Velocity Sellers Podcast
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Velocity Sellers Podcast
#111 - How To Stay Profitable Through Lunar New Year Shipping Chaos | Burak Yolga
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Logistic shutdowns don’t just slow factories; they expose every weak link in an e-commerce supply chain. When ports clog, check-ins drag, and carriers slip on delivery times, the real question becomes painfully simple: do you actually control your logistics and margins, or are you letting someone else run your business?
We sit down with Burak Yolga, VP of Sales and co-founder at ForceGet, to talk through the decisions Amazon sellers are wrestling with right now: AGL and AWD convenience versus visibility, how fee changes and misclassification can quietly destroy profitability, and why “I think I’m making money” is not a strategy. Burak shares what he’s seeing on the ground during peak disruption, plus practical ways to reduce risk: fewer disconnected vendors, better inventory management, and a clearer view of landed cost by SKU so you can spot where profit is really coming from.
We also dig into what the future looks like as omnichannel becomes the default. That includes expanding beyond Amazon to Walmart, Shopify, TikTok Shop, and international marketplaces, and structuring fulfillment to match that plan. Burak explains why two-coast inventory placement can cut last-mile shipping cost and delivery time, why Seller Fulfilled Prime is gaining momentum as FBA fees rise, and how AI forecasting tools can help brands time reorders, handle seasonality, and react when competitors go out of stock.
If you’re trying to protect cash flow, avoid stockouts, and build a resilient logistics plan for 2026, hit play. Subscribe, share this with a seller friend, and leave a review with the one supply chain problem you want solved next.
Lunar New Year Double Crunch
SPEAKER_00It is that time of year again where we're faced with logistics troubles surrounding the lunar new year, as well as countless other things that we all as sellers know we face. And it's important to know your profitability standpoint from a logistics perspective. Today's guest will help us do just that. He is the VP of sales and co-founder of ForceGet, a company that we partner with that helps sellers just like you out there navigate the world of logistics a little bit better, be a little bit more profitable, and help save on independence and margins from the Amazon shipping giant. So today's guest is Barak Yolga. So we're pretty close to a very important shipping holiday, uh lunar new year, which I think is a starts around the 17th. So this will come out after that, but it should be around this time period. It's a two-week thing. It's it's tough. Um it's also doubled right on the fact that I and correct me if I'm wrong here, I think I read this the other day that people are just sort of starting to make runs back through the Red Sea? Is that okay? So it's a double crunch, it's a double whammy of you're not gonna get any product for the next two weeks, and it this whole thing with the the Red Sea. So, so just to get to jump right into it, how are sellers navigating that? And how would you guys, at Foresket, how would you guys recommend sellers navigate that? And and how would you recommend them take on this issue?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean, today actually our office is closed uh for two weeks almost, uh even if the official time starts uh 17. I lived in China seven years and uh it's the biggest holiday in the world, I think. Like close to 700 million people like start moving around. It's not fun to be in the uh train station that time. So I'm actually happy I'm not in China right now. But yeah, it's it's very problematic, uh, especially if you're using AGL or supplies for order, you don't really know what's going on because I was talking to my team. Uh, we kind of stop accepting full content orders. Qingdao port is completely congested, trucks cannot enter the port, waiting time is three days. Shanghai port is kind of the same. Right. So it is it is it is hard. And you know, supply chain, I think lasts one to two years. It's in the very middle of it's it's very center now for every conversation. It's either Amazon's placement fees, either Amazon checking time, you know, uh reimbursement has changed, manufacturing costs is now versus the selling price. Tic Tac fulfillment uh just came up with a new announcement that uh they want people to use their own shipping contracts, which it's very big unknown. So a lot going on, and then I think a lot of sellers now they still worry about the politic and geopolitic issues, right? Uh they don't want to bring too many inventory. If they do, if they use on AWD, the product is stuck in AWD, they cannot go omni-channel. MCF is very expensive compared to another 3PL, so a lot of concerns by the seller. They don't really know what to do, and
Fixing Logistics To Protect Profit
SPEAKER_01I think they're looking for some exit plan, like they're looking for some solutions.
SPEAKER_00Right. And are there easy solutions? Is it just as simple as finding a different 3PL? Or talk to me about some of those solutions that they might be looking for.
