The buyer that the matching team met at the National Stationery Show held in February 2019 expressed interest in importing directly from ARTBOX. The buyer is operating a stationery store in Massachusetts, US and is looking for ways to import items directly from Korea. The company remembered the matching team of the Korea International Trade Association (KITA) from the expo and sent an email asking for help.

    △ ARTBOX website                                                        △ ARTBOX store in the US

A staff of the matching team in charge of stationery supplies who received the inquiry from the buyer immediately tried to contact the head office of ARTBOX but could not reach the right person at ARTBOX. To his disappointment, he was told that large-quantity purchases can be made only via the website. If the US buyer cannot import directly from Korea, it has to contact more than 30 different companies to purchase over 700 items, making it nearly impossible to make a deal. Worried about the negative outlook, the matching staff informed the buyer that large purchases on the website are not possible because it is located in another country, and that ARTBOX is planning to open a store at a department store in the US although it is not in Massachusetts. The staff remained in active communication with the US buyer to provide as much information as possible to help the buyer import directly from Korea.

△ Magic Castle Store in Massachusetts

As a result of relentless efforts by the matching staff, he finally reached the export manager and worked out specific conditions of a wholesale deal, which he communicated to the US buyer. Hopes were getting higher that the contract negotiations would proceed smoothly. Nonetheless, ARTBOX became reluctant about making the deal with the buyer because the company was already operating a store in a US department store. 

The matching staff refused to give up and persuaded ARTBOX into making an export deal after 4 months of negotiations by emphasizing that the US buyer was planning to open a new store. Under the first contract, more than 8,000 products or over 700 kinds were exported.