Exporting Flowers

If you are anywhere on earth hoping to export peonies, then you have to go up against the best.  Here a company in China is confident enough to explain the entire process...

1. Fresh Cut Listing

2. Price list

3. Packing, Shipping and documentation

One bit of advice from this page is risky...

2, By post office. The cost is about 19.4$/kg. You do not need pay tax in your country by this way and   do  not need any document paper. The plants can be ship out in one week.   

Careful... this may be practically true, but imprudent to state...  what if that one shipment is interdicted... the buyer would complain for having relied on the sellers advice.  In int'l trade, no good deed goes unpunished.

Their minimum is a 20' container.  Clearly that is for an importer with a nationwide distribution.  After adding mark-ups it is probably $7-10 a stem.  So that makes a small grower in USA competitive when selling peonies on a MOQ FOB $500 a box export offer.

So much opportunity, os little time.

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Limitless Credit to Lend

This is so sad...  because we have limitless credit to spend, the price of everything in USA is inflated until we are no longer competitive in world markets.  Vendor financing, eg, ExImBank is how we get sales.  Our largest corporations launder the profits overseas to escape the taxes, and the USA middle class is being crushed.    Not to worry, there are also police officers standing by ready to execute anyone selling loose cigarettes, a man who otherwise would have been working in a USA factory if we did not have this notion of limitless credit to lend.


(Here a dozen police officers execute a man.)

So while we are trying to blame Russia for an airplane most likely downed by the Ukraine, and otherwise fomenting instability all over the planet, and why not, we don't have to work for a living, China is cutting deals with countries with which we should be trading.

Trade between China and Brazil soared to $83.3 billion last year from $3.2 billion in 2002, with iron ore, soy and oil the bulk of Brazilian exports, making China the South American nation's biggest trade partner.According to the National Association of Rail Transporters in Brazil, the country's railroad system transported a total of 490,000 tons of materials in 2013. Coal and iron ore accounted for more than 75 percent of total goods.In less than two decades, China has emerged as the biggest trade partner with Brazil, Chile and Peru, and is set to overtake the European Union as the region's second-largest trade partner in 2016, according to United Nation's figures.Su Zhenxing, an expert on Latin American studies from Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said Latin America has long targeted diversifying its diplomatic and economic relations, which were once dominated by its relationship with the US and Europe, with growing attention to Asia.

Now this deal is for large projects, moving natural resources, but ten thousand small businesses will grow around the infrastructure.

The Chinese have better things to worry about than someone selling one cigarette at a time on the street to make a living.  In the USA, a dozen cops believe it is a matter of life and death.  I used to call the cops after making an arrest.  Now you'd have to be crazy to ever dial 911.

(I will say, I've seen similar scenes in places like San Francisco to the one above, where the cops are not so eager to prove their manhood or "bag a buck"... where they de-escalate (write a ticket?)...  or of course Hong Kong, where I'd have no problem talking to a cop.  Police departments CAN be well managed, but they are not.)

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Rogers On BRICS

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Microsoft Layoffs - Job At Risk?

Microsoft is laying off 18,000.  You may be getting nervous in your job.  Tech talent is a dime a dozen, but we are woefully short of entrepreneurs.  The big has gotten top-heavy, and things are rather getting out of control...  government can't keep control of infectious diseases at the CDC, the border is in chaos, we are losing any war we are in, missiles are launched mysteriously, chicken recalls, Target can't secure 90 million credit card numbers, the NSA is busy passing naked pictures of your girlfriend around.

The Soviet Union was this way.  I was in Moscow circa 2003, about a dozen years after the Soviet Union fell. The place was vibrant with small business, and guards at empty Soviet era establishments.  The USA Soviet is falling apart, small business is a way out.  Don't end up a guard at an empty WalMart store.

