About
The Dutch Merchant started with fasteners and a simple observation: companies buy through a wholesaler because the step to the factory feels too large. Not because it costs too much, but because nobody is standing there who speaks the language and carries responsibility. The same gap exists for most things made in Asia, so the company now trades more than fasteners.
Why Taiwan
Taiwan makes a remarkable share of what the world runs on, from fasteners to memory. Much of it comes from family businesses in their second or third generation, at a quality level buyers already recognise.
Many of them export to a few large markets and have no one in the rest. That is the gap I fill, from both sides. And from Kaohsiung, Korea, Japan and Southeast Asia are a short flight, which makes Taiwan my base rather than my limit.
Personal
My partner, Wan, is Taiwanese. That is why I have spent years there, why I know the customs, and why a conversation can simply happen in Mandarin. It sounds like a detail. It decides whether a manufacturer sees you as a serious partner or as an email from Europe.
I am young and this company is new. What you get from me is not thirty years of history, but someone physically present, thorough about the work, and with everything riding on your first shipment going well.
In life and in business
The Dutch Merchant is not just me. Wan is my partner, in life and in business.
She is the reason I came to Taiwan, and the reason I stayed. At the table with a manufacturer, she reads a Taiwanese family business in a way I am still learning to.
So two people care that your order goes well: one who knows what a buyer abroad expects, and one who knows how a Taiwanese factory thinks.
Taiwan
Kaohsiung is Taiwan's largest port and the city I work from. The fastener cluster in Gangshan is a short drive away.
