Introducing Harilo

I've already talked about our Nepal to US venture called Red Lotus Trading Company, and now I'm going to introduce on this blog our latest venture Harilo. Harilo is our US to Nepal company, designed to bring the online shopping and products that are available in the states to Nepal. Our biggest barrier is that people that have not been to both don't understand how exciting this can be. In Nepal there is a complete lack
of being able to buy things over the internet, and the things you can buy in stores is limited to what that store owner picked up on their last trip to Hong Kong, Dubai, Singapore or Bangkok. Companies like Amazon, Best Buy, Nordstroms, and Ikea don't exist here, and where they do exist they don't ship to Nepal. Even if they did, none of them accept Nepali Rupees.

The feedback we have received so far has been great, we've even had an inquiry from a large newspaper. Every expat we mention this to has something that they want to order. Many well to do Nepali's too I'm sure will be interested in things like Kindles, iPads, custom laptops, modern furniture, and fashionable clothing. For expats, just being able to order clothes that fit correctly will be a huge boost. There are some restrictions of course on what can be brought over the border, but the list is small and not items that I would guess we'd sell in quantity anyway.

So why Harilo for a name. here is the paragraph from our FAQ; Harilo is a Nepali word that means lush, i.e. full of greenery and abundant. The Nepali shopping scene is a barren landscape with few options. We scavenge for what Nepali shops think we want. A lot Nepalis don't know how bad shopping really is in Nepal - ignorance is bliss. The ones that do are frustrated or accept the situation. Those who can go on shopping trips abroad. We want to change all that. We want to change the bleak shopping in Nepal into something more abundant and make it, well, more harilo.

The idea for the business came from the other co-founder Akshay Sthapit, who we had mentioned to that we were looking to get into imports/exports. Things have really come together quickly and Akshay has been great to work with. we hope to be up and operational in the not too distant future, we are at this point ironing out the details. While our website is still very much in development, you can see it at harilo.com.