If you are working right now, distinguish yourself by telling the boss you want to earn a promotion by increasing sales...  if your company makes something, by finding new export markets (even if you export now, you'll look for new business. )  If your company makes nothing, then importing items to sell.  And this can be goods or services or agriculture or anything.

If food is your thing, I have two food specific seminars coming up, on live and one online...

Live -  UCBerkeley  15 Aug 2014  make your boss pay for this, you get Berkeley credit!

Online -  Various Schools  This one you can do from home.

Then this October I have a general import export seminar online....

The courses are hands on and highly rated by students for content, pace and humor.  Sign up now!

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Microsoft Layoffs - Two Steps Forward, One Back

For Microsoft, a company of 180,000 to lay off 10% of its workforce is news.  But wait, 12.500 of those 18,000 come from the just-acquired Nokia company.

The cuts will begin with a first wave of 13,000, with the vast majority of employees whose jobs will be eliminated being notified over the next six months, according to a memo from CEO Satya Nadella.

Well, so in essence about 5500 Microsofters are actually out.  some will get rehired, some will start companies.  Those who start companies will benefit the rest of us as opposed to remaining redundant at Microsoft.

What strikes me as Human Resource Madness is to announce the jobs will be eliminated "over the next six months."  No!  You give people their severance checks at 4:59 pm Friday night, tell them to clear out their desks, take away their keys and have security escort them to the door.  Have a nice weekend!

Then at 5:01 pm you send out a press release.  Done!

I though Microsoft had world class human resources folks.

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A Colloquy On Business Start Up

On Jul 9, 2014, at 2:09 PM, R C wrote:

Hello John,

My name is R and I live abroad in Mexico City.

***Thanks for your email.  Are you an American, I take it your are fluent in Spanish...***

I discovered your page by searching how to become an importer and the steps I should consider to tackle my idea(s). Your course sounds perfect for me, I’m an... entrepreneur (or an unemployed guy with nothing to lose and no intentions of incorporating again in the undesirable and underpaid corporate world). I have a B.A. in Business Administration and a Master in Quantitative Finance ...

***they might become exceptionally valuable to you...***

I had some international business courses which covered a few topics in logistics, import/export, international finance, and financial methods to fund and negotiate orders between two parties but didn’t covered the specifics of how to evaluate a good opportunity and the due diligence required in order to import or export a good or service as you cover in your seminar/course.

***So such a course would be exceptionally valuable?***

Is there any way I can enroll in your actual course (even if it’s already started) or in the next available?, I wish Mexico had tailor made courses such as the one you cover, it definitely lacks academic level and postgrad courses to specialize in certain topics.

***What if you were to provide what is missing?***

My future relies big time in my ability to achieve a successful importing business and though have quite a few good ideas to cover some market product that are not still available or some market segments that need a better variety of products I’m struggling to find how to start right away and easily evaluate if the product in sight is really profitable in terms of revenues, return on investment, rotation, etc…

***That is the first thing I do in my courses, discover if there are enough customers to make the start-up worth while...***

I’ll be really grateful if you could give any chance to enroll in your class or at least give me some suggestions of where to find a course that I could effectively enroll.

***I have some ideas...  also, have you thought about exporting food?

Anyway, assuming you are fluent in Spanish, what if you were to start-up a business and teach others to do so as well?  you can use your degrees as your bona fides, but use my content to teach...

As you say, Spanish speaking countries need this info too.... may we discuss this idea?***

John

On Jul 9, 2014, at 6:16 PM, R C wrote:

Now, retaking your questions and suggestions, I haven’t discarded export opportunities, and food is definitely a plus for Mexican exporters since we have a lot of the so-called Super Foods such as amaranth, spirulina, organic honey, etc., which are very valuable for organic food chains such as WholeFoods and the like, but my first intention is in the importing business to cover a market segment in Mexico that hasn’t been fully attended or that has room for growth.