SPEAKER_01I think one thing that I learned, I learned about the Amazon businesses, like any any brand is going over $30, $40 million, they start having their ERP systems and like retail, like a little bit more complicated. Right. Uh sellers we work is between 5 million to 30 million, is a little bit more uh less systematic. They don't have uh the right team set up yet, so they're struggling more on the growth. But also the marketplaces are trying to make things better, like Amazon Canada. If you want to start selling on Amazon Canada, they give you a lot of initiatives like uh free advertisement budget, account representative that who can help you to increase your limits. So things are getting actually easier to go on the channel. Uh, but also if you don't have the right logistics setup, you don't have the TPL, you have too many vendors, you don't have an inventory uh management system, uh, any software, or if you don't have the logistics team and then you just rely on the suppliers, yeah, these are something you need to improve. So I think what I see is the mainly how is your setup and how much you really want to spend money on on your supply chain team. I think uh, you know, you can spend a lot of money on the uh advertisement or uh affiliate marketing, maybe, but if you don't know your profit, if you don't know your land the your landing cost, then it really wouldn't matter because then you you're not gonna have a sustainable business.
SPEAKER_00Right. Uh it it makes it worse now that they've uh started to implement these new some of the new fees. Um, you know, we saw a couple of different fees last year with the low, or maybe it was two years ago now, the low inventory fee, um, inbound defects, penalties. I mean, they're not making it easy on sellers to they're not, they're really not. Um, I hate to go against the overlords, you know, Jeff and all of them at Amazon, but they're not making it easy. Um, are you think are are they doing this to try and force sellers into a uh into like a one-size-fits-all logistics model? And and how would a digital forwarder like Forsket, how would you guys help the sellers maintain their um maybe their independence and their margins
Amazon Fees And Visibility Problems
SPEAKER_00without triggering these new penalties or incurring them?
SPEAKER_01I mean, honestly, uh the I wish I knew the qu I I knew the answer. Uh, but basically what Amazon does, I think they think their own pocket because over the last one or two decades, they invested really billions of dollars to their fulfillment centers. Right. Uh they maybe overspend it uh now because they have too many space and then they're pushing people to use AWD. I think that's one thing that I don't like. Many sellers we're talking recently, they're trying to get out of AGL, they're trying to get out of AWD because the cost don't really make sense. The customer service is terrible, uh, there's no really visibility. So, like, why Amazon doing that? I think they want to eliminate small sellers and they they want to become like actually uh a marketplace that they can actively make profit money, not just from their servers or ads, but also operations. I know it's expensive to run an operation, but I think some of the fees technically you're like allocating space, but if you don't uh put product, they kind of like charge you. And then, you know, one thing that I think the biggest hit for the sellers are it doesn't matter if you don't like it or if you don't understand a fee, they still charge you and they overcharge you. Like, you know, we find out so many people are overpaying for their product size. Uh they say that it's this tier, but actually they they kind of put you in two tiers higher and then they're charging. You know, like people don't look at that. People are not looking at their manufacturing cost if it's entered correctly. Uh Amazon automatically, Amazon claims that they automatically re-reimburse you 100%, but it's like 50-55%. You still need to check things out like manually. So Amazon fees are like it's very hard to understand. You need to have a good analytic team, or you need to use a really good software that analyzes. And I even think that uh software engineers are like uh hard having a hard time to catch up to develop those new reports and find out and downloading them and trying to understand. It just makes it very complicated.
SPEAKER_00I think that's what Amazon does, right? Right. They don't make it easy, which is so interesting because that you you feel like they're the the the shipping king. You feel like they have the most the wide most widespread network, and you're in this day and day, maybe tell me if I'm wrong, but yeah, they feel like they have the most coverage aside from maybe Walmart, it has all of the warehouses and stuff like that. But it feels like Amazon would be so good at this, and it feels like it should be Amazon should be your first option for shipping things. Like AGL seems like a really good idea on paper, and so does AWD, but it that's that's not, it sounds like that's not being uh treated right now as sellers. Um who what type of let's say what type of product, what type of brands should maybe be using AGL or should be using AWDs or anyone that it fits better than uh other 3PL?
