Can we order furniture from China?

China houses thousands of manufacturing facilities to produce furniture. The products are manned by skilled labor and are affordable yet qualified. Therefore, the majority of furniture imports have been from China in recent years. However, it may be confusing how to import furniture from China. Since Chinese furniture manufacturers have become increasingly important both strategically and economically, it's easier to import Chinese furniture all over the world, such as import furniture from China to Australia, the USA, India, etc. There is a wide variety of elegant and cheap Chinese imported furniture to choose from, such as kitchen cabinets, sofas, bedroom furniture, and garden furniture. Most of them are pre-designed furniture, but it can also get imported furniture from China customized according to different designs, materials, and finishes.

Imported kitchen cabinets from China

When it comes to imported kitchen cabinets from China, there are different styles available. Shaker cabinets are one of the most famous styles in the world. Imported shaker cabinets from China are usually made of wood, including cherry, maple, oak, etc. They are designed to cater to modern kitchen requirements. Other types of import cabinets from China, such as louvered cabinets, distressed cabinets, and inset-style cabinets, are also accessible.

Import sofa from China

When it comes to imported sofas from China, there are corner sofas, sleeper sofas, recliner sofas, lounge sofas, sofa beds, sofa sets, and more, suitable for living rooms, balconies, offices, etc. Modern-style sofas are simple, innovative, and functional, great for commercial and residential use. Traditional-style sofas often feature sophisticated frames, curvaceous shapes, and intricate details, which give them a classy vibe. Imported sofas from China can be made of different materials such as fabric, leather, wood, and rattan.

Other imported furniture from China

As for imported bedroom furniture from China, there are bed products like mattresses and massage beds, tables like wood dressers and side tables, wardrobes, mirrors, and more! It's possible to customize a whole set of bedroom furniture as long as the design sketches are provided. Import garden furniture from China is often made of aluminum, stainless steel, wood, plastic, and Bamboo vine.

Buy furniture from China direct is a good chance to save money and have more options. More and more people go to China to buy furniture and home materials from China. In this article, we will give you a easy to understand step by step guide to help you learn everything you need to know about buying furniture from China direcly. We will cover:

• Why buy furniture from China direct
• What you can buy furniture in China
• The best place to buy furniture in China
• 3 Ways of buying furniture from China
• Step by Step guide

Why buy furniture from China Direct?

Many people tend to buy furniture direct from China because of the following reasons.

• Saving Money
• More Options
• Ever-improving quality.

1. Save Money

Buying furniture from China directly is a great opportunity to save money when it comes to decorating your new house, hotels, restaurants, bars., etc.

Everyone knows that China has become the world factory in the past 40 years. If you look at the products around you in your daily life, you may find that nearly 80% of them are made in China.

I bet you had the impression that products from China are competitive in price at an acceptable quality. What you may not know is that the quality of made in China is improving very fast in recent years due to China’s Made in China 2025 program. If you compare the high-end furniture from China and from Europe, you will see that it is almost the same quality but at half the price or even less.

In fact, some of Europe’s brand furniture is also made in China. So Why not buying furniture from China directly.

Anyway, the brand is not that important for furniture consumption. Ask yourself how many brands can you list for furniture and you will agree with me. Things that really matters is the design and quality.

Let’s take the Mah jong sofa from Roche Bobois as an example, you can buy the same quality sofa from China at a cost around, USD 4000, but how about in your country? I guess it will cost you more than double the cost in China.

2. More Options

As we have mentioned earlier in this article, China is the world factory in the past 40 years and many years to come.

As regards to furniture, China is now the largest furniture export country in the world according to a recent CSIL report. 39% of furniture in the world is made in China.

There are more than 100,000 furniture factories in the top 5 china furniture factory locations in China. Only in Foshan, the most important location for furniture in China, there are more than 5000 furniture factories producing different types of furniture in different styles. That means you will have countless options if you choose to buy furniture in China.

If these rich resources cannot meet your unique needs, custom furniture manufacturers are here at your service.

3. Ever-improving quality

Over the past 40 years of fast development, the quality of made in China has improved a lot. In terms of furniture and building materials made in China, you can find the same quality as made in Europe or even better than Europe, but at half of the price.