***VEry good...***

Anyhow, I’m not sure I understood completely your last comments but I take it as some sort of social responsibility to give back what I had the opportunity to learn. I’d certainly start helping my girlfriend who is in the pursuit of representing nordic companies in the field of design and import products from the same origin as well.

***  ungghhhh!  "give back"?!  noooooo.... make money.***

I’ve never given classes in a school or university and I’m not sure if your suggestion is in that sense or if you’re just giving me an idea of an opportunity beside my intention of becoming an importer,

***exactly...***

but I’m all ears and open to any proposal you have in mind and still would like to know if there’s any way I can join your course. As a last resource I know I can order your book via Amazon and study from there but I think I would benefit from an oriented import/export course such as yours.

***the idea is you join my course to learn, but also start translating everyting into spanish to teach others, and get paid for it...***

Please let me know what thoughts and suggestions are.

***what if you made a spanish language website and began blogging and talking about small business international trade, with a view to building up a community of Spanish speaking entrepreneurs, worldwide?***

John

On Jul 10, 2014, at 3:03 PM, R C wrote:

I'm definitely convinced that your course would be greatly beneficial for my next decisions in life which spin around a good and sound product or basket of products,

***yes...***

I have big plans for what I want to do ahead and though I don’t want to fool myself with daydreaming,

***If they are plans, then they can be tested... if they are daydreams they go "poof" when tested... which are they?***

I know that the only way to grow big is to think big

***Who said that?***

and take the right choices (measured by and adequate risk analysis)

***Right, no entrepreneur ever takes risks....***

plus a great deal of work and sweat which I’m comfortable with since I’ll be working in my own company.

*** Assuming it is work you want to do....***

Now, I don’t live in the U.S. and that means I’m not able to assist to a school or university where I can take your curse online,

***the idea is you would teach in mexico, not USA, and not associated with any school...***

so the big question is how can I be part of your course? 

*** I have one starting in 2 weeks...

http://seattleteacherscollege.net/exfoassmbu.html

http://www.johnspiers.com/Export_Agriculture/Welcome.html ***

I started reading your book in google yesterday and I’m eager to order it via Amazon, ...

***VEry good...***

I’m really happy I found your teachings and thank you so much for being such a nice person with me, there’s no doubt about all the good comments in the web about you.

***de nada...**

On Jul 15, 2014, at 11:43 AM, R wrote:

Thanks John, your link was very helpful,  I'm considering your food export course. To be honest I'm not sure it is the path I want right now, I'm not too much into the food import/export business and since you're teaching from the U.S. export point of view, it'd certainly be of great interest but may not be translated easily to a Mexican/Latin American perspective.

***I've got people in Chile and Canada and Colombia and so on who have taken the course.. it is a tool, tactic and attitude that works anywhere in the world...***

Anyway, I appreciate your attention and to answer who says you have to think big to get there (as a way to say you have to dream big and plan your business in that direction with the right strategy) Gary Keller, founder of Keller Williams realty, is one of those who think that way.

*** What I teach is "how to" not "be like"...***

One can argue there many ways to do a business or that getting big is not synonym of being the most profitable and functional business,

*** I argue exactly that...***

but what I get from it is that even if my business is "small" I can grow towards a super profitable business and get farther than the rest if I have a well planned and structured way of doing business.

***   If.    Super profitable invites competition. Profits are just another business expense... why is super profitable a goal?  Why do you need to get farther than the rest?  What does that get you?  The "if" means you must discover some unknown "well planned and structured" and you will achieve some vague "better than others."  Do you see how you are setting yourself up for no progress?  ***

It sounds straightforward and perhaps stupid for someone well lectured and savvy in its craft or business, such as yourself, but it is one of the mistakes I have detected from most of my entrepreneurial friends, they seldom know how big they can get in their market with their product or service, they have a narrow perspective and try to figure it out on day by day basis and don't have a defined vision of what it takes to get to a certain point (sales, profits, # of employees, equipment investment, lead generation, etc.).

