Going Overseas, Lesson One: Sign the Contract Before the Good Times Roll

When peers ask me about going overseas, I start with the most expensive mistake we ever made. Not a product mistake. A paperwork mistake.

How good it got, how fast

Our period pants first built a reputation on the domestic B2B platform, and buyers from Taiwan and Thailand started coming to us directly. In 2024, introduced by a mutual friend, we set up a joint venture with a partner company that had operated in the Thai market for years. We went into TikTok Shop and Shopee together. The timing was perfect — cross-border e-commerce in Thailand was booming, and within a couple of months we were doing over ten thousand orders a day in the period pants category. We walked around feeling invincible.

The problem with smooth sailing

The problem appeared exactly when things were smoothest. Because the partner came through a friend, because the business was working, because nobody wanted to be the person who asks for legal protection at a celebration — we did not sign a properly structured agreement. The store backends, the creator network, the operating accounts: all of the core assets sat on the partner's side.

When disagreements over operating philosophy and profit distribution finally broke the venture apart, the consequences were total. The partner switched suppliers, copied our product, and took the entire Thai market we had built. We lost over a million yuan, and more painfully, we lost the creator relationships and the store traffic — the things that cannot be repurchased at any price. We recovered part of the money through legal action. The market we never got back.

What we do differently now

In 2025 we re-entered Thailand, and expanded into Vietnam and the Philippines. The first act this time was the contract: joint capital, joint control of core operations, stores and data held jointly, exit terms written down before anyone was excited. It is a far less romantic way to start a business. It is also the only way we will ever start one again.

The advice I give every founder going overseas

The smoother things look, the earlier you should say the awkward things. A contract is not an accusation of distrust. It is the floor under both parties — it protects your partner from you just as much as it protects you from them.

And keep your hands on the core assets: stores, traffic, data, key relationships. Friendship is real; so is leverage. You can be generous with the first and still never surrender the second.

If you are an overseas buyer or distributor thinking about a supply partnership, the same principle applies to us: terms in writing, verification, factory audits — we welcome all of it. That is what a menstrual pants supplier should expect from you, and you from them.

Going overseas is a good direction. Learn to protect yourself first, then ride the wave.

Li Genyuan is the founder of Hunan Nafei Biotechnology, an OEM/ODM manufacturer of sanitary pads and menstrual pants exporting to Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. More from Founder's Notes.