Can it really be that simple? Could it be that you so easily came across an honest, reliable, experienced supplier with affordable pricing?Well, it might be, it might not be. It's basically a roll of the dice if the company is not an established flagship brand like the ones in our 10 best furniture brands in Turkey post, but these brands will usually have distributors for your region that you are going to be contacting which means one more pocket to fill through your order, and then the good prices became, not bad or similar to that of your local furniture with just more risk involved.
Where To Start?
You started off on the right foot. It's true that Turkey has much cheaper prices compared to the manufacturers in Europe and the quality can be very good, comparable to their European counterparts.
But this market is vast and nowhere near as digitalized as the European market. Furniture manufacturers in Turkey are usually in their 40s-50s and they don't know much about digital marketing, listing their companies and products online, or the English language.
Brands you come across online - who could afford to spend money on their digital presence - don't have as affordable prices or flexibility of delivery/payment terms.
You need to find the manufacturer who is mainly producing for the Turkish market for the Turkish consumer because they are the ones with good quality and very affordable.This is what we do as Eurus Concept, we link customers up with this experienced and affordable furniture craftsmanship and open up the Turkish Furniture market to the whole wide world. We are the intermediary between the rest of the world and Turkish furniture.
How To Find The Right Furniture Manufacturer?
As we said, this is a vast market with big potential. That might precisely be the issue, where to start? Our Top 10 Turkish Furniture Brands list is a good start, however, these are huge companies that probably won't provide you the flexibility or assistance with logistics, MOQs, and so on.
It's is not so popular in Turkey as it might be in other countries, but there is still some potential here. You will probably come across Turkish furniture groups and communities in your search, you could find your partner here but beware, there is a chance you are not speaking to the producer of the product but someone who is just advertising it and then adding their percentages of profit on the subtotal.
Turkish manufacturers are starting to pick up on Instagram marketing's added value so they are starting to give ads, use hashtags, and post stories regularly. If you look into the right hashtags you may come across someone that can work with you.
You could join some furniture export groups on Facebook and try to network. This is a great way to connect with like-minded individuals and learn more about the industry. Who knows, you might even make some valuable connections that could help you in your business ventures.
Contact Associations or Unions
It's very old school but it can still work in a yet old school market. You can contact the furniture exporters' unions or associations and lay out the details of your procurement, they may open an auction for your contract and connect with you the suppliers, this process may take some time.
Go To Turkey & Visit The Manufacturers
Go to the suppliers, meet them eye to eye, shake their hands and make your own assessment of who the person across you is. Go through their factory and see how it looks. This is the old-school way in this digitalized world and how you will feel the most confident with who you are working with.
We don't mean to say that it's fault-proof though because plenty of people shook hands and got cheated by the same person afterward, digitally or physically.
There is the issue that Turkish business owners don't speak English more often than not. This can lead to strange situations where someone shows you around a factory claiming they are a partner to it or that they own it, but in reality, they just do freelance export marketing and put their margin on top of the sales.
After Finding The Supplier
You liked the production quality, you feel good about the person you are working with and you feel confident, great! Before you are giving the order to the manufacturer, here is what you should ask them.
Delivery Terms
Producers are usually keen on exporting products only through ExWorks or FOB Warehouse which is the technical term of you will handle the shipping yourself.
You need to organize the logistical process with a freight forwarder and get a door to port or door-to-door price from them. The organization needs to be tight because if you keep the items in the manufacturer's warehouse, they could start charging you for each day you don't get them out of there.
Payment Terms
Get the details of their payment terms and see if they match your procurement strategy. Think and plan carefully what is the "success" of the process for you, is it the products being simply ready in the warehouse, or is it them being completely packaged, labeled, and ready to ship, or is it the products arriving at your location. Define them clearly and agree on it with your supplier.
The nuances matter a lot here.
Packaging
Learn exactly how they do the packaging and what are the packed dimensions of their products. This is necessary for you to calculate your shipping costs.
Packaging is the first big risk to the seller in the process. You could have amazing production and reliability of furniture from a supplier and it all means nothing with the right packaging, and your delivery terms are ExWorks, anything happens during the shipment - it's all on you.
Warranty of the Products
You need to get a written down warranty from the producer for all the products you buy in case there is an issue occurring because of a fault in manufacturing. Furniture is a headache of a product with lots of risks involved.
No one can truly know the quality of their products other than the producer itself. The sponges of a sofa's cushions can get soft and get curvy, losing their shape. The fabric that's upholstered could lose its color or show water drop marks on it because of bad quality. The leg of a coffee table could be broken prematurely.
There is no way to know if these things will happen or not beforehand until you start using the furniture, that's why you need a warranty.
Spare Parts of the Products
Let's say you bought a bunch of coffee tables with gold-colored metal feet which is a popular design these days, one of the tables' feet could be broken in the two years you are using them and you might need to replace it - in this case, does your supplier keep the spare parts of the products, if so, for how long?
Order Process
All the agreements and arrangements are made and you have finally kicked off the order after sending the agreed-upon amount of money to your supplier.
At this point you have nothing to do - the ball is completely on the manufacturer's side. Check in from time to time to see how they are doing and if they are actually going to deliver on what they promised when they promised.
Quality Control & Assurance
If you are not physically at the warehouse or don't see products with your eyes it's not possible to do quality control, obviously. Even if you ask the producer to show you with video, and photos what is the state of the products, he could simply just show you what he wants you to see and it is not much you can do about it.
If the order quantity is big, you could ask them to make a sample product and ship it to you or send someone to check it in Turkey, or request an extensive video where the manufacturer shows you all details.
When we do the quality assurance of our orders, many small mistakes that the manufacturers make are most of the time fixed in this stage. The small silly mistakes in a sample show you a very costly blueprint of faulty production.
This is not something you can skip over though, you need somehow to do it before the products are official all your Ex Works with all its possible defects and mistakes.
Logistics & Shipment
This is a very delicate process and you need to be really careful with all the information laid out as there is no margin for error.
- Get the gross dimensions of all the products and calculate the CBM volume of your total shipment
- Get a detailed packing slip from your manufacturer - make sure all the information here is correct.
- Make sure to request a Certificate of Origin from your producer for all the products.
- Make sure to ask your freight forwarder to handle all the customs declarations and custom clearance processes for you because these processes are a headache and you cannot do it all by yourself.
If you haven't made your plan properly and didn't involve all the possible costs, your total cost estimation expectations might change here.
In Conclusion
What starts out as a hopeful business opportunity can turn into a headache very quickly with all the risks and details involved that might not be so obvious in the first glance. All the things we laid out before can be divided into three main categories:- Market Research & Analysis
- Procurement Planning & Execution
- Quality Control & Logistic Operations
We don't want to scare you off but these are all demanding and time-consuming topics that require expertise and know-how. Even if you are experienced with these processes not being able to communicate properly because of the language barrier with your suppliers means that what you knew previously will likely not be useful here.
There is just simply too much effort & resources spent on the importing process, better to use your valuable resources to market this product and sell it in your local market. Let us handle all these processes we've laid out here and you just focus on your side of the business.