***Well, it may be something that causes the failure.  Success comes only from customers.  The customers are the most important thing and getting the product or service right is the hardest thing.  All that "well planned and structured" can be farmed out to others cheap.  if your theory does not work out, I have an alternative to offer.

John

On Jul 16, 2014, at 10:40 AM, R C wrote:

Thanks John,

I must be talking bananas in here and I won’t dispute your comments since you’re an accomplished and well known import / export entrepreneur, probably, since before I was born and I guess I don’t have excuses for not taking your course other than not being able to pay for it (which is not the case), or not being convinced at all to compete in the import / export business which could still be a possibility.

I’ll take a deep meditation to asses if I’m really up to this course and convince myself that something new may come out from this.

Best regards,

R C

On Jul 16, 2014, at 12:45 PM, John Spiers <john@johnspiers.com> wrote:

Meditate on this:

Do you want to work for money or lifestyle?

John

On Jul 16, 2014, at 12:35 PM, R C wrote:

I left my last job not entirely for the money, I was getting paid better than most of my friends or above average for someone in my position at the time, my future in there was some sort of certain and straightforward but I was extremely unhappy and my quality of life was at stake if I remained longer that I already had suffered. 

I suppose this answers your question if I’m behind the money or a lifestyle (quality of life). i know that as long as I’m doing the right thing for me (call it importing/exporting, retailing, trading, selling, etc.) I’ll be ok and the money will be a consequence of that, but I’m not a hippie nor a liar, I do want to make big bucks and get stuff that I can’t afford right now, so am I a fake for wanting to be super profitable? I don’t think so, is just a way of saying I’m not playing nor fooling myself into a failed intent of doing something, I don’t mind if I fail the first time I try whatever I propose myself to do, I’ll have to learn from that and keep on going for the next round.

My last degree was in quantitative finance so I suppose a lot of my communication or way of understanding business spins around that knowledge, so whenever I hear someone saying that he/she is not for the money either he/she is already doing what he/she loves in life and making money out of it or is lying in some sort of way for whatever reason you want to mention. Even if someone is doing what he loves to do if he’s not for the money, then in some way is destroying value by not maximising the profits reducing costs (by minimising waste for example), hiring the right employees, investing in the right equipment, etc., those are the strategies to get a better outcome which is then measured by many variables (quantitative and qualitative) but in the end as the song goes “no money no honey no love”. 

How big to grow a business is a matter of lifestyle as well, ... believe me when I say that you have clarified my horizon in a very interesting and insightful way.

Best regards, 

R

P.D. I found a product that I think has a lot of potential in a luxury niche for Mexico, I already contacted a few suppliers abroad that match the desired characteristics for that segment and had one answer so far from one of them. I’m not sure if this will continue because they are asking me to fill a questionnaire to evaluate me but that pretty much disqualifies me since I don’t cover any of what they ask. I haven’t given up on this though and perhaps they will try to venture with me as a partner (distributor), otherwise it served me as a very interesting and insightful first try out. I was greatly encouraged by our communication and to at least have a previous experience for your upcoming course, if I convince myself to do so.

On Jul 16, 2014, at 2:59 PM, John Spiers <john@johnspiers.com> wrote:

Do you believe passion is necessary for success?

Absolutely, that’s what I am looking for. I know that I’ll find it either building up a business that gives me great enjoyment for the challenge that it represents (as a kid gets great joy from building a LEGO or a puzzle) or from commercialising (in the import/export scenario) goods related to activities that I enjoy or that I am simply attracted to and know there’s a market for them. 

R

On Jul 16, 2014, at 5:44 PM, John Spiers <john@johnspiers.com> wrote:

It seems you equate passion with enjoyment...  but passion means "to suffer" (from the Greek) and for the last 5000 years or so when people say you must have passion they mean you must suffer in what you do.  It seems you have conflated suffering and joy.  have you thought this through?

