Feature – Innovation, social media become NAVAKA’s steps to develop furniture business

The NAVAKA furniture store in Indonesia’s Bogor district, West Java province, offers new products every year, with delivery services across Indonesia.

 

Bogor, W Java (Indonesia Window) – Running a business “just flowing”, no coercion, and no pressure”. That’s the remark of Rina Setiawati Subandi, the owner of the NAVAKA furniture store located in Indonesia’s Bogor district, West Java province, about her efforts to build a business with her two sisters.

“However every year, we have to release new products that are different from previous years,” Rina told Indonesia Window at her store this week.

Although NAVAKA is now known as a furniture store that sells local export-quality products as well as a number of imported ones, Rina and her sisters started their business by selling blankets in 2016.

“Initially, we were looking for non-culinary products, non-size, and models that didn’t change over time. Our choice fell on blankets,” Rina explained.

Although the profit was relatively small, she admitted that the blanket sales went smoothly, with a sales trend that continued to increase, for about a year.

“After a year, blanket sales decreased because blankets are not consumer goods that must be replaced every day or every month, but our customers are loyal and always ask if there are other new products that we sell,” she said.

Facing the business challenge, Rina then made an innovation without ‘sacrificing’ her blanket products. “So we sell ‘bonmut’ which stands for boneka selimut, or blanket dolls made from blanket material from unsold product stock.

This type of dolls was a unique and uncommon product, sales were also good and continued to increase, and our customers asked again, if there were other new products,” Rina said.

Requests for new products from customers continued to come, and Rina also always produce new items. “After ‘bonmut’, doll mattresses, doll sofa beds, full foam mattresses, and full foam sofa beds were then made,” she noted.

“After the full foam sofa beds, we sold wooden sofa beds, and this was the beginning of opening a furniture store, NAVAKA, which is an abbreviation of my name, Rina, and my two younger sisters, Riva and Rika,” she explained.

Customers’ demands for new products encouraged Rina to always release different merchandise, at least once a year.

“Furniture is not always bought. Demand usually increases around Eid Al Fitr because many people want to change items of their home furniture,” she pointed out.

In addition to meeting the needs of household consumers, NAVAKA attracts those who run lodging and restaurant businesses, and schools.

“NAVAKA’s location is close to villas, hotels, and restaurants. They are also NAVAKA’s main customers for sofa sets, guest tables, and dressing tables. We have also sent a number of bunk beds to nursing schools, as well as pillows and mattresses for students with embroidered names for the needs of Islamic boarding schools,” Rina added.

Besides innovating in terms of products, utilizing online social media application technology is also the main channel in developing the NAVAKA furniture store business.

“We have two employees who are tasked with doing live streaming on TikTok every day to market NAVAKA products,” she said, adding that since the beginning, TikTok has been an online marketing medium for her business.

“In fact, when TikTok was still viral with dancing, we had already used this platform to sell. That’s why we were ‘crowned’ by TikTok as the first furniture store in Bogor to market products on this platform, until TikTok Shop was closed, then allowed to operate again as an e-commerce platform,” Rina noted.

Online marketing, she said, brings more benefits to NAVAKA’s business because it can reach people throughout Indonesia, and NAVAKA furniture delivery even reaches customers in Ambon (capital of Maluku province) and Jayapura (capital of Indonesia’s easternmost province of Papua).

“For shipping by expedition, we pack it ourselves so we are sure that the goods sent are in safe condition until they are received by customers,” Rina said.

In terms of technology, NAVAKA, which has the tagline ‘Let’s Decor Your Home’, also offers kitchen set design and installation services.

To make customers even more satisfied, we provide engineer services that specifically design kitchen or room interiors with 3D and 4D images. This way, customers can get a real picture of the furniture that will be placed in their homes,” she explained.

With the increasing number of well-known furniture brands that trust NAVAKA as business partners, Rina opens up opportunities for the public to become resellers and drop shippers.

“There are special prices for resellers, and for drop shippers, there’s no need to worry because the goods we sell are according to specifications and we guarantee their quality,” she added.

As the business continues to grow, Rina created a social program called ‘NAVAKA Peduli’.

NAVAKA Peduli is carried out periodically. There are weekly programs to share alms, monthly programs for orphans from age 0 to elementary school graduates and teachers of madrasah (Islamic boarding schools), as well as annual programs held during Muslim fasting of Ramadan and before Eid Al Fitr festivities.

Reporting by Indonesia Window