Freight and Customs
Your FOB price is not your unit cost. Freight, duty, brokerage, and drayage sit between the factory door and your warehouse, and the classification code on your entry decides how much of it you pay. MakeMine books the freight, classifies the goods, clears the entry, and delivers.
Book an Intro CallThe unit price you negotiated is not the number that matters
Brands negotiate hard on FOB and then absorb whatever lands on top of it. Ocean or air, origin handling, brokerage, duty, processing fees, drayage, the final delivery leg. None of it appeared in the quote, and all of it appears on the invoice.
Duty is the part most brands never look at, and it has the widest spread. Two defensible classifications for the same product can carry very different rates, and the code you file is the code you owe against. Get it wrong in your favor and it is still wrong. The correction arrives later, with interest, and it arrives at the importer rather than the factory.
Landed cost is the only cost you can price a product against. Everything else is a component of it.
What freight and customs covers
Freight booking
Ocean FCL and LCL, air, and expedited air, quoted against your required date rather than defaulted to the cheapest mode.
Consolidation
Multiple purchase orders or factories combined into one shipment where doing so lowers cost per unit.
Export documentation
Commercial invoice, packing list, bill of lading, certificates of origin, and any certificate your category requires.
HTS classification
Your product classified against the tariff schedule with the reasoning documented, so the position is defensible rather than assumed.
Duty and fee modelling
Duty, processing fees, and any additional trade-action tariffs modelled before you commit to the purchase order.
ISF and entry filing
Importer Security Filing submitted before the vessel loads, and the customs entry filed through a licensed broker ahead of arrival.
Trade program review
Free trade agreement eligibility assessed where your sourcing country and product qualify.
Drayage and final delivery
Port to warehouse, to MakeMine fulfillment, your 3PL, or a retailer's distribution center.
How a shipment moves
Eight steps from booking to delivered goods, with clearance running alongside the transit rather than after it.
Booking
Mode and carrier chosen against your required delivery date and cargo profile
ISF filing
Importer Security Filing submitted before the vessel loads on ocean shipments; late filing carries its own penalty
Export clearance
Goods cleared at origin, containerized, and loaded
Transit
In-water or in-air time, tracked against the schedule rather than assumed
Entry filing
Classification, valuation, and duty filed with US Customs ahead of arrival
Release
Entry cleared and goods released from the terminal
Drayage
Container moved from port to the delivery point or deconsolidation facility
Delivery
Received at your warehouse, your 3PL, or MakeMine fulfillment
Clearance runs in parallel with transit, not after it. An entry filed on arrival is an entry that costs you demurrage.
What actually makes up landed cost
Every line below sits between the price you negotiated and the true cost of a unit on your shelf. Only the first one was in the factory's quote.
| Cost line | What it is | Who charges it |
|---|---|---|
| FOB or EXW price | The goods at the origin port or at the factory door | Factory |
| Origin charges | Export clearance, terminal handling, and documentation at origin | Forwarder |
| International freight | Ocean or air carriage | Carrier |
| Duty | A percentage of declared value, set by HTS classification and country of origin | US Customs |
| Additional tariffs | Trade-action tariffs stacked on top of the base rate where they apply to your product and origin | US Customs |
| Merchandise Processing Fee | Ad valorem fee on formal entries, subject to a minimum and a maximum per entry | US Customs |
| Harbor Maintenance Fee | Ad valorem fee on ocean imports | US Customs |
| Customs brokerage | Preparing and filing the entry | Licensed customs broker |
| Drayage | Container moved from port to the delivery point | Trucker |
| Deconsolidation | Splitting an LCL or consolidated container into its consignments | Warehouse |
The rates on these lines move, and trade-action tariffs move with policy rather than with your product. MakeMine models landed cost per shipment against the rates in force, rather than quoting a standing percentage that would be stale by the time you used it.
Transit times by origin and mode
Port to port, excluding the time to clear and deliver at either end. Add roughly one to two weeks in total for factory-to-port drayage, export clearance, US entry clearance, and the final delivery leg.
| Origin | Ocean transit to US | Air transit to US |
|---|---|---|
| China | 25–40 days | 5–8 days |
| Vietnam | 25–40 days | 5–8 days |
| South Korea | 20–35 days | 5–8 days |
| Peru | 10–18 days | 3–5 days |
| Honduras | 5–10 days | 2–4 days |
| El Salvador | 5–10 days | 2–4 days |
Air figures are door-to-door and industry-typical rather than MakeMine-measured. Air costs several times what ocean costs per unit, and it is worth it exactly as often as your launch date says it is. The decision belongs at PO issuance, when it is a choice, rather than at the ship date, when it is a rescue.