On Jul 16, 2014, at 3:54 PM, R C wrote:

In that respect I have to say I’m aware that the entrepreneurial life is not joy at all when starting up a venture

***Yes it is a joy when starting up... are suffering and joy mutually exclusive?******

so I guess that’s the passion you are referring to,

***No it is not what I am referring to...***

and if so the answer is yes, I believe passion is necessary for success, otherwise I don’t think it’s necessary to suffer doing something

***suffering points to what you necessarily ought to be doing... no suffering, no awareness...  ***

but rather be passionate about it, that’s what I wanted to say.

***Passion is to suffer, over a problem...  all products and services are solutions to problems...  if you find joy working on the solution to the problem (to the customers satisfaction), you have found the winning combination....  everything else can be farmed out....  then you are not only the best at what you do, you are the only one.***

John

On Jul 16, 2014, at 10:11 PM, R C wrote:

Very interesting John, thank you for sharing those thoughts as a reflection of what you’ve been through in your personal and professional career and the hurdles you probably had to overcome in order to get where you are today. I can only agree with what you say below, sounds right on its own!.

Kudos to you!

***Actually it comes from a Congolese priest...  it struck me as right too...

So now I use it as the starting point in my classes, to orient people in the right direction, to get them away from any other premise from which they may be proceeding..

John***

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Hong Kong Revival

USA loses one at the WTO...

"The panel ruling marks one more victory for China in challenging the US discriminative countervailing duty measures on Chinese products. This will further constrain the US misuse of trade remedy measures and benefit Chinese enterprises," Li said.

Well, this means a shift from USA being exempt and everyone else being obliged to follow the rules.  Every complaint USA makes the USA is a far worse offender.  I think USA should withdraw from the WTO, and get out of capitalism.  If we unilaterally offered free trade to the world, which necessarily means abandoning corporate welfare, we'd become unspeakable wealthy, defined as access to goods and services affordable by individuals own money.

For example, welfare queen Boeing has become dependent on handouts, and thus cannot compete against China, since Chinese welfare queens do not demand so much.

Commercial Aircraft Corp of China Ltd said on Monday that it had received six orders for the ARJ21, the China-made regional passenger airliner, at the Farnborough International Airshow in the United Kingdom.
The new orders, from three clients, boost the total orders for the ARJ21 to 258. The aircraft is expected to get airworthiness certification from the authorities by the end of the year, said company officials.

USA could beat the world in aeronautics if we were not tied down to capitalism.  No more welfare for Boeing, Boeing dies, Boeing 100 most capable start airplane companies, USA then moves ahead of the world.

Recall the USA government placed limitless credit behind mapping the human genome.  Private companies beat the limitless resourced USG at a profit and in amazing time.

For example, In USA the Uber Company meets nothing but resistance.... but in China... why not?

US-based mobile app Uber officially launched its car service in Beijing on Monday, and is expanding to six Chinese cities, including Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen. Uber started its test operations in Beijing two months ago.
It now operates in 140 cities in 39 countries, including 25 cities in the Asia-Pacific region.

And then to rub it in...

Local entrepreneurs and residents are building businesses and spending more of their time – and money – in traditional neighbourhoods such as Sai Ying Pun and Tai Hang on Hong Kong Island, where independent companies, including coffee houses and home-grown boutiques, are delivering a bohemian buzz to newly gentrified areas across the city.

A small business revival in Hong Kong...  what USA desperately need... well, it is possible when...

The district of Sai Ying Pun, west of Sheung Wan, is a labyrinth of colourful side streets, lined with independent restaurants and retail spaces, making it among the city’s most charming neighbourhoods. The opening of a Mass Transit Railway (MTR) station in the area by year’s end will only intensify the creative buzz in this once quiet area. 

