Tiny Quality Leaves

Large Quality Leaves

I am actually a homemaker... who has become quite an expert on Terminalia catappa leaves, having sold more than 30,000 leaves to satisfied customers mostly through Aquabid and Ebay.

I started picking and selling Ketapang leaves initially as a project for my children.  You see, we want them to be responsible for their own pets (fish and hamster etc). So we thought of a way for them to earn their own pocket money to buy their pet supplies (of course we do not require them to pay for anything else -- we just want them to learn responsibility in regard to their pets).

Since my husband occasionally collects the Ketapang leaves for breeding his bettas and shrimps; we decided to collect more to sell. Not realising that there were others selling the leaves at much higher price, we began to sell it at a price we thought to be reasonable. We did not increase the price a lot even when we knew about other suppliers. So our price is extremely competitive for such good quality leaves regardless of whether you are buying a few or in bulk.

Today my children still collect some of the leaves whenever they can, and my retired father has also joined in the effort. I reimburse them for whatever they collect. But I now do all the washing and the quality controlrejecting sometimes up to 80% of the leaves collected. These leaves that are rejected are thrown away if they are too bleached (and therefore thin and useless will not tan the water) or too green (and therefore will pollute the water if used, or will become mouldy in transit). If the leaves are torn but still thick and useable, they are set aside for sale as low grade leaves (sold by weight).

The whole process of picking, washing, quality control and packing involves quite a lot of work and time. But it supplements our modest family income.

Why do I not have an Ebay store? Well, the simple reason is that it is not cost effective for me at the moment. At the moment I sell only Indian Almond Leaves, and I will probably continue to specialise in these leaves.

There are currently a lot of competition for selling Indian Almond Leaves, so my customer base is not big enough and my profit is not high enough for me to afford to open a store. Maybe one day I will.

I hope to grow my customer base by providing very good quality leaves and good service.

Do take a look at what I have to offer. My leaves are graded according to the following:

(1) Grade A Giant Quality Leaves - At least 12"

(2) Grade A Large Quality Leaves -7-12"

(3) Grade A Tiny Quality Leaves - 5-7"

(4) Grade A Baby Quality Leaves - Less than 5"

(5) Grade B Large Leaves - Have one or two holes or small tears, at least 7"

(6) Grade C Assorted Leaves - All the leaves that do not fall into the above (sold by weight)

When you get leaves from me, you can be assured of value for money every time.