Tiles
My wife has just finished renovating her apartment in Taiwan and it is beautiful. Given the tropical location there are tiles on the floors throughout the apartment as well as tiled surfaces for the splash-backs in the kitchen and on the walls of the bathroom.
Tiles used to be used for decoration much more than they are now, having become very much utilitarian over the years. My mother lives in Portugal where many of the houses still have their outsides decorated with intricate tiles left over from the Moors. Individual designed and hand made tiles can still be sourced at the high end of the market and will be of more interest to the creative amongst you.
Ordering tiles in bulk is both expensive (due to their weight) and risky (as they are easily broken). It would be better to start out in this business at the high end, either with limited quantity/unusual tiles, non-standard shapes, or one off designs. These not only command a higher price but may allow you to express a creative part of yourself particularly if you are into design.
Before you get into this business you will need to understand what you can sell your tiles for, and thus the potential mark up. www.bolartile.com has a range that goes up to $24 per tile www.customtiles.com don’t have prices online but will give you a good idea of what can be done.
In order to sell your tiles I would try some or all of the following; -
Ebay
Website
Advertising
Promotion
Developers
Interior designers
Ebay has over 10,000 items listed under “tiles”, but as usual a more focused search for items such as “kitchen tiles” brings the number down to a manageable 700 or so. “Custom Tiles” only has 25 individual items but a further 175 Ebay stores. In short this is competitive, but with good use of keywords and a link to a nice website you should generate some sales without too much effort.
Google has about 25 million results for the word “tiles”, using better keyword combinations such as “specialist tiles” generates 1.1 million and “custom tiles” a further 1.3 million. Having a website will be important for your repeat customers and some of your initial contacts. It gives them freedom to view your stock when they have time but it is unlikely that you will generate much business through the search engines.
Given that the ideal here is to generate high end customers, advertising in the local newspaper or Yellow Pages is probably not the answer. Adverts should be placed in interior decorating magazines, or on websites with a similar theme. This will be expensive but probably not as expensive as you might think. They are also the kind of adverts that go on generating business for months, or even years afterwards because these kinds of magazines get passed on, or left lying around to be revisited later.
If advertising is not in your budget initially then you can still get featured in a magazine or newspaper. Try sending some samples to journalists who cover products or new materials along with a note explaining who you are and what is special about your products. If you have already sold some of your products then you might include some photos of them in place at your client’s premises. There is a good chance that you will get featured at some point as journalists are always looking for new materials. Anther way to get some coverage is to write an article yourself on something controversial like the damaging effect of mass producing tiles on the environment, or how everyone’s bathroom looks the same.
Property developers come in all shapes and sizes. You don’t want to take on the big guys who are developing huge housing estates or residential tower blocks as they will be looking for average quality at low prices. At the high end though there are developers who build anything from 1-10 high end residences at a time and try to fit them out in as much luxury as possible in order to boost the asking price. These guys are well worth an approach as your products could be exactly what they are looking for. Bathrooms and Kitchens are often what ultimately seal an emotional decision to buy a home.
Interior designers are also a great group to get onside. They are likely to become regular customers if you can work with them to find the right tiles for their design schemes. They are likely to be very fussy and can be difficult to work with but will usually know exactly what they want and if you can consistently provide it for them then you will soon become their first port of call. Use your Yellow Pages to find them and start calling to make some appointments.
www.alibaba.com has over 12,000 suppliers of tiles however they are likely to want to supply large quantities of the same tile. Whilst this will make the tiles very cheap on a per unit basis they will be expensive to ship and it is unlikely that you will be the only supplier carrying their stock.
A better source for your tiles might be a local manufacturer. You can find them in the Yellow Pages, or online. A small operation with their own designers would be ideal as you can work with them to create unique designs, and customer specific tiles.
If you struggle to find a manufacturer locally then try attending some home design trade fairs. You want to find someone who is flexible and also close enough to where you are based that you can get to see them regularly. Remember that the further you have to transport your tiles the more damages you will have, and the higher the transportation costs.
Whilst small runs of tiles will be expensive per unit this is unlikely to matter to your target client base. Remember that you want to be very high end. When you talk to manufacturers and suppliers understand their pricing and definitely haggle but don’t be put off by the price unless it is for a specific project and you have a defined budget.
If you have to ship tiles to customers wrap them carefully and use a courier as opposed to the postal service. There is far more chance of them arriving on time. Try to include some additional tiles with the order to cover the likelihood of some breakages.