🎯 The business: American-style high-protein meat snacks, halal certified, sold to distributors in the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, where gyms, convenience stores and online grocers are growing fast and few brands serve the niche properly. Made by a halal co-packer, not by you.

Gulf food importers and distributors who supply supermarkets (Carrefour, Lulu, Spinneys), gyms, petrol-station stores and online grocers. A 1 oz bag that retails at the equivalent of $4 to $6 is sold to the distributor at $1.60 to $2.20. Fitness and keto communities in Dubai and Riyadh are the early adopters.

Confirm which halal certifiers the UAE and Saudi authorities accept for imported meat products, because the wrong certificate means the shipment does not clear. Find a U.S. co-packer already certified by one of them. Develop two flavors. Register for Gulfood in Dubai, the region’s food trade show, or book a Commercial Service Gold Key matchmaking in Dubai. Send samples ahead.

A bag that costs about $1.10 to produce and label sells at $1.90 to the distributor, leaving $0.80 before freight and certification. A 20,000-bag order is about $16,000 of margin. Meat snacks are high-value per kilo, so air freight is viable for early orders. Margins improve sharply with volume at the co-packer.

USDA export certification for meat products to each Gulf country, halal certification accepted by that country, product registration with the destination food authority (Dubai Municipality, Saudi Food and Drug Authority), Arabic labeling, shelf-life rules, and FDA facility registration. Meat is the most regulated food export; a customs broker who has shipped it before is worth the fee.

A certificate the destination does not recognize. A shelf-life requirement your packaging cannot meet. A distributor who wants exclusivity for the whole region before placing a real order. Heat damage in a port in July. The brands that last get the certification chain right first and start with one distributor in one country.