 tips for effective international market entry to ensure your victory in the foreign markets along with one bonus tip, keep reading to unveil the suspense!

You can merge your strategies with ours and create an even better chance to perform well on your global launch. Furthermore, you have to make sure that you’re planning the right thing. In the next section we are going to talk about the factors that you should consider before hard launching your food and beverage business into the unknown markets.

Things to Consider Before Putting Your Plan Into Action

Successful entry to an international market is an art and you need to find the right brushes and colors to paint the picture. Therefore, first understand these factors which are involved to ensure that you’re trespassing the right areas!

Evaluate Market Size

Before stepping foot in different foreign markets, the first thing you need to understand is how big or small the market is. Also, what size is efficient for your food and beverage business to dominate the industry!

Calculate Cultural Differences

A foreign market will most likely behave differently than how your local market does. So, you need to calculate the cultural differences and study about the societal impressions before starting to market your products.

Understand The Legalities

You need to make sure that your food and beverage business works efficiently without hampering any laws of the foreign markets. For instance, you need your business to go well with the laws so that you do not face any backlash while manufacturing or distributing in different regional markets.

Analyze The Competition

Another step to follow is analyzing the competition to ensure a smooth entry into the international market. You need to figure out your potential competitors and understand their SWOTs (strengths, weaknesses, etc.). Also, with this you can decide what to do to make your food and beverage brand stand out.

Prepare A Budget

Investing in the international market is not going to be super cheap, so prepare your budget and act accordingly to avoid disruptions.

Implying Native Language

Since you’ll be entering various foreign markets, you would need to customize your products according to the respective region’s native language. For instance, if you are launching your products in Russia, then you’d have to make sure that the packaging, website, and marketing content are in russian language. Athena can help you with foreign language packaging!

Top 10 International Market Entry Strategies For Food & Beverage Brands

Here are our top 10 international market entry strategies for food and beverage brands out there:

Exporting Your Products Directly

Entering the international market by directly selling your products is a good way to go. For that, you need to have an online store, or get in touch with distributors and agents in the respective markets. Let’s suppose your end product is mayonnaise, then you wouldn’t opt for directly selling it through a website, you would want to get in touch with the skilled distributors. Who would try to supply your items in the geological market. Exporting your products directly keeps you in charge of the marketing of your product. Moreover, we get that it sounds really good, but it also comes with a lot of added costs due to market research, and maintenance.

Franchising (Inviting Entrepreneurs)

Now if you have a restaurant or superstore, and you’re willing to enter the foreign market. Then one thing that you can do is start offering franchises. Franchising means that you’re selling your business model to an entrepreneur in your choice of target market. You can charge the business owner for buying the franchise, and an ongoing share of profits from the revenue generated. The franchise is allowed to use your branding – name, logo, trademarks. When you distribute control over your brand, you might expose yourself to threats such as oversaturating the market.

Piggybacking

Piggybacking is like using the support of local business’s distribution channels and resources to make an effective international market entry. This can be done in two ways, one is that you manage to form a partnership with the respective party. Two, you form a joint venture agreement for making your debut international market entry. Piggybacking is a speedy process and can drive amazing results at super low costs. To be precise, way lower than direct export. One risk that you need to eat up before selecting to piggyback is that the other party has complete control. They could unwillingly harm the brand image of your business.

Licensing (Allowing To Sell Your Products)

Licensing is like giving permission to a certain party for marketing and selling your product in the foreign markets. They will gain the right to sell your food and beverage items directly in the market in exchange for a small fee. The fee could be calculated per item wise or bulk order wise. It can be highly beneficial for international market entry because you will receive support for resources cultivated by the license buyer such as market reach, and established distribution channels. However, by selling the license you will no longer be in control of the sales channels.

Buying An Already Existing Company

One of the most giga chad ways to enter the international markets is to buy a company and make it yours. Like instead of making use of others, why not just buy an entire company which has a similar product like you. You can literally rebrand their whole company into selling your food and beverage products in no time. Well, buying an existing company has its benefits such as access to an already existing customer base, skipping the resources and time cost for setting up a business from scratch. You can either merge with the respective company or completely takeover it with a valid purchase.

