Let's talk business

In addition to the last post, of things you don't get used to it for me, it's clearly one thing I forgot to mention: the climate.

Ok, It's now 2 weeks I'm here in Vietnam, but the heat and humidity is stressful. I have some kind of ritual coming home every evening. Since I shut down the air conditioning (2 for the living room and 1 for the bedroom) I always prepare before entering the apartment for a very warm welcome. Then running to the remote controls of the air conditioning and waiting for the cool breeze to come. Anyway, basically every shop, office, car etc. is air conditioned. So when you're not outside, you don't really feel the temperature. And this is currently the cold season...

Today was a very interesting day. We were visiting customers roughly 60km outside of Ho Chi Minh City in Binh Doungh Province.

First we visited a pepper and spice processing company. Unfortunately we could not go inside the production due to hygiene regulations. But it was very interesting to learn about spice processing and how the world market of spices works. Vietnam is the No. 1 exporting country of Pepper in the world.

Second stop was a rattan furniture producer. We've been shown around the production, which was very interesting, to see how these furnitures are being produced respectively handmade. First the frames are made from aluminium bars, bent, welded together and painted

Afterwards, the rattan is woven around the frames:

Ok, Rattan itself is a natural product. But many furnitures are made from Polyrattan nowadays, as it doesn't need as much maintenance as natural rattan, lasts longer and is cheaper.  A chair needs about 8 hours of weaving, and a sofa around 2 days. 

It was very interesting to see this kind of production.

Third stop was a customer producing plastic foil. Actually Plastic foil is a essential part of everyone's life in the world. Imagine a supermarket without plastic bags --> plastic foil. All kinds of packaging --> plasic foil. I couldn't image a life without it (leaving the bad aspects aside). But did you know how plastic foil is being produced? I didn't and was really surprised how it looks:

Plastic granulate is being heated until it melts and the melt down plastic is then blown into the foil which looks very amazing. After it cooled down a bit you already have finished plastic foil which then can be further processed. There are different types of plastic granules / Polyethylen, which produces different kinds of foils for the respective use. As written before, pretty interesting for such an "uninteresting" product.

Last, but not least, we were heading to a customer, mainly producing stamped parts. As a project they produce high tech locks for school lockers. 

It really was a cool day. This was only a fraction of what is being done and produced in Vietnam. There is a huge potential of this country, and it's great being currently a part of it.