Working with carriers is one of the most common ways for agents and brokers to reach out to the global marketplace. A perfect example is the story of how Capacity Coverage Co. of New Jersey, Inc. worked with Chubb to develop a relationship in China and ultimately established a division based on reverse-flow insurance, said Martin Lebson, vice president of Capacity Coverage and a director of the AIMS Society.

Now a niche-rich brokerage ranked among the top 50 in the country, Capacity began 20 years ago through a merger of the current partners. In its original form, Capacity had already been conducting international business through a marine department and reverse-flow business for some heavy products liability exposure accounts. But the brokerage's multinational business really started taking off five years ago, when Wally Gardner, senior vice president at Chubb, asked Lebson for assistance in sending AIMS Society modules for selling insurance to China. "We e-mailed him the material, they had it translated into Mandarin, and Wally and I went to Shanghai," Lebson said.

While in China, Lebson made contacts and considered the trip as an opportunity to expand his business's reach into the Far East. When he returned the next year, Lebson used his Chinese connections as a springboard to establishing Capacity Worldwide Consulting Group LLC, of which he is president, a division of Capacity that specializes in reverse-flow business insurance, programs designed for U.S. subsidiaries of foreign-owned parent companies. "We get referrals from various sources and place business for companies from China, the UK, France, Mexico, South America, Australia and elsewhere," Lebson said. "We're also working on an opportunity to open up in Russia, although the challenge of an unstable market is holding us back. Eventually we hope to write auto, business, fleet and marine insurance there. That would be a direct presence writing local Russian business."