Saturday, June 11, 2005
Protecting us from Overseas Book Glut
Important lesson to remember - if a book is printed in India, it needs to say "Made in India" on the cover, or U.S. customs won't let it in the country. Now we're scrambling to help our client find the right-sized label to put this information on his book so he can have them imported.
I think this is yet another example of our government micromanaging the little details, and missing the big picture. Look at these requirements:
- Mark each book "Made in India".
- The sticker must be in close proximity to US Address on the back cover.
- The font must be no smaller than typeface of US address.
- The sticker should not fall off.
- Books should be stored at the client's address and available for inspection by customs.
- Customs does not need to supervise stickering of all the books, but have to sign off on one sample.
- Customs requires a signed certification that all books will be stickered.
Wow. I'm duly impressed that Customs has taken such stringent measures to make sure the publishing market is not glutted with foreign-printed books without the public being duly notified. Meanwhile, how many cargo containers come unchecked through U.S. ports every day? 20,000? 30,000?
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