The shelf date, not the piece
A range is sold against a slot: a catalogue, a seasonal aisle, a promotion booked months ahead. A container that arrives three weeks late does not sell three weeks later. It misses the slot.
01For buyers
What we do for a buyer.
You are not short of factories. You are short of ones you can trust with an order.
Furniture out of Vietnam is the route we hold, and it is what this page is about.
You buy in Vietnam
Vietnam is one of the world’s largest furniture exporters.
2nd
furniture exporter in the world, behind only China.
0%
duty into the European Union under EVFTA. Every furniture line has been at zero since 2025.
2026
EUDR: from 30 December 2026, no wood product enters the European market without an origin file that names the plot the timber came from.
CapacityNot the question
The short listWhich can hold a French programme, and what stands behind the name
What a retail desk is actually buying.
Large retailers and buying groups do not buy a piece of furniture. They buy a shelf filled on the date it was promised, under a name that is often their own.
Their own name on the product
Much of what a retailer sources is sold under its own brand. A split panel or a wobbly leg is not the factory’s review. It is theirs.
The service rate
Deliveries are measured against what was ordered and for when, and a missed line is charged back. A supplier is judged on its service rate long before its price comes up again.
Compliance carried by the retailer
The EUDR origin file, product safety, the social audit, the eco-contribution on furniture, and a duty of care over the supply chain. When one piece is missing, the retailer is the one who answers for it.
One listing, a whole network
A buying group negotiates once for its members. A listed product has to hold at national volume, season after season: one broken supply and the listing goes to someone else.
The landed cost, not the FOB price
Freight, forwarding, handling, the eco-contribution, returns and markdowns. The number that reaches the margin review is never the one on the factory’s quotation.
Risk-adjusted commercial value.
The lowest quotation is rarely the lowest cost. What a retail desk pays in the end is the price, plus what it costs to bring the goods in, plus every failure the supplier might cause, weighted by how likely it is.
The lowest quotation
A supplier that holds
- Factory price
- Freight, forwarding, eco-contribution
- Expected cost of a failure: delay, defect, non-compliance, stock-out
- Our commission
- The difference, in your margin
Where the risk sits, and who holds it.
Five failures a retail desk prices in, whether it writes them down or not.
The risk
What it costs at your end
What we hold
01Delay
What it costs at your endA missed shelf date or promotion, and a logistics penalty on top.
What we holdPeak-month capacity checked before the order, the line followed weekly, a slip raised the day it appears.
02Defect
What it costs at your endReturns, markdowns, and reviews written under your own brand.
What we holdInspection in the factory against the approved sample; moisture measured, packing drop-tested.
03Non-compliance
What it costs at your endGoods held, a recall, a supplier file your compliance team cannot sign.
What we holdCertificates checked against the public registers before the introduction, and each factory’s position on EUDR stated before you order.
04The hidden subcontractor
What it costs at your endA social audit that covered the wrong building, and a supply chain you cannot answer for.
What we holdWe name the building that makes the order, and we have stood inside it.
05The broken season
What it costs at your endA listing lost across the whole network, and a range to re-source from nothing.
What we holdThe same factories, the same contact, and every season written back into the factory’s file.
You compare quotations. You pay the risk-adjusted value.
What we hold for you.
We do every part of it ourselves.
A short list, not a catalogue
Three to five manufacturers, each one visited, each one able to make your range at your volume in your season. We answer to you for every name on the list.
The factory, not the trading house
Most collections shown to a foreign buyer belong to an intermediary, and the building that cuts the wood sits one or two subcontractors further down. We name the building, and we have stood inside it with the machines running.
Your specification, in both languages
We turn your tolerance sheet into a production brief a Vietnamese workshop can actually work from. The price is negotiated in Vietnamese, and the contract is drawn up in French and in Vietnamese so that both sides sign the same thing. Nothing important is agreed through an interpreter.
Where each factory stands on origin
Certificates checked against the public registers, and a plain answer on whether the factory can supply what your EUDR file needs: what holds, and what is still missing. You have it before you choose, not after the wood is cut.
Inspection before it leaves
Our own people are in the factory before shipment: moisture measured, joinery checked, packing drop-tested, all against the sample you approved. A defect found in Bình Dương costs a repair. The same defect found in Lille costs the season.
Still there after the first order
We stay between you and the factory, the same people season after season. The same person from the first specification to the day the container sails, awake in Vietnam when the factory is and in France when you are. A question does not sit a week in an inbox.
From your specification to your container.
Seven stages, and nothing is invoiced to you until a container has shipped.
Day one — an answer
A person, not an acknowledgement. We say plainly whether we hold the factories for your range, and what is missing if we do not.
Week one to two — the short list
Three to five names, with the visit sheet, the capacity in the peak month and where each one stands on origin. If the right factory is not yet in our register, we go and find one rather than send you the nearest thing on the list.
Week three to six — the samples
Prototype, counter-sample and written tolerances, signed off in both languages. What is approved is what gets produced, and the approved sample stays with us as the reference for every inspection afterwards.
In parallel — the price
Negotiated in Vietnamese, against a cost breakdown rather than a quotation. You see the factory price. Our fee sits beside it, on the same page, where you can read both.
Then — origin, with the factory
Your compliance team builds the EUDR file; the species, the plots and the lots come from the factory. We ask for them in Vietnamese, and early, because once the wood is cut they can no longer be traced back.
Before it sails — inspection
In the factory, against the approved sample. Photographs, moisture readings, packing, count. If it fails, the container waits: raising that is our job, deciding is yours.
After arrival — the write-up
Dates, volumes, defects, delays, and how a problem was settled. It goes into the factory’s file, and it decides whether they are still on your list next season.
