Opening a business in the EU

[kfulf]

Hi,

We are small but successful and profitable online retail company with
offices in the US.

Lately, we were thinking of expanding into Europe. We can do it now,
by shipping from States to EU, but we were more thinking of opening a warehouse in Europe, hiring people in europe signing
distributors over in Europe and doing it strictly within Europe (treat
US and EU businesses as separate).

I have a few questions if anyone could give me some direciton to how to start reseaching or what i need to do to start a business in Europe I would appreciate it.

1) What shipping company is widely used in Europe?

2) How would we (and do we need to?) register a company in Europe? Do
we need to incorporate it in one of the countries? I was told
Netherlands has one of the lowest taxes in EU.

3) Would it be hard to open a business account in Europe? What are the procedures?

4) What are top 3-4 merchants that accept credit cards online in
Europe. What currency should we accept? Euro? UK pounds?

5) What is preferred payment over the internet in Europe? Credit card, cheque?

5) Customer Service & Language issues - how would we go about this?
Should the site be in English or should we add French, German,
Spanish, etc.

6) Marketing – what we do in US – just get listed on Yahoo, and
pay Google and Overture. What should we do in Europe?

7) Also, I was thinking maybe at first of opening up a small just for
the UK (as it is English speaking and all) and then gradually
expanding into the rest of Europe. If we do it this way, should we
have different domains – i.e. .com for US, .co.uk for UK, .de for
Germany? Or can we use .co.uk for all of the Europe? Would users say
in France be turned away if a domain is with .co.uk?

Any other help you can provide us with doing business in Europe would
be really appreciated as it will help us to decide. Thanks a lot!!!

[Cougar]

Hi there -

In addition to the questions you've already raised, you'll need to consider import taxes (including customs duty and import VAT) if the retail goods you intend to sell in Europe are sourced from ouside the EU.

What types of goods are you proposing to sell?

If you prefer not to be too specific on the forum send me a private message or go via our web site www.tariffaxe.com

Philip Brigstock-Bates

[kfulf]

We are going to sell retail goods that will be imported. I am aware of duties and VAT.

We are just looking for someware to begin to get an understanding of the questions the I had posted. If there is any direction you can give me so I can do the research I would appreciate it.

[Inzvestor]

Great question and post.

UK and Europe are 2 very different areas, both in legislation, customs, culture and buying habits.

For a UK firm, setting up is relatively simple, but as you are not resident in the UK there may be a few hoops to jump through.
There are equivalents to S-Corp, C-Corp and LLC options available, which I am happy to talk you through.

Domain names are important, and help establish trust.

You would be advised to secure domain names for all counties you will be trading in (.co.uk for the UK, .de Germany, .be Belgium, .fr France, .it Italy, .es Spain, .nl Holland) . Alternatively, if you have the .com address you could get by (depending on your product or service)

UK has Pound Sterling £ and Europe (including Sourthern Ireland) has the Euro €.
I would advise having a Euro account and a Sterling Account if you are trading in these markets.

Paypal, NoChex, Worldpay are the 3 most common ecommerce tools in the UK and most work in Europe.

I have several clients who trade in Europe and could ask them for their opinions on which payment methods they prefer. Your European bank may also have epos (electronic point of sale) tools that they can recommend as well.

Regarding Service and Language issues, most younger people in Europe now speak English, but it is adviseable to have your site translated into the native language. Do not just use Babelfish (www.babelfish.altavista.com) as there are many grammatical errors.

I could put you in touch with specialist translators (reliable and cost effective) who could help proof/translate and modify exisiting websites and literature.

Marketing is completely different in Europe than USA.
I'll have a chat to you about this and possibly see if there is any way that we may be able to help you out.

Hope this has helped answer a few of your questions.