By Nick Green, Teemo MD.
Working in furniture right now reminds me of the toilet roll buying frenzy that many supermarkets in the UK faced at the start of Covid! Manufacturers are buying up raw materials like crazy. Prices are rocketing and there are major shortages. The higher the price, the more they buy… and so on. OK, it’s oak rather than toilet paper that’s hard to find, but you get my point!
Why is it happening? Well, during the past 15 months of lockdowns, people have saved up the cash they’d usually spend in restaurants, on fuel, holidays, and leisure. As a result, we are spending more on our homes and buying lots of furniture. Factories have never been busier, raw material demand never higher!
It’s a challenge but we’re fortunate at Teemo because we have a brilliant and extremely knowledgeable ten-strong team based in Vietnam. They have access to some excellent off-the-beaten-path factories that use less-common materials like acacia, mountain ash, American ash and rubberwood. Our Vietnamese team are even working with the manufacturers to advise them how to get around the supply-chain issues.
Our acacia pieces pictured below are a case in point. Acacia is a local Vietnamese wood but treated correctly looks stunning and is fantastically durable.
So, by working smarter, using different materials, and drawing on our team’s unique knowledge, we can sidestep an industry-wide problem that’s causing some major headaches. We’re able to roll with it, you might say!