When AGL Or AWD Makes Sense
SPEAKER_01I mean, I think smaller teams should be using AGL uh versus the product type because I mean a lot of people they use AGL or AWD for convenience. It's like everybody's like, oh, it's very convenient. But we have a customer, they're selling like only two SKUs, and they have probably around 100-150 pallets, which is like almost equals to five track load, massive amount of product, is still being AW Fulfillment Center transfer that they they started the order like uh five weeks ago, six weeks ago. So Amazon still did not deliver them, they still didn't check, and they have no idea when it's gonna check in. So imagine you ran out of inventory and Amazon FBA, you cannot even tell Amazon, hey, my goods are in your hand, you guys are not delivering this on time, so it's not my fault, but you're losing your sales rank. So it's that a good idea put to put all your eggs in the same basket when it comes to Amazon and AWD, uh and then cost calculation. Like when you use Amazon, it's very hard to understand like everything, and then the delays we see a lot. And I think people are now it is it is really true this year. Finally, everybody's like exploring only channel sales or other marketplaces. If you are using AGL or let's say AWD, actually, sorry, if you use AWD, you cannot use your buffering mentor to do anything else, like you cannot expand to TikTok, you cannot test things in Shopify, you cannot test Walmart, which I'm sure you saw that uh Walmart hit one trillion dollar company. Not every category is great to sell on Walmart, but I think it's a place to start and test out it's catching up, yeah. Yeah, yeah, and then and then you know, uh the fulfillment uh structure the Walmart has even better than uh Amazon, like how many stores they have in person, like 13,000, 14,000. So I think it's a great way to like test things and start adding up new inventory uh strategy to increase your profit. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00No, we always like to push on the channel. You know, we always say that um maybe you start out on Amazon and eventually you move there, but it is it is the end goal. The end goal should be we're selling on multiple channels. Um, how
Omnichannel Limits And Walmart Growth
SPEAKER_00would let's you know, maybe dive in a little bit here on your end. How would Foresket help a company that is looking to expand on the channel, um, manage their logistics and what what are some of the best practices you guys use in your everyday brands?
SPEAKER_01Right now, I think the the first priority that you need to work with at Tree PL who has location on both East Coast and West Coast. So Foursquet has two warehouses, one is in New Jersey, one in California. The reason is even this year, seller fulfill prime, it's getting more and more popular because of the FBA fees. So we get a lot of questions, hey brah, can you ship this into the seller fulfilled prime? And then we're like, yes, we can do that. So what is interesting is instead of FBA fees, you'll be spending a lot less, but also fast delivery. So SFP is like uh is very popular right now. Um and uh let's say you're doing Shopify or you want to do Tik Tac and you have an inventory only in California, shipping from California to New Jersey or Florida, it's four days, five days plus $14, $15. Versus if you had inventory in New Jersey, shipping to Florida will be like one or two days plus the cost will be seven or eight dollars. So to save money in the last mile delivery, you need to have the inventory in two locations at least. So this way you will spend less money on the last mile delivery and then in your tree pl cost and lower your risk. So this is like the biggest trend right now. And uh if you keep inventory only one location, it's not good enough anymore because uh the UPS rate like cost is going up, USPS cost is going up, FedEx this year. I think they adjust to like seven to eight, eight percent each. Yeah, and so like something very interesting. Like, I think UPS is laying off close to like 7,000, 80,000 people this year, unfortunately. And oh man, the the service read is slow down. Like we are tracking the UPS delivery time. UPS ground says like let's say two days, but actually real delivery time is four days. So this is also something you need to understand. So the delay is only also not coming from let's say companies like us, but actually the end users uh and and end delivery companies.
SPEAKER_00Right. Uh that's a shame about the layoffs. And I know a lot of companies have been doing a lot of layoffs. I don't know if it's just because of I can't imagine just because of profitability, you know, they're making more and more money every year, but yeah, it's a lot more related to potentially to AI. I don't know if they're gonna have robots driving those UPS trucks, but um, or USPS or any of the companies, but uh hopefully not. Um it's interesting though.
Two-Warehouse Strategy And SFP
SPEAKER_00Like it it seems that delays tend to come at the worst times. At the beginning of the year, uh at the end of the year, really anytime. I guess there's a big influx and anything.
SPEAKER_01There's always gonna be some sort of delays, but Amazon Amazon slows down like the check-in times, you know, in the fourth quarter. A lot they're like, oh, cutoff time is like I don't know what's gonna be this year, but I remember last year was I think October. Yeah. This year when they can maybe pull the time earlier. So you have to really um and a lot of people they're having a cash flow problem. So you actually need to order your maybe your last quarter orders like from May, June, thinking about it's gonna take 40, 45 days production, the shipping, delivery, and AWD checks in or under 3PL. The timing, it just like keep extending. And then you know, Amazon is not very generous with the payouts, they like to keep your money longer and longer. So it is very tough to deal the inventory. So that's why you need to have a good payment term with your supplier, you need to have a good payment term with your freight forder, you need to have a good payment term with your 3PL. The more you stretch out those payment terms, it's kind of better for your business. And that's not Amazon. I think that's why it's even better and better for small businesses to work with companies like Foursquet or other 3PL or 4P companies uh to have better deals according to everybody's business model. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Yeah, no, I like it. I like it. And and sort of on that, while sticking on this topic of of uh what to do and and where things are going in the world, you know, we got obviously, of course, the big topic is AI as always. Um, you know, people are uh Amazon just put out the Alexa Plus. I think my Alexa thing, it's probably just turned on over there, just changed the voice, and now it's more um AI powered and it'll help you shop better and it'll give you like deeper insights into consumer stuff, and that's more on the marketing side. But in general,
Planning Lead Times And Cash Flow
SPEAKER_00how are you guys at Foursquet or how should logistics be or how should people be thinking about their logistics for a future where AI is a lot more involved and there's a lot more things happening in the process from manufacturer to consumer?
