Service
Competitor analysis: who they buy from, who they sell to
From customs records we compile a factual dossier on any competitor: suppliers, buyers, volumes, ports, price levels and entries into new markets. No guesswork, only recorded shipments.
The problem
A competitor is taking your buyers, and you cannot see how
You lose business with a buyer you have worked with for years, with the explanation that they "found a cheaper supplier". The competitor undercuts prices, widens their range and shows up in markets where they were never present before. You find out only after the contract is gone, and you know neither where their goods come from, nor on what terms they buy, nor who else they have taken.
Publicly available sources do not help here. The competitor's website shows what they want to show. Annual accounts arrive a year late and are aggregated: they reveal no flow of goods, no supplier, no buyer, no price per shipment.
Customs records show exactly that. Every shipment is a record: who ships, who receives, which goods, what quantity, what value, which port. We turn those records into a competitor dossier based on recorded transactions, not on assumptions.
How we work
How a competitor dossier is built
Free feasibility check
You send us the competitor's name and what interests you most. Within one business day we confirm whether, and how many of, their shipments we can see in customs records, before you pay anything.
Scope agreement
We define the analysis period, usually the past 24–36 months, and the questions the dossier should answer: sourcing, sales, price levels, or all of them.
Shipment analysis
We cross-reference all of the competitor's recorded shipments: suppliers, buyers, quantities, values, ports and monthly dynamics. We benchmark their price levels against the market average for the same goods.
Delivery and monitoring
You receive the dossier as a PDF with Excel tables, and we walk you through the findings in a 30-minute call. Optionally, continuous monitoring from €190/month flags every change: a new supplier, a new buyer, a new market.
What you get
What the competitor dossier contains
- Sourcing map: all of the competitor's recorded suppliers, with quantities and values per shipment
- Buyer map: who the competitor sells to, in which markets and in what volumes
- Price references: unit values of their shipments against the market average for the same goods
- Volume dynamics: monthly shipment flow across the entire analysis period, with seasonal patterns
- Logistics routes: the ports and lanes the competitor's goods move through
- New market radar: the competitor's first entries into markets where they had not sold before
- An Excel annex with every shipment from the analysis, ready for your own further filtering
Common questions
Questions about this service
Is it legal to analyze someone else's shipments?
Yes. We work exclusively with licensed customs records that governments release in line with their regulations. We use nothing that is a trade secret: we analyze official shipment records and turn them into a usable dossier.
Will I see the prices at which the competitor buys?
In most markets, yes: customs records contain the value and quantity of each shipment, so we calculate unit price levels from them. Where the value is masked, we provide an estimate based on comparable shipments and clearly mark it as such in the dossier.
Will the competitor find out we are analyzing them?
No. The analysis is performed on existing records, without any contact with the competitor, their suppliers or their buyers. Nobody receives an inquiry, a call or an email.
Can I take over my competitor's buyers?
You can, and it is the most common next step. The verified buyers report from €890 turns the buyer map into a list of 25 to 50 companies with decision-maker contacts, and the complete outreach service from €1,900 handles the contacting as well.
Related services: Finding buyers Supplier verification Market report
Next step
Send us the competitor's name and we handle the rest
The free feasibility check shows whether, and how many of, your competitor's shipments we can see in customs records. We reply within one business day, with no obligation to order.