Indochina Creative Investment and Development Joint Stock Company (English name Indochina JSC, brand name Viettime Craft) has grown from a business with only 3 employees in charge of import-export business activities to a business listed in the Top 10 exporters on Alibaba.com. The female CEO born in 1990, Hoang Thi Thanh Tam, shared with us about that not-so-easy journey.

CEO of Indochina Creative Investment and Development Joint Stock Company Hoang Thi Thanh Tam.

Wishing to preserve traditional craft villages, spread Vietnamese culture to the world "In 2015, Indochina had a retail store at 93 Ma May (Hanoi), specializing in selling handicraft products to international tourists. At that time, other stores mainly imported goods from Dong Xuan market or wholesale agents, while we went directly to craft villages in Nam Dinh, Ha Nam , Ha Tay... to find sources of high-quality goods with beautiful designs. Therefore, our products attracted the attention of many foreign customers. Some people even bought wholesale in large quantities to bring back to their country", CEO Hoang Thi Thanh Tam took us back in time when opening the story. Through the times returning to craft villages, witnessing the meticulousness of artisans and craftsmen, most of whom were elderly, the 9x businesswoman felt that she needed to do something to help preserve craft villages that were facing the risk of being lost, while spreading Vietnamese national culture to the world. At the end of 2015, Hoang Thi Thanh Tam officially entered the import-export sector when she took on the role of head of Indochina's Import-Export Business Department. Exported handicrafts require quite high standards of quality, aesthetics, etc., while artisans and craftsmen often only work based on spontaneous experience, not according to professional standards. Indochina's quality management staff must regularly visit each production household to check the goods very carefully, from the weaving stage to the standard color. After a period of collecting small-scale goods from production households in the craft villages, in order to increase business efficiency, Indochina decided to build two factories in Ninh Binh and Chuong My, recruiting workers, prioritizing young people. Every year, experts in the handicraft industry or units specializing in technology and quality come to train workers right at the factory.

Both Indochina factories apply European quality management standards.

In the past 2 years, both factories have applied European quality management standards, which are quite strict. Therefore, Indochina's products are ready to meet export standards, even to demanding markets. Going on e-commerce platforms to find a new direction A small business like Indochina hardly has the budget to attend foreign fairs several times a year like large businesses that have a name in the handicraft import and export industry. "Necessity is the mother of invention". At the end of 2015, Indochina sought a new direction - online business channel. At that time, in some other countries, e-commerce was very developed, but domestically, not many handicraft businesses had access to this modern business channel. After researching the market, Indochina decided to register as a member of the Alibaba.com e-commerce platform; the products when "on the platform" were branded Viettime Craft. The initial stage was not without difficulties. Indochina's import-export business team consists of only Thanh Tam, 2 employees and 1 collaborator, who have operated the e-commerce channel themselves, from preparing content to posting articles, taking care of customers... "More than 1 month after being "on the floor", the Viettime Craft product received its first inquiry letter. About 2 more weeks later, the first order came from Brazil, worth about 800 USD, ordering 50 sedge baskets with hanging wool balls. We sat down diligently to make wool balls and line up for customers to save costs. The second order came from India, ordering more than 2,000 brocade bags, and the whole company sat down to hang labels on the bags and then pack them for shipping", Director Thanh Tam recalled the happy memories when he first "entered the game" of e-commerce. Handicraft products are made from a variety of materials such as: duckweed, sedge, rattan, bamboo, banana fiber, palm leaves, coconut... Each batch of raw materials is coded, supporting the tracking of the entire process of which raw materials are brought to which workshop/factory, which products are made, which orders... Each order has its own code, customers can enter the code into the system to know detailed information about the origin of the product from when it is still raw material until it reaches the user. The system of tracing the origin helps international customers feel more secure about Vietnamese branded products. Identifying itself as a "newbie", to attract customers, Indochina implements a policy of selling a minimum of 50 products for each order code, while large enterprises often sell at a minimum of 100 - 500 products/code to optimize logistics costs. “Indochina’s policy of selling at least 50 products/code has attracted the attention of many international customers, especially small and medium enterprises. In April 2016, Indochina exported its first container to France. The customer was a new business person in the French market, wanting to order many types of products in one container because he did not know which products would sell well. That container had more than 20 product codes. We agreed to create conditions for them to have business opportunities. Later, some product codes sold quite well, they ordered again many times,” the 9x female Director continued.

Diverse handicraft products of Viettime Craft brand ensure export standards to even demanding markets such as the US and Europe.

