Business model of tile suppliers?

[tanglin 0]

My designer has recommended a lot of tiles for A&A of a bungalow house. To my surprise, the tile supplier doesn't offer volume discount. Is this normal practice?

[AWS 6]

Shipping cost has gone up due to various reasons like fuel cost and covid requirements for container usage. Before covid, a 20T container charge from China to Singapore including clearance was around $1800. Now that container after off loading will return back to China empty, causing container shortages. Before covid, fuel price is half of what it is now. You can roughly estimate what will be the factor of increase. 
In business sense, if the demand is high, no business will lower prices or discount as there will still be buyers even they increase price. Now builders are actually buying up/reserve stocks when they are just doing demolition or piling works phase.

[tanglin 0]

14 minutes ago, AWS said:

Shipping cost has gone up due to various reasons like fuel cost and covid requirements for container usage. Before covid, a 20T container charge from China to Singapore including clearance was around $1800. Now that container after off loading will return back to China empty, causing container shortages. Before covid, fuel price is half of what it is now. You can roughly estimate what will be the factor of increase. 
In business sense, if the demand is high, no business will lower prices or discount as there will still be buyers even they increase price. Now builders are actually buying up/reserve stocks when they are just doing demolition or piling works phase.

Agree the cost has already gone up. Just dont understand how come the unit price is the same for buying 300 sqft vs  3000 sqft 😅

[AWS 6]

Just for matter of interest for all, in China, the sellers of tiles are referenced to square meter. In Singapore, we use square feet. The factor differences is 10.7.

A common mill MIC tile starts at SG$2/sf in Singapore. In China, this same tile is selling at SG$2/sm. The profit margin is 10 times excluding freight charge for the Singapore sellers. Factor in the freight cost of around $1800 average pre covid, excluding GST, the profit margin is still a good 7-8 times.
A 20T container can fit in easily 800 square meter for tiles at 10mm thickness or 400 square meter for granite/marble of 20mm. 

[snoozee 97]

A single landed house is still just one house. Volume is considered small compared to big condo projects. So don’t expect too much discounts if any. 
If you want discount, ask for the commission from your designer. Normally they will get a small percentage of the total sales amount as commission. 

[Kellhound 4]

I got tile discounts only through my contractor. Tile suppliers as with many other suppliers like countertops, vinyl flooring etc. will not offer discounts directly to end users. It is also up to contractor whether they want to pass on the discounts to you

[snoozee 97]

2 hours ago, Kellhound said:

I got tile discounts only through my contractor. Tile suppliers as with many other suppliers like countertops, vinyl flooring etc. will not offer discounts directly to end users. It is also up to contractor whether they want to pass on the discounts to you

I went directly to buy by myself and got some discount back then