Oliver Gibson

Oliver co-founded TradeWind after almost a decade of running UK e-commerce businesses that sold to American buyers. Until summer 2025 the maths on that worked: a £40 doormat or hand-poured candle could sit in a Royal Mail Tracked envelope, clear US customs duty-free under the $800 de minimis threshold, and land at a buyer’s door for less than £10 in carriage and zero hassle.

When Executive Order 14324 ended that arrangement in August 2025, Oliver watched his own US-shipping costs jump from ~£10 a parcel to £40+ overnight as the incumbent DDP carriers spotted an opening. He spent the autumn negotiating a UPS Worldwide Economy reseller contract on the basis of his own combined volume and the volume of two other UK e-commerce founders facing the same wall. TradeWind grew out of that conversation: pass the negotiated rates on at cost, plus the bare minimum to keep the lights on, to any UK seller who needs them.

Oliver writes about the strategic side of UK→US shipping: what to absorb vs pass on, when DDP makes financial sense, how to think about margin in a post-tariff world, and the genuinely good news that some US customers will actually pay extra for a properly priced UK product if you stop apologising for the shipping. He still ships his own parcels through TradeWind every morning before the rest of the team is online. Cyclist, occasional home brewer, very bad at golf.