As a matter of fact, many Europe brands are manufactured in China.

What you can buy from China.

Furniture is one of the important home décor products that you can pursue in China. Except furniture, there are a lot of other products you can buy when you are in China. In fact, you can buy everything you need for home decoration here.

Moreover, it’s the correct way to buy all the home décor products in one place and consolidate them into one container.

Here is a simple list of products you can buy in China to help you make your own checklist.

• All types of Furniture
• Lighting
• Sanitaryware
• Tiles and flooring
• Home accessories
• Mosaic
• Windows and doors
• Kitchen cabinets
• Wardrobe
• Home appliances
• Staircase
• Pipes
• Wall tiles
• Outdoor furniture
• Other decoration materials

 You must be wondering whether there is such a place where you can get all these products easily. Well, let’s continue.

The best place to buy furniture in China

There are furniture markets in each city in China. However, not every market worth a visit. In this article, I will introduce the top 3 furniture markets which worth your attention.

• Lecong Furniture market in Foshan city (South China)
• Xianghe furniture market in Hebei Province (North China)
• Likou furniture market in Suzhou City (East China)

1. Lecong furniture market

Lecong furniture market is the largest wholesale and retail furniture market in the world. It has an area of 4 million square meters’ showrooms extended 10 kilometers along the 325# China national highway. Over 5000 shops displaying over 20,000 furniture pieces covering 99% of furniture types and styles in the world.

Not only local furniture factories from Longjiang, Jiujiang and Lecong open furniture stores here but also furniture factories from other furniture factory locations are seeking fortunes here. You are almost guaranteed to find any furniture that you could ever think of in Lecong Furniture market.

There are over 20 big furniture shopping malls in Lecong furniture market. The 5 malls listed below are the most famous ones.

• Louvre international furniture Exhibition Center
• Lecong International Exhibition Center (IFEC)
• Sunlink Furniture City (north section)
• Red Star Macalline Brand Furniture Exhibition and Wholesale Center
• Shunde Empire Furniture market introduction (Royal)

Related article: Top 8 furniture shopping malls in Lecong furniture market.

Lecong is one of the towns in Foshan city, which adjacent to Guangzhou (Canton), Shenzhen and HongKong, which make it very easy to reach.

It is no doubt that the Lecong furniture market is the best place to buy furniture in China. That’s why CBM TRADE also set up an office in Lecong. Welcome to contact us for help if you are seeking to buy furniture from China directly. Contact us now.

2. Xianghe furniture market in Hebei Province (North China)

While Lecong furniture market is the most important furniture market in China and the world. Xianghe furniture market has become the rival for the Lecong furniture market in north China.

Located between Beijing and Tianjin, not far from Tianjin port, it is also a good place to buy furniture from if your major business is in North China.

Xianghe furniture market is the second-largest furniture market in China and the most sophisticated furniture market in north China.

It has an area of 2.6 million square meters. More than 5000 brands including 1500 famous one set up showrooms here. Every year, more than 7 million people visited Xianghe furniture market seeking different types of furniture.

Xianghe is no doubt a good place worth a visit if you would like to buy furniture from China directly.

3. Likou furniture market in Suzhou City (East China)

Likou furniture market is located is Suzhou city, Jiangsu province. It is the largest furniture market in east China. Yangtze river delta is also an important furniture factory location in China. Likou furniture market could be an option if you don’t want to go to Lecong furniture market in Foshan.

Likou furniture market covers an area of 1.2 million square meters with over 3000 furniture shops displaying furniture in its over 10 furniture shopping malls.

After a brief introduction of the top 3 China furniture market. I guess you are already clear about where to go.

Yes, as you can tell, Foshan furniture city is your best choice. More importantly, Foshan is not only famous for furniture, but also famous for ceramic tiles, mosaic, home appliances, and building materials.

Foshan is also close to the Guzhen lighting market, the most important town for lighting in China. I assure you that you will be satisfied with the Foshan furniture city if you plan to buy furniture from China.

3 Ways of buying furniture from China Direct

If you have decided to buy furniture from China, here are 3 ways that you can consider. Let’s check one by one to learn the pros and cons of each option.

