Greetings from Yiwu, China
So busy in Yiwu, lots to do and this being China things happen at pace it's quite invigorating..
Coco my wife (and your China agent) makes it all happen. I'll describe a typical day below.
Last week I was telling you about catching up with some of our old suppliers and always greeting each other with the Chinese greeting.. "Long Time No See!" .. if you missed it you can catch up here..
I also mentioned our trip down the G60 (China's Route 66) to Coco's home town where we caught up with the rest of her family and made a visit to the ancestral village.
Coco's family are the nicest people, she has a brother (James Dean good looking) who runs the village supermarket and farmers supply store. His wife (beautiful and fashionably dressed) is a close friend of Coco and came with Coco's sister (also beautiful and super jolly) to take me out for a welcome meal.. over the next few days we had to meet and eat with all the extended family at various restaurants always serving the local food.. which I really like.. it's nothing like what you would find in Chinese restaurants in Europe. We eat lamb and pork chops dusted with spices you have never tasted before, all sorts of vegetable dishes and local river fish.. always served for sharing on a revolving table top with cartons of local beer stacked on the floor for easy access. Peanuts are a local crop and a delicacy is peanut veg dish.. de-shelled peanuts but still attached to the root stems, steamed and served as a vegetable.. the stems taste of peanuts.. Who knew!
There are a lot of relatives.. this area has a Christian culture, and maybe because of this in the bad old days the local villagers colluded to evade the one child policies. Coco tells me fascinating tales of how the rules were got around, pregnant women hidden away, and children "allocated" to different families in "official" documents.. Hence these days we are lucky to have big family meals.
At family meals of this kind everyone has to give special attention and respect to everyone else.. they way you do this is by standing up with a full glass of beer and toasting your respected person and both parties have to down the full glass. Fortunately the beer is not too strong, but if the rice wine appears.. then believe me it's time to run away..
After dinner they like to play a drinking game - a bit like Paper, Rock, Scissors.. but with numbers chanted loudly in the local language with corresponding hand-signs that have to add up to something.. it's complicated and involves considerable mental arithmetic - the loser has to down the drink. Late afternoon on May day in the local restaurant every table was playing the game - total raucous fun.
Coco posted a video from one meal on her social media.. I'm the only foreigner in town (at least I didn't see anyone else), and this propelled the post to an amazing 70,000 views (at the last check) - with thousands of comments. Coco has switched it off after a small amount of what you might call "racist comments" came.
After three days of feasting it's time to head back to Yiwu, we decide to go early (mid-holiday) to avoid the traffic.. It works and we get back to Yiwu in four and a half hours.
Coco's life in China.
Coco, like the rest of her family is immensely hard working and naturally entrepreneurial. She learned how be an export agent from a good friend and took over from a dodgy agent some six years ago, and we haven't looked back since.
Now we do straight honest business, no kickbacks or commissions, whenever we start with a new supplier Coco will explain that she is not expecting and doesn't want commission and they should just give us the best prices and quality.. this is the way to build trade over the long term. The smiles from suppliers reflects better relationships and much more scope for producing bespoke products.
Coco spends all her day organising things, deliveries, the next container date, chasing orders etc. A lot of time is spent on compliance papers these days, customs officers in UK and EU like to make importing anything as difficult as possible so Coco spends a lot of time getting things tested and checking that products are to proven standards and are what they claim to be. Her phone is literally red hot, messages from and to suppliers at all hours of the day.
We have a warehouse for loading our own containers (same system as in Indonesia) and Coco checks every delivery, and container loading personally.. it's hard and detailed work.. and (don't tell her) but I'm immensely proud of her.
On top of this job, part of the warehouse is turned over to a small candle factory.. we pioneered Soywax candle making in China.. no-one was making candles with Soywax and they laughed at us, because in those days the mentality was to make candles as cheap as possible, why would you use wax at double the price? Now of course as we walk around Yiwu market every candle showroom has a Soywax section.
We are working on a new range of rather exciting candles.. totally different and quite special.. watch this space.
Coco is just busy by nature.. never stops. When she is not organising exports or the candle factory she has her grandchildren to entertain and an apartment to look after. And any free time is taken up with Yoga (which she is super advanced at) and her DouYin (TikTok) channel.
Anyway that's my update for this week.
More news next Friday.. have a great long weekend (if you are in the UK) The King apparently is going to be crowned the king.. he is already but any excuse for an extra bank holiday.. Enjoy!!
And a good excuse for some King Sized Flash Deals to give you a Right Royal Bonus.
.. and wishing you much peace, love and laughter. Take care.
David
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