SPEAKER_01Right. I mean, probably 50 years later we will be seeing like robots are actually unloading and offloading the containers or driving the trucks. But if we are talking about like a short term, I think like what we are building, it's our new Sauce tool uh for inventory management uh management and forecasting tool. I think AI is going to be uh helping companies a lot in the inventory forecasting and inventory management. That's one of the biggest, I think, pain point for a lot of brands that they don't know when to order. They cannot calculate the seasonality. They even don't calculate if their uh competitors are out of business or out of stock. Suddenly you wake up and then you start seeing like 20, 30 units more sales a day. You're like, oh, I was not prepared for that because I don't have enough uh inventory in the US or in Canada. So all these things are like it needs to be uh understanded by computer, like organize it. Why did you have spikes? Why you ran out of inventory? Uh, I think this is gonna help a lot. Uh otherwise, uh, sometimes I'm talking to some brands and they have over 100-150 SQs and they're still using exile sheets to like track those inventory. I know it's just like I'm like, guys, just kill me.
SPEAKER_02Uh what are we doing?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so and then they they don't really understand. And uh they have five, six different vendors. I think being not connected, the vendors, supplier, freight company, custom broker, tree, FPA, different countries, it just like makes everybody's life harder. So I think everybody's really focusing on inventory management this year, e-commerce brands, and then they're looking for a good solution. And then I think the AI is going to help a lot in the inventory forecasting um and then landing cost calculation. So many brands they don't know that, unfortunately.
SPEAKER_00Love it. Yeah, no, it's it's gonna be an interesting year this year, and for the next couple of years, it's always gonna, we're always gonna say that. Um, you know, what's next? What's next with AI? What are they gonna do next? I know we talked about Amazon investing millions in their logistics programs and billions, even maybe. And I think a lot of that has been going towards
AI Forecasting And Inventory Management
SPEAKER_00improving warehouse times. You know, they do the thing, they were really leaning into it last year of the same-day delivery, and then it was two-hour delivery, and then it was even more than that. Um, and that's been a big, a big uh talking point for them is that we can get this together.
SPEAKER_01Everything you mentioned is for their consumer though, nothing for the sellers.
SPEAKER_00Right, right.
SPEAKER_01You know, so I I feel like most of those services Amazon offers, it's just like a burden on the seller's pocket because like it means like more and more fees. And I don't know, like it just um I think Amazon Accelerate has been a big help to sellers. Like, you know, we we we have a boot like last three years uh in Accelerate, and a lot of people are they can talk to their account representative, but after Amazon laying off this 14,000, 15,000 people, unfortunately, so many brands lost their account managers. Also, they're like right, they start from the beginning, from the scratch. So it is also frustrating, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, and and even more so on the Amazon seller side, but also some of these three PLs we've been talking about, um, really for even just like a mid-size three-piece seller, you know, competing with this fee and fee increases, competing with this 30-minute delivery speed um that they're eventually going to get it to, they're just gonna drop it off at your house before you even order it, they're just gonna know. Um, it seems like anyway, that's the direction we're going in. But but for the this the mid-sized seller, um, is the goal, should the goal be just to get it there as quick as possible? Is that where we should we be following in Amazon's footsteps? Or do you think that the the definition of logistics is going to shift and as far as inventory placement goes? Do you think customers are going to all demand that things get there within 30 minutes? Or do you think people will pull back a little bit and say, okay, I that's unrealistic? Um, but you know, what should a seller be weary of? Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I I I really think it depends on the brand where they want to go. If you're a cosmetic brand or if you're like um maybe supplement brand that you start driving more traffic from TikTok or or your Instagram account, Meta. And I also see a lot of people they're trying to not just leave Amazon, but like they want to add new marketplaces to like have a better profit. So I think people people like they need to decide like where they want to take their brands, and then their logistic is gonna follow that, and then they need to be ready for that because we all know that you might be um having very profitable business, but then if your inventory levels are not correct, then they could
Speed Expectations And Supply Chain Reality