Forming A Partnership

Forming a partnership means that you’re ready to get in a professional contract with a company from the foreign market. It could be a strategic alliance or you investing funds into a foreign firm to make a subtle international market entry. A partnership is achieved when both the parties have an understanding of their goals and agree to work on them collaboratively. It is like the barter system (give and take), trading regional expertise with each other to grow altogether. Partnerships can be a gamechanger for your food and beverage brand. However, you must closely analyze your future partner before moving forward with the deal to avoid setbacks such as clash in goals, mindset, etc.

Forming A Joint Venture

Joint venture is a formation in which two or more brands come together to create an organization. Imagine entering the international market with two partners who may have less or more experience in entrepreneurship. It will decrease the risk percentages as the loss would be divided amongst the number of parties, the same goes with the rewards. You’ll have a head start venturing in the market where one has already experienced everything. Forming a joint venture is truly an astonishing way for effective international market entry. However, you need to calculate the risk of a miscommunication happening which could cook all your plans.

Hiring Foreign Market Firms

If you’re willing to hit the international market with your food and beverage products and have no idea where to settle for a factory. Then, you can consider hiring local firms to build you a factory full of things that you would need for producing, and packing products. It would mostly be a contract based project, and you’ll get access to the facility once the construction and everything is done. The hired firm is responsible for legal compliance, planning, and construction of the facility. Although it may sound like a really average way to make international market entry, hiring a foreign firm may benefit you to make a stand in the already existing market.

Global E-Commerce Expansion

Another great way to test the waters is leveraging e-commerce platforms or software to promote your food and beverage products globally. Some food business consulting firms do provide a B2B Global Sales portal, connecting you with international retailers. Such a strategy does not require your physical presence in the respective foreign market. Additionally, you would be required to pay a monthly fee to access the platform. It wouldn’t be that costly, and you’ll be able to reach out to international customers super quick. Meanwhile, one drawback could be that the customers would be scared to trust your food and beverage business because of zero physical presence. Also, you’ll meet up with the immense digital competition.

Self-Launching A Subsidiary Brand Into The Market

Putting money to establish a business right from the start may incur heavy costs, but will also allow you to have 100% control over the operations. Make your international market entry remarkable by investing in the market you’re planning to enter. Now, these decisions are not made right off the bat. You will be required to completely understand the demand, and analyze the customer behavior before stepping foot into an unknown market. It would be a subsidiary of your original idea, focusing on a single variety of product. Personally, we wouldn’t be recommending you to test the waters by self-launching yourself into the market.

Bonus: Take Help Of Athena Marketing International

Athena Marketing International is your golden ticket for international market entry. If you’re willing to spread worldwide, what better to choose than the business experts themselves. We have a splendid track record of assisting over 100 food and beverage brands enter foreign markets with strategic business development services. AMI outshines the competition with our strategic partnerships and relations with distributors around the globe. With almost 20K+ buyers/distributors in 130+ countries, we make sure that your food business makes a smooth entry into the competitive international market. We are known as the best food business consultants for a reason, know more in the blog on “Seize Export Sales Opportunities with Leading Export Management Company”.

How Can Food & Beverage Brands Benefit From International Market Entry?

Food and beverage brands hear up, we understand that you’re scared of jumping the gun and heading unprepared into the international market. However, being international can totally change the image of your business up and down. Let’s take a look at a few benefits of foreign market entry:

• Creating Global Presence: Posing an international presence will educate more consumers about your products which will indirectly help in boosting your sales numbers.

• Diversifying For Risk Reduction: A food and beverage brand only involved in a singular kind of market will always be vulnerable to risks such as market crash, natural disasters, etc. Entering foreign markets will ensure that your business keeps cruising even at the time of difficulties.

• Increasing Overall Sales: Targeting a global audience increases your chances of generating more sales than targeting a local market. To simplify, there is a limitation to a local market, but there are way more sale opportunities in the global market.

• Finding Growth Opportunities: International market entry will totally benefit your food & beverage brand to find amusing business opportunities. You will be ready to be discovered, and by discovery we mean that lucrative and strategic opportunities are bound to come.

Wrapping Up Words

Making a successful international debut is a difficult feat to achieve. However, things can go pretty much easy and clean if you follow the 10 tips for international market entry given in our blog. Also, do not give up on your dream of globally scaling your food and beverage brand. Still confused? Get on a free 30 minute consultation video call with us and get your doubts cleared.