Assess
Understand the brand, the product, the margin structure and the commercial objective. This is also where we tell you if we think expansion is the wrong move right now.
About
Built to remove the heavy lifting from international expansion.
LaunchGrid was founded to make market entry more structured, more accessible and considerably less improvised for ambitious brand owners.
LaunchGrid was founded by Paul Girgis and Tom Clearkin with a straightforward observation: a great many strong brands have the potential to scale internationally, and are held back not by product but by the research, compliance requirements, buyer relationships and operational complexity that market entry involves.
For most businesses, expanding into a region like the Middle East is genuinely difficult to manage without support. Understanding registration requirements, meeting local market expectations, and finding the right channels, distributors and buyers is a considerable amount of work, and it is work that has to be done in a particular order.
We built LaunchGrid as an end-to-end market entry partner, starting with Dubai, one of the most dynamic and commercially interesting markets available to consumer brands. Our focus is helping brands move from local success into international opportunity, supporting the full pathway from registration and commercial strategy through to channel development, buyer introductions and long-term retail growth.
What began as a way to help Australian brands reach new markets has become a broader remit: helping brands expand into high-growth regions with clarity, structure and a commercial strategy behind the decision.
Our objective is unchanged. Remove the heavy lifting from international expansion, and give brand owners a partner who can manage the process end to end.
Founders
Who you will be working with
PG
Paul Girgis
Director / Founder
Focused on partnerships, brand positioning and supporting brands through the practical steps needed to enter new markets.
Read profile TCTom Clearkin
Strategic Partnership Manager / Co-Founder
Focused on market-entry strategy, buyer relationships and helping brands move through the process from registration to commercial opportunities.
Read profileOur approach
Six stages, in this order, for a reason.
Each stage depends on the one before it. Most of the expansion problems we are asked to fix come from the sequence being improvised rather than the steps being done badly.
Validate
Test market suitability against your actual position, category fit, price tier, regulatory burden, channel structure and whether credible partners exist.
Prepare
Build the foundations: classification and compliance pathway, pricing architecture, commercial materials and the documentation partners will ask for.
Connect
Define partner criteria, shortlist candidates against them and approach the market with a complete commercial case rather than an introduction request.
Launch
Support the commercial entry, registration through to first orders, with the terms and channel rules agreed before rather than during.
Scale
Develop channels, manage performance, plan the next market and use what has been proven to make the following entry faster.
How we work
Connected workstreams, not separate briefs.
Expansion involves several disciplines that are usually handled by separate providers with separate briefs. We run them against each other, which is where most of the value is.
- Market intelligence
- Commercial strategy
- Compliance
- Buyer readiness
- Distribution
- Retail access
- Partnerships
- Channel development
What we are not
We are a commercial consultancy. We are not a regulatory affairs firm, a testing laboratory, a law practice or a licensed financial services provider. We map pathways, prepare documentation, structure commercial arrangements and manage process, and we tell you plainly when a question needs a qualified regulatory consultant, an accredited laboratory, a lawyer or a licensed financial adviser instead of us.
Start with a conversation about your next market.
Tell us where you are trying to grow. We will tell you what the pathway looks like, what it would take, and whether we think the timing is right.