Tropicana Magazine Nov-Dec 2018 #121: Festive Frivolities

HEW YIT FUN AND ALISON CHEN
When I met Alison Chen and Hew Yit Fun
of Stone De Art in September, it was at
their home. Ensconced in the privacy of
a quiet, gated community within Bandar
Sungai Long, the family – Alison, Yit Fun,
their 16-year-old daughter, 10-year-old
son and Yit Fun’s mother and father – had
only moved in two months before. It would have been sooner, but
sometimes personal lives must take a backseat to business and this
was one such instance.
“ It took two years for us to complete the renovation,” Yit Fun
shared. “ We had to stop for 9 months.” At the time shipments of
marble were arriving and it was a very busy period in the factory, so
the couple put their own home renovation project on hold to focus
on placing their clientele first. It’s one of the hallmarks of their
business.
Both Alison and Yit Fun are the founders of Stone De Art,
a well-established business that sources, supplies and lays high
quality stone such as marble and granite for use in the home and
in commercial spaces. Usually the Tropicana editorial team would
choose to meet its cover personalities at their place of business – the
Stone De Art showroom and factory is located in Balakong – but
the couple’s spacious home is itself a fabulous showcase of the
very materials and detailed workmanship that their business is
grounded upon.
SET IN STONE
Prior to Stone De Art, Alison who is originally from Alor Setar
and Yit Fun who is from Kuala Lumpur, spent many years honing
their skills and gaining experience in the construction line, cutting
their teeth in a diverse variety of specialisations. The pair met while
working in the same company and eventually married and what
they learned during that period sparked within them an idea for a
business.
Yit Fun thought back to those days. “ Because we had been in the
bungalow market for many years, we had seen different suppliers
supplying different things to bungalow owners. I remember
speaking to my wife and telling her that we can start a business
supplying anything, except for marble.”
As a natural material both Alison and Yit Fun understood that
stone could be difficult to work with and customers’ expectations
were seldom met. “ There was always an argument that the stone
had a natural defect or that the colour of the stone could not match
the requirement of the owner. It seemed very difficult for suppliers
to 100 percent fulfil the desires of the private bungalow owner,” he
recalled. But you know what they say-never say never.
“Their fate was sealed when
they accepted an invite from
a friend to attend a stone
fair in Italy. Their attendance
provided them with valuable
insight into the business.”
TURNING MOUNTAINS INTO MOLEHILLS
New businesses are often faced with a steep learning curve. Stone
De Art was no exception but at times the pair wondered if their
particular hill was surmountable. “Almost every year for the first
five years we considered changing to another business,” Yit Fun
divulged. Stone De Art faced two major challenges: the technical
and the financial.
Throwing themselves into the business, one of the first things
they did was to set up a factory. In doing so they encountered
numerous unanticipated technical difficulties.
Then there was the matter of sourcing. Their first port of call
was Italy, a country widely recognised for its high-grade marble.
However this threw up some challenges: they had a language barrier
to get over, new relationships to forge and hard-to-come by highquantity
marble to source. Prized marble, they discovered, is in
very short supply.
For Alison, whose background is sales, and managing accounts
and purchasing, the most satisfying aspect of her job is finding a
beautiful slab of marble. “ Then I know we are in the position to
perform a good job,” she beamed with satisfaction, but it is also the
most challenging aspect of the job. “ Stone De Art focuses on quality
that is average and above,” she shared. “ But there are people like
us from all over the world that are also looking for good quality
marble. The advantage is that they have volume. The Malaysian
market doesn’t.” “Also consider how much it would cost for our
exchange rate. Our money is small,” Yit Fun added. Suddenly not
only did it begin to dawn on them how tough the business is, but if
they were to maintain their commitment to quality, the business
would not be able to grow.
27 NOVEMBER/DECEMBER 2018 | TM