Easier done than said…
- Posted by Steve on August 18th, 2007 filed in Retail, Tourism and travel, online
“C” posted some comments on Thursday’s post where I suggested there is an opportunity beyond local tourists to sell “local” items…
today’s comment:
“Your examples come from the us. Great but normal. How many local craft stuff did you order from let´s say Lithuania, Mongolia or Soweto? Just for fun?”
and…
” turn to ask a question. Why is it that Wal Mart did not buy tons of romanian handycraft stuff to sell it across the us? Or thailands elephants or Kuwaits camels wich they carve out of everything? Or Ikea, wich produces worldwide, thus having an huge insight to local crafts?”
This morning, your mention of philatelists (stamp collectors) and Lithuania reinvigorated my interest in stamp collecting
and even greater interest in items from countries behind the iron curtain that were in circulation just before and just after the various revolutions. I found it is possible to order stamps from the the Lithuanian post office’s online store and ordered some 1990 and 1991 stamps with about 5 minutes of effort. Your mention of “Mongolia” peaked my interest as well. I made a bid on eBay to a seller in Latvia for a set of photos in the 1970’s of Ulan-Bator, Mongolia. In one day, I’ll know if I am victorious.
Your mention of “Soweto” reminded me one of my good friend Rob who left the U.S. as a young university student in the late 80’s to South Africa to support the country in its transition to and beyond apartheid. This experience sent him on a career towards traveling around the world to dangerous places helping people. He is also a guy with pretty worldly tastes in music. I took a look online, found a poster of “the Sounds of Soweto, 1987″, ordered it and had it shipped to him.
Regarding your question on Wal-Mart…. that is about the best example of a mass market store one could find. Although they do change their individual store selection to suit local tastes, they are not in the business of selling niche items. Even so, Pier One and Cost Plus World Markets are two very large U.S. stores (albeit nowhere near as large as Wal-Mart) where you can find Romanian items, usually glassware. These stores also try to have interesting items from around the world - although these “unique” items must be able to be produced in sufficient quantity given the scale of the stores distribution. This is, in essence, exactly why the online store is interesting… there might not be enough U.S. interest (or any country) in Sibiu to justify their local products in Wal-Mart but… if you can aggregate this demand around the world on the internet and get them to click on your store… you are in business. The only two sticking points are payment and shipping but…btw…paying extra to ship your Northern Luzon fertility symbol is cheaper than traveling to the Philippines.
Consider this… Assume 1/100th of 1 percent of persons who will own a computer in the next few years are interested in what you sell. Consider of these, only 1/10th have the money or ability to pay (credit card, pay pal, etc.) and receive shipment. That is still 22,000 interested people who can find you with a few clicks of a mouse.
Things are getting interesting for the suppliers of niche items who understands how to find their buyers. “The Long Tail” by Christopher Anderson - from his blog, his book, and the original article in Wired - explains this well.
Written by Steve
August 19th, 2007 at 12:26 pm
Hi Steve. Glad that the countries i mentioned brouhgt something up in you. As you see, the action you took was upon input. Easy? Yes. Still you miss my point. As i said: it wasn´t your motivation to active check upon that stuff. You did not wake up and had the idea on checkin that countries. You did it to show it could be easy. Wich never was the discussion here. But who and why and when will go on these sites. You prove me right.
Nobody cares except on mention or on a special personal interest in some particular area wich by natural extension will lead to other countries offer in that.
This is why i say that only if somebody will somehow bring up Romania, maybe there will be some interest raised. To order a stamp is very easy, yes. Also having the stamps in your home is cool, since it is part of a theme, a collection and its in the closet. There will be items like the thick shepherd blankets from romania wich you will not find on the floor in most of the houses. And this even in Romania itself where the traditional stuff still has value and understanding.
The taste in western countries is too different. You mentioned glassware. It is made in Romania, but has different modern designs. Wich is not to be considered traditional artwork, like some painted special handmade ceramics are. These are far away from the average western taste.
The calculus that you make is nice, ok so far. Potential interest and stuff. Just selling doesn´t work like that. There are so many factors coming into equation. Like for ex. there are so many americans going to Germany. Statistically in a 14 days stay they will average some 16 visits to McDonalds and other 26 stops at Starbucks, given there is one in the city. The first alternative is then again the McDonalds, just for coffee stops. Tell me how you account behaviour like that when showing of your loose-on-paper- counted-potential. Big business for tour operators and local businesses? Also most bought stuff: shirts, lederhosen, keyholder, beerglasses. This is the destination garagebox stuff. Other stuff includes the non-traditional purchases: sunglasses, armani, cameras. Wich is business, but nothing relevant for local manufacturers. Yes, it works if you are a huge company. Press everything in the markets. But there is no pull here. There is no natural demand for “Romania” around the world. Its just what people with interests here can bring on their ways. The said is not a unique behaviour. All nationalities have their customs taste and interests.
