As I stared at the 15-page Excel sheet filled with rows of sofa models, material and sizes,

my mind was searching for an efficient way to organize Tang's Furniture's catalogue — a thick

book filled with over 146 furniture items — into a multilingual e-commerce website. ​My eyes

scanned back and forth between the Excel tables and the ​thick book filled with over 146 furniture

items​. I had no idea how many hours I would end up dedicating to this project, and that night I

shut my laptop with a nervous heart. "I need to do this for my family," I thought to myself as I

showered.

I always thought Tang’s Furniture was so loud. Located in the middle of the industrial

sector of Brooklyn, you see nothing but warehouses and hear nothing but the roaring engines of

trucks. Customers come in throughout the day asking, “​Is this mattress pad made from coconut

or polyester?​ What sizes do you have for model-232?” My mind scrambles to answer in​ both

Cantonese and English ​while maintaining a professional attitude. ​As the phone rings off the

hook, I am bombarded with customers saying: “​I would buy this, but I can’t see the chair through

the call” or “Can you send me photos of this bed frame?” ​Bombarded with all that noise and

questions, I felt frustrated because we were losing time and money over these trivial problems.​ I

decided to analyze the obvious flaw of our business model: the reliance on in-person sales

exchanges and the lack of e-commerce. Evidenced by the outdated furniture displays, incorrect

inventory codes, and lingering discontinued items within the system​, the lack of efficient

communication​ created confusion in the office and often came at the cost of maintaining

customers. ​Looking at this business my dad built from scratch with his minimal knowledge of

English, I decided that building a website was the easiest way to solve these problems, and that I

was the best person to do the job.

 Importing the previously in-person-only inventory to an online cloud database wasn’t an

easy task -- I had to filter out furniture that had been discontinued or out of stock. I found the

existing lists of inventory codes to be lengthy, inefficient, and unorganized. I would spend days

in the warehouse meticulously checking item descriptions and differences between models, so I

could accurately log each onto the website. As a solution, I sorted each furniture type by

category and renamed each piece to match its code. Using this format, I created an interactive

shop on the website where customers could easily maneuver and order their furniture. I ensured a

minimalist checkout process and implemented paperless receipts, and soon enough the incessant

phone calls in our office decreased. Instead my notifications increased as more customers started

using our new site. As​ COVID continues incessantly, the bustle in Tang's Furniture now extends

into our home as I sit in front of my computer managing daily web orders while my dad arranges

curbside pickups from the warehouse.

As I removed an old picture of a metal-framed bed and replaced it with our website’s new

QR code along with our newly designed logo, I realized that this project sparked my passion for

business and economics.​ Transforming my dad's outdated, mostly offline business to a more

contemporary model with a brand new e-commerce site gave me direct exposure and experience

to break traditional boundaries and expand new potentials. ​Whether removing paper catalogues

or interacting with customers, my experience building​ this website gave me the skills to

approach and analyze problems with an open mind.​ ​As I headed towards the trashcan to throw

away the last printed Tang catalogue, the silence in the warehouse told me I had truly succeeded.