Many other international customers are also very satisfied when buying Viettime Craft brand handicraft products because of the understanding and maximum customer care of Vietnamese businesses. During the Covid-19 and post-Covid-19 period, there were customers who ordered more than 100 product codes for 1 container, each product code only had about 30 products, and were still served attentively. Many letters and messages from foreign customers sent to the young female Director after purchasing Viettime Craft products have added positive energy to the Indochina team on the chosen journey. "I cannot help but praise the sophistication and beauty of the bamboo and rattan products from Vietnam, especially your factory! I feel the respect and love of the weavers for their profession", Vicky Lauren, a customer from the US shared her feelings. Sam Green, a director in the UK, said: “I didn’t have the chance to visit the factory because Vietnam is so far away. I chose to trust you and I was right. You did a great job, I will come back next time. Thank you.” However, Indochina’s development journey has not always been smooth and progressive. In 2017, a major incident occurred. An online business development collaborator quoted a private price to a customer lower than the company’s regulated price. Indochina lost many large orders, its reputation was affected when bad guys used the company’s brand to sell products but the products did not ensure export quality. “We were quite shocked when we heard about this, but then quickly completed the human resource management and customer management processes to avoid similar risks when expanding online business activities,” the young female director did not hide her sad memories of the past because she believed that in misfortune there is luck, this incident also brought better management experience to the company. Along with the booth on Alibaba.com, Indochina also deploys many other online business channels such as websites, social networks... Online business sales in the period of 2020 - 2021 increased by 40 - 50% compared to 2018 - 2019; in 2022, it increased by 15% compared to 2021. Notably, in 2022, Indochina was unexpectedly named in the list of Top 10 online export enterprises on the e-commerce platform Alibaba.com. Conquering many picky customers Although it is just a small business, Indochina has currently brought a variety of Vietnamese branded handicraft products to many countries around the world. In particular, the US market including the US, Mexico, Canada is the main online export market, accounting for more than 40% of Indochina's sales. The European market includes France, Denmark, Germany. The Asian market is mainly Japan. There are also other potential markets such as Italy, Brazil, and Arab countries... In the US market, Viettime Craft brand products are introduced to a supermarket system at a low price, under 5 USD/product, but customers order continuously, 3-4 containers each time with tens of thousands of pieces, often requiring new designs. "At first, we also thought that with that price, we could not do it. But through the process of researching and developing products, we found a way to satisfy customers, which is to change colors, add decorative motifs according to trends (market trends) to create novelty for the product. It is now the end of 2023 but we have finished the product sample for Christmas 2024 and have orders from American customers, even have samples for 2025", the 9x female Director revealed the secret. Indochina's Product Research and Development (R&D) Department regularly releases new collections for export markets every 2 months. The US market releases new collections the most frequently, sometimes up to 6-7 times a year. The European market releases new collections less frequently, only 3-4 times a year...

Indochina team continuously researches and designs new collections for export markets.

However, when doing cross-border e-commerce, not all orders reach Vietnamese businesses easily. A very large interior decoration company in Denmark ordered lacquer trays and lacquer boxes, which are very high-tech products. Indochina had to draw product samples and send them to Denmark 4-5 times, accepting high shipping costs, each time they only made small adjustments, sometimes adjusting the house to be slightly skewed, sometimes adjusting the horse's eyes to be slightly slanted... The Danish company also required the product to be shiny and without any blemishes. Normally, Indochina only checks the quality according to AQL standards (a certain percentage probability in the order). This batch of lacquer products was 100% inspected to ensure there were no small defects. After receiving the goods and being satisfied, the Danish company has become a regular customer of the Vietnamese company for the past 3 years. Another picky customer has a fairly large chain of stores in Europe. The Lighting project (making decorative lighting products) for this customer was started by Indochina in September 2021. After coming up with a series of unique designs, naming products related to Europe, making product catalogs that suit the tastes according to the customer's requirements..., there were long days waiting for the customer's key management team to approve the samples, prices and quantity of products. Next were 3-4 times sending samples to Europe for approval. After nearly 2 years, this special customer finally closed a large order, exporting throughout 2024, with the requirement that Indochina must purchase liability insurance for exported products, up to more than 200 million VND/year. “The picky customers always want to bring the most perfect products and the best value to their buyers. Indochiana has learned a lot from those professional customers. With the slogan “The best choice for you”, our consistent business philosophy is to always bring the best choice to customers, not to sell customers what we have but to sell them what they need, so that they become happy customers. The more demanding the customer is, the more we can satisfy them, proving that we are also growing up”, Director Thanh Tam analyzed. Emphasizing the feeling of pride when “Make in Vietnam” export products with the Indochina and Viettime Craft brands are increasingly known by international customers, the young female Director also frankly expressed her wish that Vietnamese businesses have higher connectivity when doing business online on cross-border e-commerce platforms. “Chinese businesses are closely linked together to receive international orders on Alibaba.com. When there is a general inquiry, as long as they see that a domestic business can make that product, any Chinese supplier will not hesitate to accept it and tell each other to make it. Meanwhile, Vietnamese businesses are often only interested in the individual products they can provide. Vietnamese businesses need to be more flexible and united when doing e-commerce to be able to compete with strong competitors in the world. For example, a large order, if done by one business, would take 7 months, but many businesses working together will shorten the time, reduce costs, prices, and will easily get more orders. At that time, Vietnamese branded handicraft products will be more present globally,” the 9x female director took the opportunity to recommend while standing next to the world map in the living room so we could take a photo to post with this article.

Vietnamnet.vn