• Go to China by yourself
• Buy online
• Work with a sourcing agent

1. Go to China and make the order by yourself.

If you know China’s furniture industry well and are familiar with the importing process. You can go to China and select furniture by yourself.

The advantage of this option is obvious, there will be no extra charges since you have done all the job by yourself. However, it will take you a lot of time and you will need to come to China several times because work like quality inspection, loading supervision are very important. Thus, the cost would also be high as international travel is costly and time-consuming.

Though money won’t be a problem for you, time is precious. If there is anyone in China who can help watch your orders at a flat rate. You are most likely to gain more from the time you have saved using services from a professional sourcing agent. So, my suggestion for you is to consider this option more cautiously than you have considered before.

2. Buy it online.

Nowadays, the internet is becoming more and more convenient. China’s cross border e-commerce is growing very fast in the past 5 years. E-commerce is in fact sophisticated in China especially for products of small value and small volume.

There are also several B2B and B2C online platforms which offers furniture and building materials. Among those online marketplaces, Alibaba.com is the most famous one. Here I have listed the top 5 platforms that you could check if you prefer to buy online.

B2B

• Alibaba.com
• Made-in-china.com
• globalmarket.com

B2C

• aliexpress.com
• dhgate.com

3. Work with a sourcing agent

A professional sourcing agent will have lots of resources and rich eperiences to help you buy furniture from China more effectively. If you don’t want to waste too much time, to work with a professional sourcing agent is a smart and easy way.

Cost breakdown of buying furniture from China.

 If you choose to import furniture from China directly, the cost is different from buying in your local market. It consists of the following parts.

• Sourcing cost
• Product cost
• Follow up cost
• Quality control cost
• Custom broke cost
• Logistic cost
• Import duty
• Inland transportation cost

Your first impression of the above cost breaks down maybe it is complicated. If you buy from your local market, what you need to care about is the product cost and inland transportation cost, or maybe the retailer will cover the transportation cost as well. All other cost is hidden.

Though there are as much as 8 cost items, don’t be afraid of it. You will eventually find that to buy it from China directly is cheaper than buying locally.

To buy from the local market, all the costs mentioned above will be covered by customers. Moreover, there is a high rate of margin by retailer. So why not check the cost buying directly from China.

Contact us here to have an idea.

Step by step guide

1. Do your homework

No matter to buy the furniture from your local market or buy it in China. The very first thing you need to do is to make it clear about what you want, your preference for styles, materials, and your budget. If you have a designer, work closely with him/her to finish the drawing and have a clear picture of what you want.

Then you can send your floor plan, product list and your preference of style, material to a reliable agent like CMB trade, ask them to make a preparation of suppliers and schedule for your buying trip.

2. Trip Planning

Different people have a different preferences for furniture about style, comfort, material, etc. It’s necessary to try it by yourself before you make the order.

To plan a trip to China is a good start. According to our experience, a 7 to 10 days trip is enough if you have communicated well with your agent in step 1 and have your agenda ready.

A good agent can also recommend the proper hotel, transportation and route to save a lot of time. The market here in China is huge, you may lose in the jungle if you don’t have a good plan and guide.

At CBM trade, we have built solid foundation with thousands of suppliers. Order a free consultation with us. We will help you plan your trip and take you directly to the right place to get your dreamed furniture. Contact us today.

3. Shopping

After the first two steps, it now comes to the shopping time. For each product, we suggest to check 2 or 3 reliable suppliers before you make your decision.

During your visiting, you should confirm the size and select the colors when you are there in the showroom. Make everything clear with the supplier so things won’t go wrong. Take photos of what you want to buy and ask for color swatches if possible.

We would also suggest to order as many products as you can in one supplier to get a better deal. What’s more, it’s also easier to manage the orders and control the quality.

4. Make advance payment

Most suppliers will ask for 30% advance payment as order confirmation. But if you have too many customized size or irregular colors, they may ask 50%.

Some suppliers accept cash while others only accept wire transfer. For LCL, aka loose cargo load orders, EXW term and RMB payment is what 90% of suppliers requires. EXW term means you need to pick up the goods from factory and handle everything next by yourself or your agent.

A good solution is to this issue is to transfer USD to your agent and ask them to transfer RMB to different suppliers. As you may know, for each payment, there is a bank charge. You surely don’t want to do so many transfers by yourself.

