See every part of launching in the uae and wider gcc before you commit to any of it.
An honest version of building here.
Twelve parts of the business. I have built all twelve, in this market, for three years.
$297 until 30 September for the first readers. $499 from 1 October.
Who has actually done all of it?
You can see it. The Gulf is growing, the consumer here is curious and spending, and you have a product you believe belongs on these shelves. The ambition is not the problem.
The problem starts when you try to find out how.
There is an enormous amount of information and very little of it agrees. So you start booking calls. The lawyer knows the licence. The freight agent knows the container. The distributor knows the listing fee. Every one of them is good at their piece, and not one of them has run the whole thing, so nobody can tell you how their piece changes yours.
Underneath every call is the same question. What does this actually cost? Not the licence, not the certification, the whole thing, done properly and done well enough to work. You have a number in your head and no way to find out whether it is close.
So you lie awake doing the sums again. It is daunting, and it is the part nobody warns you about.
Who has actually done all of it?
Imagine making your next decision with the whole picture in front of you.
The two questions still turn up. Now you can answer both of them.
Every part of the business, laid out for this region. Legal, finance, compliance, commercial, brand, marketing, operations, logistics, customer service. What each one costs, what order they happen in, and how each one changes the next.
You have a budget built from real numbers instead of a guess you are quietly hoping is right. You know which route to market is yours, and why. You know what your product's standard is, and you bought it before you designed the packaging, not after. When somebody quotes you a fee, you know whether it is fair.
And you sleep, because every decision you are making is one you can stand behind.
The launch is still hard. However, it is no longer a guess.
Nobody you spoke to has sat in every seat
May 2023, I landed in Dubai for the first time in my life, ready to set up our new life here, with absolutely no clue how to bring a beverage into the UAE market, let alone the wider GCC.
Within my first week I was sitting across from lawyers, agents and consultancies. All of them wanted the high fees. None of them had actually built anything from where I was sitting, as a founder, a CEO, a managing director. That frustrated me. So I became an expert at figuring s*** out quickly, on my own. Not by choice rather, the need for survival.
The GCC Playbook is what I wish I had at the start of our Middle Eastern adventure to save me time, money and sleepless nights.
Note: This does not replace your lawyer. It replaces the agonizing months of trial, error, and burnt capital that even the best legal counsel cannot navigate for you. The playbook is pure operational reality, stripped of corporate fluff and theoretical advice.
your
The GCC Playbook
Everything it takes to launch and build a FMCG brand in the UAE and wider GCC, written by somebody who did it. Not a course you watch. A vault you work from, with the templates already built, so you finish each section holding the thing, not notes about the thing.
Twelve sections, because there are twelve parts to this business and every one of them can sink the others.
Written to save you the time, money and pain it cost me. Minus the assumptions other markets teach. I already made the mistakes.
In the order they actually happen, because the order is most of it.
About Me
Legal
People
Finance
Compliance
Commercial
Brand
Marketing
Operations and Forecasting
Logistics and Customs
Customer Service
The Emotional Toolkit
What you get
content
12 Core Sections
Covering every corner of your business and how it adapts to this market.
Checklists & Guides
19 Templates
Ready-made templates designed to fit your business needs immediately.
calculators
Implementation Tools
Including calculators to give you visibility on the number no one will give you straight.
Talk-to-Camera Videos
My Personal Takes
My personal anecdotes documenting the mistakes to save you time, money and sleepless nights.
what you need to use it:
No setup needed: You sign in with the email you paid with, it opens in your browser on any device, and the templates download as normal files. No account to create, nothing to install.
Ideal Profile
This is for you if
You have watched this region grow and you believe your product belongs here. What you do not have is a straight answer on what it takes.
You have decided you are launching in this market and you want to check what you think you know before you commit the money.
You are still weighing whether this market is right for your brand, and you would rather run a proper market study before you commit than find out after.
You are bringing a food, beverage or consumer goods product into the GCC, whether you import it yourself or go through a distributor.
You would rather read the version written by somebody who did it than pay a consultancy to tell you the same thing more slowly.
Disqualified
This is not for you if
You are interested in the region but you have no product, no company and no intention of bringing one here. This will be interesting and useless to you.
You want somebody to do it for you. This gives you the operator's judgement, not the execution.
You need company setup guidance outside the UAE. My company setup experience is the UAE, specifically. Setting up is country-by-country. Distribution is the part that applies across the GCC.
$297
Why it is $297 until 30 September:
This is the first complete version of the vault out in the world. Everyone who buys before 30 September pays $297, and I am asking one thing back: tell me what was useful, what was missing, and what you would have paid to know sooner.
Prices increase to 499$ as of 1st October.
FAQs
Is this just for the UAE or the entire GCC?
My company setup experience is the UAE, specifically. Setting up is country-by-country.
Everything after setting up travels further. Compliance runs on GSO, which is the whole GCC, with the UAE's extra Emirates Quality Mark layer on top. Logistics and Customs covers Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia separately, because they are separate systems and the paperwork is not interchangeable. Commercial, Brand, Marketing, Operations, Customer Service and the Emotional Toolkit are not jurisdictional at all. So: the company you set up is UAE. Getting a product certified, landed and sold is GCC.
Is this a course?
No. It is a private site you sign in to, with the templates built and a checklist on every section. You work from it, you do not watch it.
Do I need to have decided I am launching before this is useful?
No. Some of this vault exists for the decision itself. The Commercial section carries a market study prompt you run before you commit, a benchmark of 17 distributors and retailers with what to know before you pitch each one, and a route-to-market decision tree that sorts you into your own path.
What you do need is a product and a genuine intention. That is what makes this relevant to you rather than interesting.
Is the information updated for 2026?
Every external source carries the date it was checked. Costs, standards and incubator terms change in this market, so you can see what was verified and when.
Can I edit templates?
Yes. They download as normal spreadsheet and document files, so they open in whatever you already use and everything in them is yours to edit and keep.
What is your refund policy?
There are no refunds. You get the whole vault the moment you buy, so read what is in it and who it is for before you do.
What happens if I do not send you feedback?
Nothing. You keep the vault, the price you paid is the price you paid. I am asking because the first readers shape what the next version looks like, and because I would rather hear it from you than guess.
How long do I get access to the materials?
You get lifetime access to the core playbook and the operator vault, including all future regulatory updates and new templates we release.