MTR = Mass Transit Railway. So, mass transit helps?  Therefore government has a role to play in economic development?  No!  Just as no sane person ever lets government have anything to do with money (in Hong Kong several independent private companies issue the currency) no sane person would ever allow the government to get involved in the provision of mass transit.  The idea is unthinkable!  One has to be suffering some sort of psychological or physical ailment, some lack, to think in terms of government provision of mass transport.  Something profoundly wrong. (I'd recommend treatment by Dr. Block immediately.)  MTR of course is a private company.  Transit needs to be in strictly private hands.

We need a Hong Kong in USA to preserve our genius while the cloud of retribution passes over for the next 70 or so years.

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Corrigan on Capitalism

Sean Corrigan actually cost me enrollments when I linked to him way back when... people said he had no idea what he was talking about.  He has been consistently right.  Here is a part of a recent essay... (autodownloads .pdf)  Upon a peak in Darien   (24.06.2014)

The Austrian treatment of the Bust as the true healing process which makes good the diseased structures laiddown in the Boom may be widely derided as 'Old Testamentmoralizing' or 'bitter-end liquidationism', but it issurely undeniable that, as Axel Leijonhufvud has longpointed out, in a slump we are weighed down by the'web of contracts' we all blithely issued when we assumedconditions would be very much more favourablethan they in fact turned out to be. The debt overhang isitself the problem – as oft-quoted Fiscal Keynesian Richard Koo has made a career out of highlighting and as thecurrent darlings, Atif Mian and Amir Sufi, hammerhome in their 'House of Debt'. From Solon onwards, Seisachtheia has usually proven thebest solution as is borne out by the many crashes andpanics which peppered the first century or so of largescaleindustrial capitalism (each in their own way a product of flawed monetary arrangements). These tended to be severe, but also short-lived due, in somegood measure, to the fact that debts were instantly extinguishedin an age before overly-intrusive central banking,ham-fisted fiscal policy, and well-intentioned - butoften suffocating - welfare nets encouraged everyone to cling to the wreck of their zombie enterprises and horribly sub-marginal investments.The individual misery may well have provided a familiar trope for the writers of Victorian melodrama,but it cannot be denied that such catharses did little to hinder the unprecedented raising of living standards for more members of a greater mass of humanity than ever before achieved. No, the business of perpetuating depressions and then fretting about ‘secular stagnation’was left to Roosevelt and his Brain Trust to pioneer and was simultaneously raised into a central pillar of economic dogma by the often Marxist followers of dear old Maynard.

Exactement.  Free markets brought the unprecedented wealth creation, capitalism introduced widespread usury and its apotheosis, lending credit at interest.  When our system comes down, let's recall that it was free markets that brought this unprecedented expansion of goods and service, and wealth defined as access to goods and services.

In free markets banks go bust.  Ouch.  But it is over in a day.  In capitalism the bust is stopped by bailouts with credit, and then the bubble is blown ever larger as wars, famines, stagnation rises.  Down with capitalism!

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MOQ FOB Search and Learn

Here is a letter that went around the world...  part of the process of "search and learn" new markets is to write letters...  often there is no immediate reply, and sometimes the people you contact are no longer in business... c'est la vie!

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How Do You Lose Money Running A Casino?

Build one too many.  Trump Atlantic City is shutting down.  Since gambling makes so much money, everyone is in it, especially the states.  In an example of diminishing returns, gaining customers required outbidding other casinos on winnings, narrowing margins into nothing.

All major religions and ethical systems outlaw gambling because it produces nothing. The fatal flaw in the business model is whereas in a business that offers a good or service, say a restaurant, the customer is satisfied by the meal at the price offered.  A second meal at that price immediately following is of no interest.  At a casino, a players winnings never satisfy.  They want more at the same price, a price at which the casino necessarily loses.

Another reason casinos are failing is there seems to be a better one at play, the stock markets.  Stockman strikes again:

At the end of the day, the Fed and its fellow traveling central banks have systematically dismantled the natural stability mechanisms of financial markets. Accordingly, financial markets have now become dangerous casinos in which speculative bubbles are guaranteed to build to dangerous extremes as the central bank driven financial inflation gathers force.  That’s where we are now. Again.