More is here to say. Your potential clicking people are once more different. I met people who were in China 10 weeks and could describe all meals they had, but nothing chinese from the country. Had bought a lucky jade frog. And they are both very heavy clickers with money and all your mentioned payment opportunities, but it is enough for them to see it online, and have the possibility to buy if only they would wish. They don´t. And won´t. At least they bought the frog there and not before while researching.
I agree with you that the opportunity, technology and the internationality we have today are great and very unique. But i won´t go with you so far and bend everything to fit the scheme. You showed me that you as interested “clicker” have “just” bought stamps. Thats your interest. I had some mongolian wooden games and some other leather stuff imported from there. Did you informed yourself what mongolian craft is made in the country? Not to buy. And please, not ebay. Thats not mongolian business or interest. Some thais put Kublai Khan on silk and sell original “mongolian kafthans”. I want to know how many real mongolian sites (or latvian) sites did you check to understand their craft. Don´t you think that is very important to also understand the culture of a country, maybe some history to real discern what and why traditional craft is? Instead of turist expectations? Examples for this: Dracula Castle, Dracula stories. Everybody jumping on this train. But this is no tradition, no wooden weapons or garlic stuff. Now there are a lot of supposedly old stories and traditions. Tell you, the remaining stories will be the best selling ones. Or, like in thailand, the River Kwai Bridge. The whole zone makes a decent living because of a non asian movie. Nothing traditional there. Also, if you wouldn´t have a higher payd job and living at romanian costs, mabe having children and mortgages etc. you also would reconsider a lot of this kind of purchases. How many us families beiing in financial troubled waters will now order handcrafted stuff from everywhere? Or the rich ones who want to be seen at Burberies, Abercrombies, Sakses and Harrodses of the world are interested in Sibius craft store? Maybe filming Cold Mountain 2 will help a little, the stars already receiving their welcome bag with some local goodies and a prewritten info for the press conferences.
Now some other remarks. I visited the cost plus markets site, the other was down now. Entered romania = no results. My remarks are: glassware or as you say ” romanian items” are just “Made in Romania” and really not to be mixed up with the genuine handcrafted traditional products. And by the labour costs in Romania,you could have enough stuff to make a one-week-end sale with two to five romanian traditional products at Wal Mart. You could that, i guarantee you. You only would need to order. They don´t, because there is no market. Just as simple as that. I was offered the opportunity to sell 250 containers with wool knitted baby clothes made in Serbia and Croatia. All prospects said the handcraft is so unbelievable. It took so much time to produce that according to western scales is considered as “cannot be payd”. But nobody wanted them. Proce was ok. Reasons: did not like the colours or their combinations. Did not like the patterns (a lot beeing serbian traditional), or right pattern false colours. No handcraft brand. The offer was posted on more big sites. Business ops and baby stuff. Its easier to sel a ship than those containers.
It is always about who WANTS to BUY. Then he gets it. Its not about where i post it. This is a common mistake made by companies and people who put up sites and hope it will boost to the point they can sell it out. I will once more refer to your click-calculus. From a real life experience and not from the wish side of the company. I can have all the vegetarians of the world click 100 times on my site. If i sell steaks it will be no business. If steaks are your niche in a vegetarian world, you need to change your offer, not extending it through more ebays.
Ill be out here for a while. Just wanted to tell you that i expected something different here. Like business ideas that you spot that are missing in a particular area or particular spot. Like near that hotel with the main customer beiing french a missing service would be …. How can we do that. What do we need to make that real. Or if somebody wants to really do it, how can you be of help.
That its not
Anyway, if you are really interested in philately, you will find a huge offer behind the iron curtain. since it was one of the best methods of exchanging local money into western currencies, and transferring them to western countries and invest them via a “collecting partner” who was a lawyer or thrustee. It was not only a legal way around the posession prohibition but it offered a tremendous exchange rate. There you can find some gems, since a lot of people collected for this reasons. Sure, some became real collectors through the hard work on their assets. But of course you need to search and and meet those people in real. However ebay won´t do this for you.