We were visiting Tokyo the last couple of days to go to the Tokyo International Gift Show. Last week, one of our suppliers, San-X, invited us to come and meet them in person. So we decided very quickly, that we will fly to Tokyo to meet them. We booked the airplane tickets and the hotel a few days before the show and flew to Tokyo on the 1st of February. Luckily we got 2 tickets because it is Chinese New Year right now and lots of Chinese people are going on holidays to Japan. We spent 4 days at the gift show and walked for hours and hours to check out all the booths. We met some companies who we ordered from before like San-X, Prime Nakamura, Debika and Echino, and we found a lot of new contacts. There were so many nice products displayed and we talked to so many companies, we had trouble to carry all those catalogues we got with us.
We even met Rilakkuma and his friends, Kapibara-san, Beggar Swindle and others in person. It is not allowed to take pictures at the gift show, only a few booths got a special permit to allow photos while the characters were walking around. Of course I had to take some pictures with them

I met Rilakkuma and his friends!

Kapibara-san and me

pink Beggar Swindle character

evil Beggar Swindle character

in front of Tokyo Bigh Sight, the exhibition center in Tokyo

we had a meeting with San-X and had to take a picture

San-X's booth at the Tokyo Gift Show 2011

lots of people lining up to register for the show

entrance to the Gift Show trade fair

Tokyo Gift Show

Tokyo Big Sight at night

I had to use this foot massage in the hotel room every night, my feet were so sore

Today we had a visit from our supplier from Japan. He represents all the popular fancy stationery brands like Q-Lia, Kamio, Crux, Poolcool, Mindwave, Kutsuwa etc. from Japan. His responsibility is exporting these items overseas. We are working with him for just a short while, as I wrote about in an earlier blog post: New Fancy Japanese Stationery Supplier. He was visiting a trade fair here in Hong Kong and we set up a meeting so we could finally meet in person and discuss our future business collaboration. It went really well, he brought lots of new catalogs (he sends us new catalogs every 2 weeks from Japan) with the latest collections and some samples. We are going to place another order shortly as the Japanese stationery items sell really well. I can’t wait to get the new cute stationery items. It is always very exciting to open those parcels

I have to admit, I couldn’t overcome the temptation to order some samples for myself at the trade fairs I visited the last weeks. There were so many gorgeous Christmas decorations, useful household items etc. So I pretended that I am interested in their products and ordered some samples. These days I received a few parcels containing some really beautiful candles, silicon baking forms and some ceramic knives (Alan plans to do some business with them though). Sometimes it is really useful to have a company he he…

Today I finally received the samples I ordered from the factory I found on the trade fair in April. I got some really cute fans and the quality is really good. Not the usual bad quality I am used to get as samples. The only problem is the MOQ (Minimum Order Quantity) for these items. I would need to order at least 3,000 sets. So I am not sure yet if I am going to order them. That’s a lot of fans to sell.

I went to the Gifts & Premium Fair the first time today. We were just curious what they are offering there and hoped that we are lucky and find something interesting for our shop. The fair was huge; so many halls. Every time I go to a trade fair I come back home with burning feet and legs. It is SO exhausting. You don’t realize it while you are there because there are so many things to see so you are totally distracted. But after leaving the premises you suddenly realize how many kilometres you must have walked. High Heels are a No-NO, you just wouldn’t make it through countless aisles of booths.

I was really lucky this time as I met a Japanese guy who is the official distributor of San-X. If you don’t know San-X, here is the official website. They have lots of cute kawaii-style characters like Rilakkuma (a cute bear) and Mamegoma (a baby seal). San-X didn’t have a booth there but the factory who is producing their products gave me the contact details. I will definitely contact them. Their items would fit perfectly into our shop.

Rilakkuma, the cute Relax Bear

Mamegoma, a baby seal

We also found a contact for a printing shop here in Hong Kong who could make low quantity of t-shirts for us. The printing quality is really good so that could be a useful contact in the future. We plan to make our own t-shirts soon. And low quantities are always welcomed. There was also a company who could make our prints on stickers, so our customers could iron the designs themselves onto their t-shirts. But I personally think the printing shop is more interesting because the quality is just better.

These weeks many trade fairs are held in Hong Kong. They are just in time for companies ordering for their Christmas business. Alan and I went to a Houseware Fair and we could see lots of Christmas decoration. I must say I LOVE Christmas and seeing all these decorations, Christmas trees, Christmas candles etc. made me really looking forward to this year’s Christmas. Like every year, we will fly to Austria and celebrate Christmas with my family. Can’t wait to see them again and lots of snow and Christmas decoration.

Now, back to what I wanted to write about: We checked out that trade fair because we wanted to see if we can find anything interesting and maybe get a 2nd product range for our business. It is always wise to not just stick to one product range but to extend it and maybe even find a totally different product range for your business. I have a colleague from Germany who is exactly doing this. He is selling ducks (the ones for the bathtub) and he has another online shop selling cherrystones and other natural products.

