About the Buyer

Dino's Travel Blog

Bali - Buying with Dino

Thu July 2, 1998

I’m going to try to give you an update on the last 3 days of my buying trip here in Bali; I’ve been going non-stop like I know you all have. I usually wake up with a nervous anxiety tingle throughout my body when I’m in Bali and I’m still not sure why, but it happens every time I’m here. It’ more like a psyche type of feeling, and even though it can be a paradise like it is, I usually don’t enjoy the fruits of this beautiful paradise and become somewhat anti-social. I do however start my day with a morning and evening swim in the pool even though the beach is a 5- minute walk from my hotel, go figure! I am soon going to make a point of enjoying some chill’n time. Since the suppliers are closed on Sunday, I’m going to start with a day on the beach combined with a Balinese massage.

I plan to fly to Java on Monday or Tuesday and go to 3 different cities for about a week to do more buying and check out our pre-ordered furniture state of affairs.

I’ve been waking up at 6 or 7 am every day, starting with breakfast, then usually I check my e-mails, then I hit the streets, the bank back to the suppliers then back to the bank again. I can’t believe how much I’ve spent in such a short time!

The weather is very hot and sticky here and combined with the dust , fumes and smog , I’m usually pretty grungy by the end of the day. I rented a hotel room for about $30 bucks a day and I rented a Jimmy for under $20 a day with full insurance. I fill the gas tank for about $7 and eat lunch for approximately $3.50.

I picked an excellent time to be here; there are very few tourists, the exchange rate is very good and the suppliers are eager, combined with my now experienced buying, well established relationships with my suppliers and knowledge of our customer’s needs and Kuda’s new direction; an tremendous combination!

With the exchange rate the way it is, I’m finding the prices combined with quality and design very exciting!

I believe I probably bought 3 containers of furniture and home wares by now; I seem to be buying from a ‘place’ of desperately having an empty store and needing to fill it; this could be good on one hand and potentially dangerous on the other. I’ve managed to amass a collection of great styles, designs, finishes and prices, yeah!!!

I am also buying an additional container consisting of T.V cabinets, curios, wardrobes, buffets, book shelves, material hangers, swivel book stands and star studded mirrors and more.

Today I bought a lot of leather-upholstered chairs and benches for dynamite prices! I ordered a whole bunch of small cabinets, coffee tables and tables that will sell for amazing prices.

I went to the Bamboo furniture factory and there’s good news and bad news. The good news is I must have ordered an entire container of this stuff: beds, wardrobes, dressers, TV cabinets, coffee and dining tables, with matching chairs, the ‘whole story’ at amazing price points!

The bad news is that they are so backed up with orders and it is a 6 month turn around time, yikes.

I also bought from a top end company that has some of the best quality, wood and workmanship I’ve seen in Indonesia. My friend introduced me to them last year and she buys tables from them. She has introduced the ‘Marion’ table design to this company that selects the best old teak. They hand make the whole table buy scraping the wood continually for several days with shards of glass, they then sand, stain and polish them until there’s a natural shellac like sheen to them. Even under the table is done; this company is owned by 3 Chinese –Indonesian brothers who focus on quality. We spent the whole morning designing furniture for our climate; they’re not going to use glue, but rather an apparently seamless table tops with tenant joints that will allow for climate expansion. They wouldn’t sell me stuff they had doubts about. They are higher end and a “ Royal Marion will sell for about 1,500- $1,700, but wait till you see the finish, it’s like nothing you’ve seen before.

The matching chairs will sell for under $ 195. I’ve been thinking about their dark (almost black) finish for over a year now. So I ordered the “Royal Marion” and “Royal Anderson” style tables in both black and natural finish with matching chairs, very sexy!!!!! I also ordered some custom beds with old carvings on the headboard which after careful review, I’m going to cancel because they’re too expensive and would have to retail for over 2,500.

From another company I bought a lot of teak root furniture for a steal! This stuff can go outdoors and is very funky with a nice finish on it. I bought many wood Buddhas and 1 at 5 feet, carved dragon’s large and medium size, as well as all sizes of lucky ceramic Chinese coins; the large ones can be used outdoors in ‘Zen” gardens, could be a hit!

I’ve ordered about 1,200 placemats, wood, palm twig, and black bamboo, with matching coasters. I bought baskets and hampers, and will soon buy the mats; haven’t seen the woven style yet. I will buy the elaborate birdcages tomorrow.

I ordered more bags with deeper base, printed on both sides with black rope and grommets; should solve the strength and storage problem.

The other thing I need immediately is the dimension of a single and double bed. I also bought a small quantity of didgeridoos made from bamboo and teak wood for those die hard’s that keep coming in for them; they will sell between $19.99- 35. One will sell for $135. for the pro’s. I also bought a fabulous oil painting of a Buddha.

Well, as you can see, that warehouse will fill up with all this new and fabulous stock.

A lot of this stuff will take up to 2 months to make and therefore we will get some of it in the spring and the rest in early to mid summer.

Chinese beds in the Queen size are likely to be in the first shipments where as the King’s may be in the next due to available stock and production time. They seem to be a little different, all with carved headboards and apparently no footboard. I am trying to re-fresh their memory by drawing it out from memory about the footboard matching the headboard design. This design will definitely not be in the spring container.

Well, I’m pooped, bonsoir…Dino,