Minimum Advertised Price sounds like something cooked up by a committee of lawyers to keep you awake at night. And honestly, it kind of is. MAP, Minimum Advertised Price, is the lowest price a brand lets you advertise their product for. Not sell it for. Advertise it for. That tiny difference is where new sellers get flattened like a squirrel in rush hour.

Wholesalers aren’t running adoption agencies for dreamers. They don’t want to take a chance on you because you’re passionate and you’ve got a killer idea. They move truckloads of product every day and they’re allergic to risk. If you roll up with nothing but a Gmail address and a long story about your vision board, they’ll shut the door faster than a bouncer at a nightclub spotting a fake ID.

Most new sellers think shipping is a cakewalk. Slap on a label, toss the box at UPS, and boom, it’s magically in Paris by breakfast. Sure. And unicorns handle customs paperwork. The moment you try international shipping, you find out fast that carriers aren’t your fairy godmothers. They keep long “nope” lists, and every country adds their own pile of “absolutely not” rules.

Every seller wants better pricing. That’s obvious. The problem is that too many rookies treat negotiation like they’re hustling at a garage sale. They think if they argue hard enough or push long enough, suppliers will cave. That’s not how wholesale works. Try that, and you’ll just end up on the “do not answer” list.

Selling overseas feels like you just leveled up. Bigger reach, bigger orders, bigger bragging rights. But the honeymoon ends fast when you realize international shipping isn’t just domestic shipping with a longer drive. Borders slow everything down, customs plays by rules you’ll never see, and local carriers sometimes move like they’re stuck in molasses. If you don’t set expectations right from the start, you’ll end up with a pile of complaints and refund requests you didn’t earn.

Fraudulent orders are like termites. You don’t notice them right away, but they quietly eat your profits from the inside. One day you think you’ve landed a big sale, and the next day you’re staring at a chargeback, missing inventory, and a fee on top.

One of the fastest ways to kill a supplier relationship is by being the seller who doesn’t follow up at all. The second fastest way? Being the seller who follows up so much that the supplier dreads seeing your name pop up.