It seems there is now a "win only" casino out there, the stock market.  Good luck with that.

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Larry Reads My Mind on November Hong Kong Wine Show

Hi, John.

It occurs to me that you could create an online course for trade show participation.  I was quite interested in the Hong Kong show, but since that it limited to wine and spirits it wouldn't help me at this point.  I may instead attend the Korean food fair toward the middle of November.

I would like to start participating in trade shows, but I certainly need more information (as well as customers) to make the expenditure worthwhile.

Thanks,

Hey Larry,

That is exactly what I am doing...  I've held up a book on this point: the trade show and selling.

The trade show itself is a seminar, and the prerequisite is either the online selling food or the Berkeley all day seminar...

http://extension.berkeley.edu/search/publicCourseSearchDetails.do?method=load&courseId=3381416

OR

http://seattleteacherscollege.net/exfoassmbu.html

In fact, the HKTDC has added "friends of wine" to this November show, and we have a Maraschino cherry exporter and some fish people on board.  the heart of the booth is wine, but we have food as well.

But you are exactly right, and I stress this in the seminars (and the upcoming book) get the customers first, THEN go to the trade shows, not the other way around.

John

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Passion and Joy In Start-up

I argue your "right product (or service)" is discovered by approaching what problem causes you to suffer (passion) and what gives you joy in working on the solution to that problem.  Happiness is around family, and not vocation.  But joy is around vocation, what you "do."  And you cannot get to joy directly, it is only through passion (suffering).

Happiness is tough, because it is tied up with family.  But joy is completely up to you.

For a working example of all this, suffering and solving problems and joy, here is a working example, in action:


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Amazon, Mish, France & Free Trade

Mish has a price on his head in France so he can be excused for going over the top regarding that country.  I agree with him 94% of the time, so on the rare disagreements, I like to highlight the differences.

Mish is a devotee of Austrian economics, and he has made a tremendous contribution to the field.  While Schiff, North et al were all predicting hyperinflation based on Austrian analysis, Mish pointed out there the unprecedented introduction of lending credit off balance sheet suppressed inflation, and hyperinflation was not going to happen.  And if I recall, Mish suggests what we will see before hyperinflation is deflation due to credit destruction.

Now, people are coming around to this notion, and it can all be traced back to the 1971 Nixon cutting loose from the Bretton Woods “gold standard lite.”

That the destructive bank practice of off-balance-sheet lending of credit is now well known and recognized is largely due to Mish, I believe.  Recognising the implications is above my pay grade, but my claim to fame in all of this is to have discovered the time, place and means that the practice was disseminated.  It was promoted in the banking industry back in 1982.  On this I have blogged, and it will be the heart of a book I am writing.

So Mish is exercised on the French treatment of Amazon:

Under "unfair competition" laws France has decided it is far better for consumers to pay full price for goods than to receive a discount. Striking out at Amazon, France passed a law dubbed the "Anti-Amazon Law", that banned free shipping. Amazon's response was to charge a penny, but sadly it can no longer offer discounts on books.
The Wall Street Journal reports Amazon Shelves French Book Discounts. Amazon.com Inc. ended all book discounts in France on Thursday, and began charging a token penny for shipping books, bowing to a new French law aimed at protecting local bookstores from what they had described as “unfair competition” from the U.S. online retailer.
The new law, which went into effect Thursday morning, essentially forbids online booksellers from applying government-regulated discounts to the cover prices of books. They can mark down shipping under the new law--often called the “Anti-Amazon” law--but they cannot offer it free. 
The new law is the latest step by European governments--particularly France’s--to rein in what they see as the growing power of a group of largely American tech companies. The French government said last month that it aims to propose new regulations at a European level to ensure a “level playing field” for European companies against U.S. firms.
"Publishers and bookstores are organizing against the unacceptable commercial pressure exercised by Amazon," France's main bookstore association, which had lobbied for the new law, said in a statement. "We have repeatedly denounced the 'dumping' and unfair competition by online retailers, particularly Amazon." 

