EXW, FOB or DDP? Incoterms, Payments & Landed Cost Explained for Handmade Glass Importers

Most first conversations with a new wholesale buyer include a version of the same question: "Is that price EXW or delivered?" It is the right question to ask. Two suppliers can quote the same unit price and still leave you with landed costs that differ by 30% or more, depending on the incoterm behind the number, the payment structure, and what happens between our furnace in Cairo and your warehouse shelf. After 20 years of exporting hand-blown glass to more than 30 countries, we have learned that importers who understand three things — incoterms, payment terms, and landed cost — negotiate better, plan better, and reorder sooner. This guide walks through all three.

Incoterms in Plain Language: Who Pays for What, and Where Risk Transfers

Incoterms are simply an agreement about two things: which costs each party pays, and the exact point at which responsibility for the goods passes from us to you. For handmade glass shipped from Egypt, three terms come up in almost every conversation we have.

EXW (Ex Works, Cairo). You take over at our workshop door. The unit price is lowest, but you (or your freight forwarder) arrange export clearance, trucking to port or airport, freight, insurance, and everything after. EXW suits experienced importers with their own forwarder and consolidated shipments from several Egyptian suppliers.

FOB (Free On Board, named port). The seller handles export customs and delivers the goods cleared and loaded at the named port; the buyer controls the international leg. It is a common term for port-to-port cargo, but it is not one we offer: our wholesale orders ship by air express (DHL, FedEx or EMS), DAP to your door, or EXW Cairo if you prefer to use your own forwarder.

DAP, DDP and door-to-door courier. For smaller consignments and repeat orders, express courier to the door is often the calmest option: one invoice, one tracking number, goods at your door. Under DAP you settle import duties on arrival; under DDP the seller pays them. This is how every order we ship travels — air express, DAP to your door — and it is exactly how our $99 Sample Box travels, with express shipping included and delivery 5–8 business days after dispatch.

Whichever term you choose, insist that it appears on the proforma invoice together with the named place: "EXW Cairo" or "DAP Dubai" means something; a term without a place is an argument waiting to happen.

Payment Terms That Protect Both Sides

Handmade production is made-to-order — your 100 candle holders in amber and smoke grey do not exist until our glassblowers gather the first ball of molten glass. Because of that, the standard structure in this trade is a deposit against order confirmation and the balance against shipping documents. Our own arrangement is simple: any order can be paid by card, Apple Pay or PayPal at checkout, or by bank transfer — same price. Bank-transfer orders over $2,000 can pay a 50% deposit to confirm and the 50% balance before shipment, once you have approved pre-shipment photos of your actual order; orders under $2,000 are paid in full.

Bank transfer (SWIFT) remains the workhorse of this trade. Whatever you agree, get it in writing on the proforma invoice alongside the incoterm, the production time, and the packing specification. A supplier who is precise on paper before your deposit tends to be precise with your glass afterwards. And remember that payment terms are also a risk conversation: our own policy is that any transit breakage is replaced or credited, which removes the most common source of post-shipment disputes in glassware. Full details are on our payment methods page.

Landed Cost: The Only Number That Matters

Your retail customers never see the ex-works price. They see the shelf price, and your margin lives in the gap between that and the landed cost — everything it took to get one piece onto your shelf. Before you commit to any glassware order, build the calculation piece by piece:

1. Unit price at your order value. Orders start from $250, models and colours mixed. Pay by card, Apple Pay or PayPal at checkout, or by bank transfer — same price. Mixed models and colours carry no surcharge, so you can build your whole assortment without betting on a single colour.
2. Freight. Every order we ship travels by air express (DHL, FedEx or EMS), DAP to your door; if you buy EXW Cairo, your own forwarder quotes this leg. Hand-blown glass is light for its volume, so dimensional weight — not kilograms — usually drives the airfreight bill.
3. Insurance. Cargo cover typically costs a fraction of one percent of shipment value. With breakage already replaced or credited by us, insurance is protecting against loss and damage of the shipment as a whole.
4. Duties and import VAT. Ask your broker for the rate on your HS code for glassware in your market before you order, not after arrival.
5. Local delivery and handling. Port fees, customs brokerage, and the truck to your warehouse — small lines that are real money on small shipments.

Run that arithmetic on a full carton quantity of a specific model — a votive candle holder for volume programmes, or a gilded perfume bottle for higher-value niches — and you will know your true margin before a single piece is gathered from the furnace.

A Worked Habit, Not a Worked Example

Numbers change with lanes, seasons, and fuel surcharges, which is why we resist publishing a single "typical" landed-cost example. The habit is what transfers: quote at your order value, choose the incoterm that matches your experience, fix payment milestones on paper, and price duties before you commit. Importers who follow that sequence are rarely surprised — and rarely disappointed. Full terms, payment and lead times are laid out on our wholesale page, and if you are developing your own shapes or branding, the same logic applies to custom OEM/ODM projects, where tooling and sampling simply become one more line in the calculation.

Start With the Numbers in Your Hands

The fastest way to test every figure in this article is to hold the glass itself. Our Sample Box brings a kit of best-selling Egyptian glass pieces to your door for $99 with express shipping included, arriving 5–8 business days after dispatch — and the full $99 comes back on your first wholesale order of $1,000 or more placed within 30 days of delivery. Prefer to talk through an incoterm or a freight quote first? Message us on WhatsApp (+20 122 259 6927) or email sales@grandbazaareg.com, and we will put a real proforma — incoterm, milestones, and all — in front of you within a day.