5. Production follow up

After you have made advance payment, production will start very soon. Normally the Leadtime is 30 to 60 days from the date supplier receive advance payment. You’d better considering the Leadtime when you make your plan.

Since you will have many different suppliers for different products. Production follow up is quite important if you don’t want any trouble.

Production follow-up is a quite time-consuming job. The more supplier you have, the more time you will need. Remember to plan the Leadtime well to let different supplier to finish your product at almost the same time so you can reduce troubles for quality checking and delivery.

I bet you don’t want to waste your time on such time-consuming jobs. My suggestions will be to leave it to your agent who has merchandisers to seamlessly follow up your orders and keep you updated with photos, videos or messages.

6. Quality inspection

When it comes to the end of the production of your orders. You should plan a quality inspection to ensure the quality and quantity. It may take 1 or 2 days depends on the number of suppliers you have and the distance between different suppliers.

There are 3 ways to do the quality inspection.

1. Fly to China and do it by yourself.
2. Use a third-party quality inspection service such as Asia inspection, SGS or Intertek.
3. Ask your agent to do it for you.

Since to do it by yourself is costly, many buyers won’t choose this option.

A third-party quality inspection service may cost 200 to 300 USD per man day while the cost for an agent may vary. They can either do it free if you are using their service package or charge at 100 to 300 per man-day.

At CBM, quality inspection is free if you are using our service package. Or you can enjoy our service at a rate of 100 USD per man day if you only want to use our quality inspection service. Check CBM Services

No matter which way you choose, don’t forget to ask for an inspection report. And always remember to check the following points.

• Dimensions
• Colors
• Materials
• Quantity
• Craftsmanship
• Packaging
• Testing data such as Moisture content of wood, fire retardant level.

7. Logistics Options

To import furniture from China, one of the many problems you will encounter is the shipment issue. The volume of furniture is too big to ship by air. Even you choose to ship by sea, the cost for loose cargo load (LCL) will also be high.

I bet that you must be wondering that if this is true, buying furniture from China directly will not be an opportunity but troubles instead.

Well, there are always more solutions than problems. The Full container load (FCL) is much cheaper and safe. You will have at least two logistic options if you choose to buy furniture from China.

1. Find an agent who can help you mix container with other customers from your country and share the cost by volume.
2. Buy furniture, building materials and all the home décor products from China and mix a container all by yourself.

It is easy to accumulate one full container if you can take all of them from China. Guangdong is such a place where you can find everything with a wide range of selections and good quality.

We would suggest this option as it is the best solution according to our many projects accomplished over our 10 years’ experience.

For a regular shipment, you need to take care of the following matters.

• Forwarder Selection
• Cargo consolidation and loading supervision.
• Inland transportation in China
• Export Custom clearance in China
• Import custom clearance in your country
• Inland transportation in your country

It is a complicated process especially for armatures. I would choose an agent to help arrange all the staff if I were in your shoes.

A good agent should be able to offer end to end logistics solutions, which means you just need to seat back and wait for the container to arrive at your home.

At CBM, we offer end to end logistic solutions if necessary.

8. Installation

After you have received your furniture and building materials, try to unpack and install it as soon as possible. Installation for wooden furniture like cabinets will need professionals as it often comes in KD to avoid damage during transportation and save space.

If any damages detected during unpacking and installation, don’t forget to take photos for after sale services purposes.

If all above 8 steps are finished successfully, congratulations! Enjoy your new house.

9. Make claim

Though nobody wants claims, but it happens sometime. Knowing how Chinese suppliers work with claims is important to minimize your cost. If you have photos and order details, it will help a lot to make the claim.

CBM service will not end after the ship departure from the port, we will assist you with after sale problems if there is any. With our many years of experience, we can minimize your lost with our expertise.

We will work with you and supplier to find a proper solution for any of your claims.

About CBM TRADE.

CBM TRADE is a professional and reliable one-stop China sourcing solution provider specializing in furniture, lighting and building materials. We dedicated to helping family buyers and interior designers to buy dream furniture and building materials directly from China to accomplish their projects. Throughout the complete process, we offer step by step guides and services at a flat rate. With over 10 years’ experience and rich resources, we managed to save time and money for our clients.