How It All Got Started - part 3 (Jumping in With Both Feet)

See the July 8th post for part 2.

So I needed to come up with a way to get a large number of different minerals that would fit into my business model of the majority of the specimens affordable for the majority of collectors. (Even today the majority of my specimens are under $50). Well at the time Indian minerals were just starting to really hit the market and I made an offer to buy over 1,000 pieces and have them shipped directly from India. (After all how hard would importing them really be?)

The company that I was purchasing from required either a money order or wire so the cheapest way was a money order so I got one and sent it over and played the waiting game. I was told that it would be about 6 weeks as due to the weight and cost coming over by ship was the only economical way. To save money I also decided that I would go to the docks and get the lot through customs myself. Over the next few weeks I started hearing stories about things getting tied up in customs and decided that I would pay someone to help me get it through and also deliver it from the port to my house.

After a few more weeks of waiting, I get a call from my broker and they tell me the information I gave them was wrong. There was no ship by that name coming into port in the next week and was I sure of the information. Well I confirmed that they had what I was given and my heart sank. It had now been six weeks and the money order was long since cashed. So I decided to call the business and of course there was no answer. Now I am really starting to panic. I then realized that there is a big time difference and maybe I needed to call around 1 am. So I waited up and called at 1 am and several other times and still had no one answer. I finally tried to go back to bed so that I could get some sleep and not be a total zombie at my regular job that paid all the bills. Well the next night I tried again and at 2 am finally had someone answer and while he seemed to speak some English, once I mentioned that there was an issue with an order I placed he mentioned I needed to call back in two days as he did not speak English. (I am sure you could guess that I was now thinking I was out a lot of money.) Finally Friday came and I called and actually talked to someone who said that he was sorry and that he would have to look into it and for me to call him back next week. I now thought that I was out the money and maybe I just needed to cut my losses. Needless to say I did not get a good night’s sleep during this time. Finally their Monday came and I call again at 2 am (my Long distance bills were getting a bit higher after all this was over 25 years ago.) He said there was a mistake and they gave me the name of the small boat that brought the minerals to the main port and not the ship that was loaded to make the ocean voyage. To speed up the story I did find out that the ship was coming in and that I would be getting the shipment within a week. (Or so I thought).

Little did I know there were still a few more hurdles that I was not expecting. The first hurdle which made me very glad that I paid someone to help me get it through customs, was that the whole lot was being quarantined as they believed there was some type of mold in one of the crates. My broker and I had to convince customs that it was not mold but the mineral Okenite (I wish I was still able to get that quality at that price). After a few days it was finally released and then came the last hurdle, the shipping company refused to deliver to a personal residence. So I had to get permission from my boss to send it to where I worked.

After all that I was glad that at the first show that I sold almost half of what I had bought but realized that if I was going to be doing more shows and sell out all of those pieces that I needed to continue adding to my inventory. So over the next 25+ years I have imported from different countries, bought out dealers, bought miners entire yearly production and any other way that I could get a good price and pass that savings over to my customers and add to my inventory. While the website currently has pieces $15 on up to $9,000 most of the pieces that I have in inventory are under $50. If you see me at a show or visit the two antique malls you will find pieces all the way down to $1.50.

So that is how as my wife always says my “Hobby Went Haywire”. Hope you enjoyed this series of how this all got started.