Arcade AI, a luxury ecommerce platform, had a frustrating problem: international buyers were getting stuck with unexpected customs fees and having their items held at customs. Buyers weren't aware of these additional costs upfront, creating a poor customer experience and operational headaches.

The platform needed a way to make customs duties transparent during checkout and enable makers to ship with DDP (Delivered Duty Paid) labels so buyers knew exactly what they'd pay.

My Approach: I led a 2-month project to eliminate customs surprises by integrating duty calculations into checkout and enabling makers to ship DDP. Here's how we did it:

• Vendor evaluation and integration: Researched and selected a customs duty provider, then led the technical integration to calculate duties at checkout.
• Transparent checkout experience: Integrated customs fees directly into the buyer checkout flow so customers knew total costs upfront, eliminating surprises.
• DDP shipping labels: Enabled makers to generate DDP shipping labels, ensuring duties were pre-paid and items wouldn't be held at customs.
• UX audit and optimization: Conducted comprehensive UX audit of the entire shopping experience, uncovering critical bugs and delivering improvements from navigation redesign to clearer copy.
• Japanese market support: Launched targeted marketing solution for Japanese commercial under tight deadlines, supporting international expansion efforts.

Within 2 months, we solved the customs transparency problem and enabled smooth international fulfillment:

✅ Eliminated unexpected customs fees through transparent checkout integration
📦 Enabled makers to ship with DDP labels, preventing items from being held at customs
🌍 Improved international buyer experience with upfront cost transparency
🇯🇵 Launched Japanese market marketing support under tight deadlines
🔧 Delivered UX improvements across the entire shopping experience
⚡ Completed technical integration with zero post-launch bugs

What the Arcade AI team says about working with Alicia on rapid international expansion:

"Alicia dropped into our AI-driven e-commerce startup and immediately became the calm force driving clarity and momentum. In just two months, she led a complex customs & fees rollout, turned a messy UX flow into a developer-ready punch list, and distilled a scattered product backlog into a strategic roadmap. She's one of those rare product leaders who can zoom out to strategy and zoom in to edge-case QA—often in the same hour. Standups ran smoother, launches shipped cleaner, and the whole team felt lifted. If you need someone to cut through chaos and deliver, Ali's the one you want."

"I was impressed with how much background research Alicia did on a topic on which she had to quickly come up to speed! She was great at coordinating across different functional areas, she listened to different perspectives and was persistent in driving toward the end goal! I highly recommend the services she provides to early stage start-ups."