MOD makes accessories for one very specific little car. With TUNL handling the shipping, they turned worldwide demand into an international business, without cross-border costs getting in the way.

At a glance

255 international shipments and counting

• Grew from 1 to 2 international shipments a month to 11 to 17 a month (mid-2023 to mid-2026)

• A two-person team shipping to customers around the world

• Main markets: Australia, United Kingdom, and other Jimny strongholds worldwide

About MOD

MOD makes accessories for the Suzuki Jimny, and only the Jimny. Founders Donnet and Stan started the brand the way the best small businesses tend to start: they had a problem and got creative on a solution. They bought a Jimny, went overlanding, and quickly discovered that packing a tiny car for a long trip is its own kind of puzzle.

So they designed a few products for themselves on the road, made them when they got home, and found other Jimny owners wanted them too.

While most of the 4x4 world is, as Stan says, "beige and olive drab," MOD leans into colour: a red, yellow and blue palette so owners can make their car feel like theirs. That personality has earned them a loyal global following, strongest in places where the Jimny has a cult following like Australia, the UK, and in many pockets of Europe. Which is exactly where the shipping challenge began.

The Problem: before TUNL

The demand was international from early on. The ability to serve it wasn't.

Before TUNL, MOD was figuring out cross-border shipping on their own, and the numbers didn't work. They pulled a quote from a local depot, which came back effectively impossible.

"We even looked at major carriers directly, and it was just unbelievably expensive."

For a two-person business, the added cost of shipping on top of the product cost was going to push them out of an international market completely.

The appetite for MOD's products was there all over the world. The shipping economics were the bottleneck. At that stage international orders trickled out at roughly 1 to 2 a month.

The Solution: TUNL

Discovering TUNL changed the maths. A South African platform built to make international shipping simple and affordable, handling the cost-saving rates, the customs, the duties and the export paperwork that usually overwhelms small exporters. TUNL took the part MOD couldn't crack on their own and made it workable.

As TUNL grew, MOD grew alongside it, coming on as an early partner who helped shape and test the product in the real world. They didn't just sign up and disappear into a dashboard.

Today MOD is fully integrated with TUNL, and the TUNL Shopify integration runs the whole shipping journey.

International shoppers see live shipping rates and duties calculated right at checkout, before they pay. When an order comes in, MOD packs it, prints the label, and leaves it for collection. TUNL handles the carrier, the customs paperwork and the tracking from there. What used to mean manual quoting and guesswork now just happens in the background.

"We'll package something, leave it downstairs, it gets collected, and off it goes. I don't even check if it gets delivered anymore, because I know it will.”

The Results

With shipping no longer the constraint, the growth shows up clearly in the numbers.

Before TUNL: roughly 1 to 2 international shipments a month, each one a manual, uncertain and often uneconomical effort.

After TUNL: 11 to 17 international shipments a month, run as routine. That's close to a 10x lift in monthly international volume.

The fuller picture:

• 255 shipments in total.

• All of it is run by a team of two, now reaching customers worldwide.

• Biggest markets are Australia, the UK and Europe

A small South African brand built around one quirky little car can now confidently sell to the world.

"This takes our business from just being a South African business into actually being a global business, and being able to access markets we didn't even realise were there."

There is a confidence shift, too, that goes beyond logistics. Customers reach checkout and get a quote that says UPS or FedEx, names they recognise. That makes a small South African company feel more legitimate globally.

Sell internationally? TUNL can help.

If you're a South African brand with customers waiting beyond our borders, TUNL makes international shipping simple, affordable and built to scale with you, Shopify and WooCommerce integrations included.

[Start shipping internationally with TUNL →]