Opening the China Trade

Bloomingdale's has made itself a kind of international bazzar where the shoppers take the pick of the globe almost for granted. How does the store do it? A good example is illustrated by its dealings with of all places, the People's Republic of China.

"We thought that the Chinese had interesting merchandise that our customers would like." says Presdient Marvin Traub, recalling how the venture began in 1971. When the White House lifted the embargo on trade that summer. Traub immediately called a friendly French importer of Chinese goods and persuaded him to redirect to Bloomingdale's a shipment already on route to France. Result: on Oct. 25, 1971 the very day the U.N. gave a seat to the People's Republic, Bloomingdale's opened its "China Passage" shop. The timing helped to make the shop an immediate hit. Woven rattan baskets, bamboo ladders and other simple items sold well. Bloomingdale's customers snapped up 4,000 blue cotton Mao suit -despite warnings that the wearers might turn blue since the dye was not fast.

Bloomingdale's has since regularly shopped the Canton Trade Fair and has imported nearly a million dollars' worth of Chinese products, putting some to uses for which they were not intended. Rattan headrests, a sort of pillow in China, were stood on end, wired, and -presto! -became lamp bases. But Carl Levine, vice president in charge of home furnishings, was not satisfied; he wanted the Chinese to tailor products specifically for Bloomingdale's. Lacquered boxes and fans, which were decorated with floral patterns and calligraphy, had great potential, he thought, if their makers would forget the flowers and concentrate on the ideograms.

The puzzled Chinese replied that the flowers were the whole point of the decoration, and they would not permit Bloomingdale's executives to go to China outside trade-fair time to argue. Nor would they even answer the letters in which Levine suggested new designs. But two months ago, a delegation from China's National Light Industry Group toured Bloomingdale's in Manhattan, and the leader was so impressed that he arranged for Levine to visit Peking. There, factory officials showed Levine samples of new products based on the designs he had mailed.

So, in about a year, Bloomingdale's will offer a modified version of the classic rattan peacock chair, fans, framed posters featuring, yes, calligraphy, and even some Chinese-made copies of American Indian baskets. After that? Well, says Fashion Coordinator Anne Bertsch, the store's international strategy has been to "start with more or less simple ideas, then graduate so that we are challenging manufacturers abroad to produce more spectacular items." The Chinese, it seems, will just have to learn to please choosy capitalists.

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