Buyer beware: know the main issues when working with suppliers abroad
Technology! We love it because it makes us wiser, faster, responsive and more productive in our personal and professional lives. When it comes to finding and procuring new interiors for your commercial spaces, the internet is the best place to start your search – helping give you design inspiration, conduct price checking and become more knowledgeable on specifics to help narrow down your options.
But what happens when you need to buy large quantities of fixtures, furniture and lighting products from international sources? We often hear of procurement professionals saying they logged on to a popular website known for finding foreign manufacturers of anything and everything – and negotiated a very cheap price and use this as the driving factor to proceed further.
But when a reputable manufacturer presents their products and technology to the same procurement professionals, they are hit with “I can buy this for cheaper online” or “I have a direct email relationship with the foreign manufacturer” or “you are simply buying from the same supplier and adding a markup”. At ideoli, when we are confronted with these comments, we always advise them to proceed with caution and wish them best of luck!
