Home Furnishing Products plans first retail outlet in 2018

Owner and managing director Sakda Samakayanu, 32, said that in the meantime the company would promote its brands both domestically and abroad, initially participating in the “Thailand International Furniture Fair 2015” (TIFF) in a bid to attract overseas customers.
“Our products are exported to neighbouring countries such as Laos and Myanmar, but that is done through retailers that have shops close to those countries. We now want to export by ourselves, which is why we are taking part in the international trade fair,” he said.
TIFF 2015 takes place from March 11-15 at Impact Muang Thong Thani.
Sakda decided to become an entrepreneur after working for 18 months in his family’s business – furniture retailing. That spell of work followed his graduation with an international-business master’s degree from Golden Gate University in San Francisco.
“I wanted to be a producer and distributor of furniture under my own brand, rather than being a retailer like the family business. As a result, I decided to go into business on my own, and borrowed Bt1 million from a commercial bank to build up my business,” he said.
Sakda initially imported furniture from China for sale to Thai retailers, as the costs were lower than for producing furniture in Thailand.
In its first year of operation in 2011, Home Furnishing Products sold containers of Chinese-made furniture worth about Bt5 million.
“But we were affected by the flood of 2011, and faced a cash-management issue as we were expanding the business faster than our cash flow. As a result, we had to ask the Thai Credit Guarantee Corporation [TCG] to guarantee a new loan with TMB Bank worth Bt3 million, to be used as cash flow,” he said.
In 2011, when the company had capital of Bt1 million, its first import shipment worth Bt750,000 had to be paid for within one month of receipt, but it had to provide a two-month credit line for its retailer buyers.
That situation led to an immediate mismatch between cash inflow and cash outflow when the company imported its second shipment from China, resulting in the need for further borrowing to support the business, he explained. “If we had not had the loan guaranteed by the TCG, we may have been out of business in just our first year,” he added.
After that, the company expanded the business by designing its own furniture products and having them made to order in China, Malaysia and Thailand under its own brands.
The company recorded sales worth Bt41 million last year, and targets a similar amount this year.
Sakda said sales were not expected to be higher than last year’s level because the economy is still growing relatively slowly, and purchasing power has fallen amid rising household debt.
The economic climate has led to Home Furnishing Products revising its business plan to produce furniture at reasonable prices to match prevailing demand, he added. However, he is confident the business will grow strongly next year, when the company expands its export activities.