Incoterms, and what each one actually transfers
The three letters on your purchase order decide who books the freight and who pays which leg. Separately, they decide where risk passes to you. Those are not the same question, and assuming they are is what makes CIF expensive.
| Incoterm | Who arranges freight | Where risk passes to you | What you still pay for |
|---|---|---|---|
| EXW | You do, from the factory door | At the factory door | Everything: origin handling, export clearance, freight, duty, brokerage, delivery |
| FOB | Seller to the vessel; you from there | When goods are loaded at the origin port | Freight, duty, brokerage, drayage, delivery |
| CIF | Seller, through to the destination port | At the origin port, despite the seller paying for the freight beyond it | Duty, brokerage, drayage, delivery |
| DAP | Seller, to the named destination | At the named destination | Duty, brokerage, and import clearance |
| DDP | Seller, all the way | At delivery | Nothing further, in theory. In practice, whatever the seller priced into the unit cost |
CIF is the one that catches people. The seller pays the freight but risk has already passed to you at origin, so you carry the loss on a damaged container while having had no say in the carrier, the routing, or the schedule.
What MakeMine won't do on freight and duty
- We don't quote FOB and let you discover the landed cost afterwards. The model comes before the purchase order.
- We don't guess a classification. Where a product's HTS code is genuinely arguable, we say so and set out the positions and the exposure, rather than filing the cheaper one and hoping.
- We don't under-declare value. It is fraud, the liability lands on the importer, and it is not a service anyone should be offering you.
- If air freight is the only way to hit your date, you hear what it costs before you commit to the date, not after.
Frequently asked questions
What is landed cost, and what goes into it?
Landed cost is the total cost of a unit delivered to your warehouse, not the price the factory quoted. It includes the FOB or EXW price, origin charges, international freight, duty, any additional trade-action tariffs, customs processing fees, brokerage, drayage, deconsolidation, and the final delivery leg. It is the only figure you can responsibly set a retail price against.
How is import duty calculated?
Duty is a percentage of the declared customs value, and the percentage is determined by two things: the HTS classification of the product and its country of origin. Additional trade-action tariffs, where they apply, stack on top of that base rate. Apparel and textiles sit among the higher-duty categories in the tariff schedule, which is why classification matters more in this industry than in most.
What is an HTS code, and who decides which one applies?
The Harmonized Tariff Schedule code classifies your product for customs purposes and determines the duty rate. The importer is responsible for declaring the correct code, not the factory and not the freight forwarder. Where two codes are defensible, the difference in rate can be substantial, so the position should be documented rather than assumed. A code chosen because it is cheaper, without a basis, is the importer's liability to settle later.
How long does customs clearance take?
An entry filed correctly and in advance of arrival is commonly released within a day or two of the vessel discharging. Delays come from documentation errors, classification questions, or an examination hold, and an examination adds time that cannot be shortened. Filing on arrival rather than ahead of it is the most common self-inflicted cause of demurrage.
What's the difference between FOB and CIF?
Under FOB the seller delivers the goods onto the vessel and you arrange and pay for carriage from there. Under CIF the seller arranges and pays for carriage to the destination port, but risk still transfers to you at the origin port. So under CIF you carry the loss if the cargo is damaged in transit, on a carrier and a routing you did not choose. FOB gives you control of the leg you are already carrying the risk on.
Who is the importer of record?
The importer of record is the party legally responsible for the entry: for declaring the correct classification and value, paying the duty, and keeping the records. That liability does not move just because someone else filed the paperwork. MakeMine establishes who holds that role before the first shipment, because it determines who answers to Customs if a classification is later questioned.
Does MakeMine handle freight, or is it a separate vendor?
MakeMine handles it. Freight booking, documentation, HTS classification, duty calculation, and customs clearance are managed by the same team that manages the production the goods came from. When production, freight, customs, and fulfillment are four separate vendors, every delay is somebody else's fault and none of them is holding the schedule.
Price the landed cost, not the quote.
Freight, classification, duty, and clearance managed alongside the production they belong to. Book a call to model your landed cost before you commit to a purchase order.