Business is booming in bamboo blinds
Bamboo blinds are becoming increasingly popular with Vientiane residents as a way of providing shade for their homes and businesses. Not only are they a natural product, they are a great deal cheaper and more attractive than plastic blinds.
Mrs Lay Phomvilayvan sells her bamboo blinds along Khouvieng Road.
Along Khouvieng Road in Sisattanak district, Mrs Lay Phomvilayvan is negotiating prices with a customer who has decided to buy two bamboo blinds. Every morning, she transports more than 10 blinds by truck from her home in Nongtaeng village, Sikhottabong district to sell along Khouvieng Road.
Nowadays, it is not only the general public who are keen to buy these products; hotel and restaurant owners are choosing them as decorative items.
Mrs Lay started weaving bamboo blinds for sale after moving from Vientiane province to live in the city in 1996. Before starting the business, she had no weaving experience. But she loved working with bamboo and she learned how to make the blinds by herself after buying materials from other weavers.
The first sale of her blinds happened in 2002, and this encouraged her to work harder. The number of customers increased and the work became her main job and source of income. Some people started ordering the blinds in advance by telephone.
Some customers buy blinds directly from her house, and she sells many more on the roadside. However, now many other vendors are making bamboo blinds, which could start to affect her income.
“More and more families are becoming involved in this kind of work, so I'm trying to make different designs to attract buyers and increase my income.”
She buys bamboo from a nearby village at 3,000 kip per length of bamboo. She produces a variety of designs in sizes depending on the customers' orders. Regular sizes are 100cm by 100cm and 300cm by 300cm and prices range from 40,000 to 120,000 kip depending on the size of the blind. Normally, Mrs Lay can complete one big blind every three days and one small blind every two days.
“However, I have to hire workers to do the job for me if I have a lot of orders at the same time. I pay them 15,000 kip to make one big blind,” she said
The bamboo blind typically features well-known places and scenes in Laos. Mrs Lay is flexible and can produce different designs to order.
“It's good work and allows me to save money to support my family,” Mrs Lay said. “I'm very happy to be an artisan and to have the opportunity to preserve the bamboo handicraft tradition.”
By Sisouphan Amphonephong
(Latest Update September 3 , 2010)
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Topic: Bamboo blinds (Read 535 times)
