Competitive Analysis

My entrepreneurial idea was to create an importing business of international products that create a relationship between the manufacturers of a country to a local non-profit organization unique to that country. That way the developed countries can help the developing countries build their business to benefit a larger whole, economically. 

http://aroundworldstore.com/

The Around The World Store also has products imported from countries where manufacturing costs are low, such as Bangladesh. It is easy to bring culturally unique items from other countries because they are easy and cheap to make by the people in those countries. However, since the labor cost is so cheap, only the business owners are benefiting from the sales of these products. The difference in my business would be that the profit that the markets back in Bangladesh make, definitely has to help a non-profit organization. Thus we won' be taking advantage of the ease of bring unique imported items for cheap and making a big market here.

http://www.tenthousandvillages.com/

A big fair trade retail organization is Ten Thousand Villages. They sell handmade products from developing countries and sell them directly to consumers so that the manufacturers of the products, which are usually underprivileged workers, get full profit for their work as they are full deserving of it. This organization is similar to my idea of helping from a humanitarian perspective through business, but it has a simpler structure. Ten Thousand Villages is more simple because their goal is simple, and it is easier to make sure the manufacturers get the full payment for their hard work than to make sure that the international market in the developing country is making the promised monetary contributions in return of their business in a developed country. 

Based on these observations of existing business that are similar to my idea, I think my approach needs more solid planning because there is a lot of regulations involved with the exchange of money and then to involve a non-profit organization. However once the legalities are taken care of and after once cycle of imports, sales and monetary distribution, it might be easier.