Yes, it is defensive.  USA tech companies have the advantage of limitless credit with which to come in and cut prices to the point of destroying what they want.  And Amazon does not have to make money, because it's credit is essentially zero cost.  Yes, it is unfair, and destructive, and advances false economies. Now, privately the answer is not protectionist laws, but entrepreneurship.  Amazon cannot compete with brick and mortar stores.  So now Amazon is establishing brick and mortar.

You can order online, and pick up your order from a physical location, as in these lockers in Seattle:

Amazon is losing money on online sales.  Therefore, help them lose as much as possible.  Shopping online and shopping in a bookstore are two separate and distinct human activities.  Aside from a book being involved, neither has the slightest connection with the other.  75% of book sales are classic, like The Iliad and anything Shakespeare.... the other 25% is bestsellers and special order.  So cut off Amazon's move into brick and mortar by setting up an order desk in your bookstore that orders from Amazon and delivers to your store.  Instead of letting amazon win the foothold in brick and mortar as above, clear an easy 8% affiliate fee giving the customer what they want.  And be have access to every book in publication, so Amazon has nothing over you since you front Amazon as a small bookstore. In fact, we still have countless thriving bookstores in USA, they are not complaining about Amazon, because they are busy thriving with Amazon.  And every bookstore in USA should have a coffee shop and a fireplace.

Mish goes on:

No One Looks Out For the Consumer
Who is watching out for the consumer? Answer: no one. When you reward inefficiency, ineptitude, and rudeness, the result is more inefficiency, more ineptitude, and more rudeness. 
People who have to pay more for books, have less money to spend on something else. And if they feel books are not a bargain, they don't buy them. 
France supposedly wants more tourist dollars. Good luck with that, when everything is overpriced and the government tells store owners what hours they can or cannot be open.
Petition of the Candle Makers 
Ironically, French economist Frederic Bastiat lampooned protectionism back in 1845 when he penned 'Petition of the Candle Makers', mocking the sun's "unfair trade advantage" over candle-makers.
We are suffering from the ruinous competition of a rival who apparently works under conditions so far superior to our own for the production of light that he is flooding the domestic market with it at an incredibly low price; for the moment he appears, our sales cease, all the consumers turn to him, and a branch of French industry whose ramifications are innumerable is all at once reduced to complete stagnation. This rival, which is none other than the sun, is waging war on us so mercilessly we suspect he is being stirred up against us by perfidious Albion (excellent diplomacy nowadays!), particularly because he has for that haughty island a respect that he does not show for us.” 
"No Competition" Laws
"Unfair competition" laws should be called what they really are: "No competition" laws, complete with higher prices, poor service, and higher unemployment. 
What's next? Outlawing Kindle? Taxing eBooks as "unfair competition" against "real" books? What about taxing those who use free solar energy instead of candles? 

Well... it is unfair competition, it is USA imperialism inflicted on France, but it can be beat.  That is the beauty of a free market, it needs nothing to win in a fight with imperialism.  As you see, Amazon gets around the government of France's best efforts.  What I advise Amazon cannot get around, for the more if exerts, the more it loses.

I love amazon, I make amazon, and as a micropublisher myself, I compete with and beat Amazon.  But if you ask the government to help you fight amazon, you lose.

France invented the term Laissez Faire, having learned it from the Spanish scholastics who picked it up from Moslem universities...  Scottish Catholics past it on to Scottish protestants who took it worldwide with the British empire.  And as Sowell notes, USA citizens of African ancestries from former slave colonies of the British are the wealthier sort in USA, whereas those of formerly French colonies are generally of the impoverished sort.  Free trade matters, and the French ought rediscover what they put a name too.

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