When you have to start.
A shelf date in March is decided thirteen months before it. Count backwards from the date you cannot move.
the following year
Tết
Feb – AprYour brief, and the short list against it
May – AugSamples and approval — the tolerances are fixed here
Sep – NovProduction, followed week by week
Dec – FebInspection, then sailing around Tết
Mar – AprOn your shelf, in France
Counted backwardsOnly the shelf date is fixed
What you actually receive.
Two things. The first before you commit to anything; the second for as long as you buy from the factory.
Before you commit
The short list dossier.
- The visit sheet for each factory: capacity, kilns, joinery, finishing line, workforce, safety.
- Real capacity in the peak month, and how much of it is already booked.
- Where each factory stands on origin: the EUDR file, the chain of custody, FSC if it holds one, and what is still missing.
- A sample plan with dates, and the tolerances we propose to hold them to.
- An indicative price, with the cost breakdown behind it rather than a round number.
- And the names we left out, with the reason we left them out.
After the first order
What stays in place.
- The same contact at the factory, and the same one on our side.
- The inspection report on every shipment, photographed, against the sample you approved.
- The factory’s file, written up after every order: dates, volumes, what held and what did not.
- Where the factory stands on origin, kept current as the rules change.
- The next season, talked through with the factory before you have written it down.
Ask us for the visit sheet before you decide anything. We send it blank, so you see what we look at in a factory before you see what one showed us.
What it costs you.
You pay us; the factory never does. It is the only arrangement in which our opinion of a factory is worth anything to you.
A commission on the order
One rate, agreed in writing before the first container and held for the season. Invoiced once the order has shipped, against the same documents as the order itself.
Beside the price, not inside it
We work on commission, not on resale. We never take title to your goods and we take no margin on the wood: you see the factory price, and our fee sits next to it.
Nothing before there is an order
The visit, the short list and the sample rounds are not invoiced. If nothing ships, nothing is owed. We carry that cost because it is the only honest way to be paid for a recommendation.
A trading house resells
- One price, quoted to you.
- Their margin, inside it, never itemised.
We work on commission
- The factory’s price, negotiated in Vietnamese.
- Our commission, on its own line.
One rate, agreed before the first container.
There is no other line: no retainer, no visit fee, no margin on the goods. If a request sits outside what we do, you hear it before we begin, not on an invoice.
What we will not do.
The limits, stated before you ask.
We do not resell
We are not a trading house. We never take title to your goods, never buy in order to sell them back to you, and never hand you a price with our margin hidden inside it.
We do not send a catalogue
If our register does not hold the right factory for your range, we say so and go and look for one. We would rather lose the order than put a name in front of you we cannot answer for.
Your programme stays inside your programme
Your prices, your drawings, your short list, your volumes. They are never shown to another buyer, and never used to bid your own range against you. The file is encrypted where it rests, and there is a confidentiality agreement we sign first.
We do not introduce from photographs
Every name on your list is a factory we have stood inside, with the machines running. That is what separates a recommendation from a directory.
We answer for every name we give you.
What a buyer asks us first.
The eight questions that open almost every first call.
What is your commission?
One rate on the order, agreed in writing before the first container and held for the season. It depends on the range, the volume, and how much of the search is ours — a factory we went and found for your range is not the same work as a repeat order from one you already run. You have the number in the first conversation, in writing, before you have sent us anything.
Do you take a margin on the price?
No. We work on commission, not on resale, and we never take title to the goods. The price you see is the price the factory quoted, negotiated in Vietnamese with the cost breakdown behind it, and our fee sits beside it on the same page. It is also why the factory is never invoiced: an agent paid by both sides of a deal can be trusted by neither.
Can you source outside furniture?
Yes, within reason. Furniture is the lane we run hardest and where our register is deepest. The home categories around it — textiles, homeware, ceramics, basketry, lighting — are sourced on exactly the same terms, and we will take on garment or footwear where the programme justifies going and finding the factories. What we will not do is put a name in front of you in a category we cannot answer for. If your range sits outside what we hold, you will hear it on the first call rather than after the samples.
How quickly do I get a short list?
Two weeks from a specification we can work from, with the visit sheet behind each name. If your range needs a factory that is not yet in our register it takes longer, and we tell you that at the start rather than send you the nearest thing on the list.
What volume do you work with?
From roughly one container a month upward, because the programmes we build are seasonal rather than one-off. Below that, tell us anyway: a small first order that becomes a season is worth more to us than a large one that never repeats.
Are you responsible if the shipment is wrong?
We inspect in the factory before the container leaves, against the sample you approved, so it should not reach you wrong. When something does go wrong we are in the room for the settlement — in Vietnamese, with the record of what was agreed and the photographs from the inspection. We are not an insurer and will not pretend to be one: the contract is between you and the manufacturer, and we say so before you sign rather than after.
Can I visit the factories myself?
Yes, and we would rather you did. We arrange the visit, come with you, and interpret. Nothing on a short list of ours is a name we would be uncomfortable standing beside in its own workshop.
What happens to my specification if we do not work together?
It stays with us and goes nowhere: never shown to another buyer, never used to price a competing range, and deleted on your word. A confidentiality agreement is signed by us first, on request, before a drawing or a price list ever leaves your side.
France → Vietnam
Furniture out of Vietnam is our main lane. This one is handled case by case, for a few houses.
Wine and spirits, dairy, cosmetics, grocery: EVFTA is stepping duty on most of these lines toward zero, and a Vietnamese buyer now knows how to read a French label. If you produce in France and are looking at Vietnam, write to us.