SPEAKER_01be a problem very fast. So when we're talking about logistics, I don't even want to use the word logistic, I I like to use more supply chain now because it's just not one thing, it's everything all the way from factory floor to the end user, and the entire timeline and entire fulfillment pipeline, it just extended so long. It used to be 90 hundred days from the time you you order and then until you sell it. Now it's like 150-180 days. It means that you need to have stronger cash flow, you need to have better understanding what your margins are, and it makes like really brands' life harder. I know that so many people are not sure when they need to order, like what quantity. So AI plus supply chain, I think has to be the number one priority for brands, and then having a good uh payment terms, like otherwise, it doesn't matter how much profit you have. If you don't have enough product to sell, then you know your customer, your consumer will go and buy from a competitor. And I just recently the competition is so tough, it's just like very hard to bring that customer back, like because consumer is sensitive, they always want to test something new, but if they like a product, so you have to make sure you actually deliver it on time in the same perfect condition. Otherwise, as a buyer, like I order my, you know, I I like some brands I ordered, and if they mess up, I'm like, you know what, I'm gonna change, I'm gonna change, I'm gonna try something new.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and same thing, you know, if I see something, if I'm shopping for something and I see that um one gets here in two days and one gets here in a day or in a few hours. I like to think and hope that I'll take different more factors into consideration. I'll say, okay, well, what's the price? What are the reviews? But that really stands out. And I think a lot of people will just fall victim to that and say right away, I want whatever one is going to be here quicker. So I think that's very it depends on the category, of course. And there's a million other factors, like I said, but I think that one takes up a large portion of the decision is how quickly can I get it? So it'll be very interesting to see how this year goes and how the rest of the year plays out with four logistics shipping, four people selling products that get there in two days. That used to be that used to be quick. That used to be the Amazon's thing was we'll get there in two days. That's how good we are. And now it's you know down to 30. The last mile, you know, feels like it's the last minute or the last foot instead. So it's very interesting. It'll be very interesting to see how the rest of the year plays out with this and if sellers and if if uh sellers can keep up, but also if consumers do go that way, maybe they won't. I'd like to be wrong about that. I think the data says that they will just go for whatever gets there quicker, but we'll see.
Expand Markets Now And Final Advice
SPEAKER_01And I and I really think that it's the best time right now, beginning of the year, to test at least one more market, at least test one more country or a marketplace, because you never know. Like we have a lot of brands, they successfully expand to Australia, they successfully expand it to Mexico if you're uh Spanish speaker, also. Um Canada is a great market. Just increase your revenue, use your catalog. It can increase the uh order quantity your place into your factory so they can actually give you a better price, maybe they can increase your payment terms. So this is the right time, actually. Let's say from February or from March until June, July to test a new marketplace, play around a couple of months, and see if you start seeing some you know action, if you start seeing some spark uh spark, then why not to push it on the fourth quarter to increase your profit? Because we know that fourth quarter, everybody's like really uh struggling with Amazon, the checking time, transfer, they run out of inventory. FP fees are insane in the fourth quarter. So I highly recommend people to test it now. Don't be afraid, guys. Just test it and regret it than not test it and regret it because everybody's doing that right now.
SPEAKER_00Better to have tested and regret it than never have tested at all. I think so. That might be the quote of the episode there.
SPEAKER_01So I agree.
SPEAKER_00Barack, I uh appreciate you coming on. I want to give one more question here. I want to see what is one to sum up, we had a we've had a nice discussion here so far, but what is one maybe piece of advice to condense everything? It might be on the channel, it might be other things related to logistics, but what is one piece of advice you would give to all of our listeners out there to help again navigate themselves through this bit of a tumultuous state we find ourselves in for logistics in 2026? What's one thing you can help reassure them in these dark times?
SPEAKER_01I I would say don't let anyone else control your business, just have the control of your own business. So relying on only AGL or AWD or uh without talking to any other company, like just there are a lot of options out there. Do your own research and understand your landing costs, understand your profit so that when it time when it comes to keeping extra buffering entry or going omni-channel, new marketplace, you'll understand like what's your profit coming from and which SKU, if it's not making money, don't stick to it too much. Just to understand like your math, I think that's the most important thing. Unfortunately, last two, three years, we have seen so many aggregators failed. It's not fancy anymore to be seven, eight-figure seller brand. Right. It is important if you are making profit or not. You know, that's something that we have experienced last couple of years. So I would say 2026 is the year to growth, but also being very careful with your budget and with your profits.
SPEAKER_00Amen. Alrighty. Yes, I agree. Barack, again, thank you so much for coming back on. I will have your LinkedIn as well as Foursketch website down below for everyone to check out. Um, and again, thank you for being a guest. Thanks for all the advice here. Thanks for having me, Peter. Yeah, of course. Thank you all for watching. I am your host, Velocity Pete, and we will see you next week.