Assessing export readiness

What export readiness means

• Export readiness is whether this business is in a position to export now: whether it has the capacity, the money, the people, the systems and the product to sell offshore without damaging what it already has.
• It is a genuinely separate question from whether anyone wants the product. Many businesses with strong export potential are not export-ready, and the honest finding of an investigation is often "yes, but not yet, and here is what has to happen first".

The six dimensions to assess

• Capacity.
  • Can the business make more than it currently sells, and by how much?
  • Could it meet a large first order without failing its existing customers? Losing the domestic base to serve a new export customer is a real and common failure.
  • What would extra capacity cost, and how long would it take to install?
  • Is supply of the key input reliable at a higher volume?
• Capital and cash flow.
  • Exporting consumes cash long before it produces any: research, registration, certification, translation, travel, samples, stock in the pipeline, and then payment terms measured in weeks after delivery.
  • Can the business fund that gap from reserves, from borrowing, or with support?
  • What happens to the business if the first year produces no profit at all?
• The product.
  • Does it comply with the destination market's rules — ingredients, labelling, language, safety standards, certification?
  • Does it need to change — size, format, flavour, packaging, name?
  • Does it survive the journey? Shelf life, temperature, handling, humidity.
  • Is its intellectual property protected in that market, or could someone register the name there first?
• People and skills.
  • Does anyone in the business have export experience?
  • Who will do the extra work? In a small business the answer is usually the owner, who is already fully occupied.
  • Is there language or cultural capability, or a plan to buy it in?
  • Can someone respond in the market's business hours?
• Systems.
  • Can the business handle export documentation, customs, freight and foreign currency?
  • Are its production records good enough to satisfy an overseas buyer's audit?
  • Can it trace a batch if there is a recall?
• Commitment.
  • Is the owner or board prepared to sustain the effort for years rather than months?
  • Is exporting part of the business's strategy, or a response to a quiet domestic quarter?
  • This is the dimension that most often decides the outcome, and it is the one students least often ask about.

Assessing it honestly

• Score each dimension and say what the evidence is:

Dimension	Assessment	Evidence
Capacity	Partly ready — could increase output 30% on current plant	Owner interview, 14 May
Capital	Not ready — no reserves for a 6-month cash gap	Owner interview
Product	Partly ready — labelling and ingredient compliance not yet checked	Desk research on destination rules
People	Not ready — owner is the only person who could do it and is fully occupied	Owner interview
Systems	Ready — batch traceability already in place for a domestic retailer	Site visit, 21 May
Commitment	Ready — exporting is in the business's three-year plan	Owner interview

• (Invented business, illustrative assessment.)
• A mixed result is the normal and most useful finding. It gives the investigation something to conclude: what must change before this business could export, in what order, and what it would cost.