We found 2 interesting products: One is a factory producing stickers. Stickers aren’t anything special, but they have wall stickers which can be stuck on a wall or any other big surface. It is great to decorate your room. They have designs for children rooms, adult bedrooms, living rooms, kitchen and so on. Some examples of designs: gorgeous flowers, Buddhas, Asian inspired themes and many more.

I also found a factory who makes 3D stickers for decorating bathroom & kitchen tiles, cups, glasses, fridge, MP3 player, PSP, iPhone, iPod, mobile phone and many more. They are really cool because the quality is amazing and after sticking it for example on a tile it looks like it was printed on it, not just a sticker. And the 3D effect is really amazing too. We were totally surprised that a sticker can look like a print. With these stickers it will be easy to change your bathroom, kitchen or any of your decoration within seconds. You don’t need to spend huge amounts of money on new tiles, glasses or whatever anymore. The stickers are even removable, so you can change the design as often as you want. Here is a photo of some examples, unfortunately you can’t see the quality:

I hope we can find a way to produce and sell these products very soon. We can even make custom made designs. So anyone interested, please contact me by e-mail.

I have to admit I couldn’t resist when I saw all these gorgeous candles and ordered some samples for myself. That’s one of the advantages when you have a company, you can order free samples for yourself, but don’t tell anyone.

We are constantly on the lookout for new products. This year I decided to go to all trade fairs in Hong Kong that sound interesting. You never know what you will find. As I live in Hong Kong and there are so many international trade fairs here, I should take this chance and check them out.

Today, Alan and I went to the Gifts & Houseware Fair to look for some new ideas. And we really found some interesting things. Alan is really into ceramic knives and we found 2 factories who could manufacture them for us. I also found some factories for badges, cute fans, plastic accessories (mobile phone straps, bracelets etc.) and factories who produce blankets and doormats for one of my customers. Alan also found a company who makes iPhone skinz but unfortunately, their quality isn’t good enough for his expectations. He is doing a local chinese blog related to iPhone news, software etc. and always looking for new products that could be interesting to blog about.

For my my company modeS4u, the cute, kawaii-style fans and the badges could be interesting to add to our current collection. Here are some pictures of the fans, aren’t they cute?

I planned to go to the Canton Fair in Guangzhou / China this coming weekend to look for new suppliers. Now, the Chinese government just changed the rules for foreigners visiting China.

The usual procedure is: you go to the border, fill out an application form at the visa office, wait around 10min and you have your visa (single entry). Even better, you can go to a special travel agent in Hong Kong and apply for a multiple-entry 1-year visa. I got that one before, just took 2-3 days and you can go to China as often as you wish.

As the Olympic games are approaching, the Chinese government gets more and more worried about bad publicity (for example the disaster in Tibet) and therefore secretly changed the rules. Even worse, they didn’t announce this news to the public. Hong Kong reporters called to the Beijing goverment department and asked what happened. They denied that anything changed. But the point is, you can’t get any multiple entry visas anymore. Only single and double entry and only in a very complicated way (embassy, etc.). Furthermore, many people confirmed, that they even couldn’t get a single-entry visa at the border or at the travel agent anymore! It was said, that the rules will change back after the Olympic Games are over.

Ok, if the Chinese goverment is doing such stupid ridiculous games with us foreigners, I won’t be going to the trade fair. I don’t want to risk to get stranded at the border and have to return without going to the trade fair. Luckily, for me it’s not such a big deal as I seldom go to China anyway, but I know of many people who do business by going to China a few times per week. Their financial income is on a great risk now and I have heard of some husbands who have to stay longterm in China now and can only come back once in a while to see their families. What a mess! These Olympic games are really starting to annoy me

A few days ago, I wrote that I found a new factory which can make some really nice scarves with stars on them. Well, after we left the trade fair we found out that the business card from that company was not here anymore. I can’t explain how could that have happened as we tacked it to a catalog as a precaution. Anyway, as I was so excited about these scarves I went to the trade fair once more today and got another business card from them. Let’s hope it was worth the extra trip and we can sell lots of them.

Finding new products is crucial for our business so I search the Internet, visit trade fairs, etc. very often. Today, Alan and I went to a trade fair and found a very promising new factory from China which is producing scarves. Most of their designs are not interesting for us, but there was one design I really loved. Its a silky style scarf with lots and lots of stars on it. My customers love stars, so I had to talk to them. They told me that it’s their first time exhibiting on a trade fair which I could see because they had 3 sales there and only 1 spoke English! The other 2 only spoke Putonghua (Mandarin). What are they thinking? That foreigners visiting trade fairs all speak Putonghua? Crazy! I speak some Putonghua but I don’t know the vocabulary for business related conversation.

Anyway, there was one who spoke English and I discussed with him questions about the product. They can make different colours and I ordered 4 samples (neon-pink, neon-yellow, black, white) to be able to take some pictures and show them to my customers. Neon colours are so IN now! Their MOQ (Minimum order quantity) is also really attractive (300 pieces/colour), their prices are also good. Now, I will wait for the samples and post some pictures here soon.