Export Operations Manager — Furniture (Australia Market)

About us

We are a premium handcrafted furniture brand. We work with workshops in Central Java to produce solid teak, rattan and leather pieces, and sell them directly to customers in Australia.

Our customers pay premium prices and expect a premium experience — 3D approval before production, photos during production, and their furniture delivered inside their home, not left on the driveway.

The role — read this part

We are building this supply chain right now. It does not exist yet.

No forwarder appointed. No fumigation provider chosen. No clearance and delivery agent in Australia. You will help us choose them.

The first months are about calling forwarders, checking what they actually offer versus what they claim, negotiating, running a test shipment, and finding out where it breaks. After that you own every order from customer confirmation until the furniture is standing in their house in Australia.

If you want a defined role with an existing system to follow, this is the wrong job. If you have opinions about how export operations should work and have never had the chance to build it your way, this is the right one.

What you'll do

Build the supply chain (first priority) Find and evaluate freight forwarders in Java. Verify credentials rather than accepting claims — is that AFAS registration actually current, does that forwarder really run the Australia lane. Find a clearance and delivery partner in Australia who delivers into the home, not to the kerb. Negotiate rates. Run test shipments, document what breaks, fix it.

Customers (Australia) Confirm orders, send production updates, give accurate delivery dates, flag delays early, coordinate final delivery.

Suppliers Coordinate timelines and specs with our Semarang/Jepara workshops. Check quality and packing before goods leave. Confirm volumes for freight quoting.

Freight and compliance Book and track shipments. Make sure every shipment has valid SVLK / V-Legal, a Form IA-CEPA Certificate of Origin (0% duty for our customer instead of 5%), a fumigation certificate from a provider whose AFAS registration you verified beforehand, ISPM 15 marking, and a correct Packing Declaration.

Australia side Manage the clearance agent, handle any DAFF/biosecurity hold, keep the customer informed, make sure delivery happens properly.

What we need

Essential

• 3+ years in export operations, EXIM or export merchandising — furniture, homeware or another wood product

• Hands-on with SVLK/V-Legal, fumigation certificates, ISPM 15, Certificates of Origin

• Strong written and spoken English — you write to Australian customers daily, unsupervised. Not negotiable.

• Experience selecting forwarders, not just working with one chosen for you

• Can track 10–20 live orders without dropping one

Preferred

• Shipped to Australia specifically; familiar with AFAS and Australian biosecurity

• Know the Jepara/Semarang furniture supply chain

Suits: someone bothered when a detail is wrong, who follows up unasked, and is comfortable cold-calling a company to ask difficult questions.
Doesn't suit: someone who needs a system to work inside — for six months there won't be one.

We offer

• BPJS Kesehatan & Ketenagakerjaan

• Fully remote and flexible working hours

• Your choice of partners and your own process, with budget behind it

• Direct access to the founders

How to apply

Apply through Jobstreet with your CV in English, answering these three questions briefly:

1. Biosecurity. A container of solid teak and rattan furniture arrives at Melbourne and is held by DAFF. Give us the three most likely reasons, and for each one, what you would have done in Java to prevent it.

2. Door to door. A customer in a Melbourne suburb has bought a 90 kg solid teak dining table. Walk us through what happens from the ship docking to the table standing in their dining room — who does each step, and where does this usually go wrong?

3. Certificates and partners. Exactly how do you check that a fumigation certificate will be accepted by Australia — what do you look at, and where? And what would make you reject a freight forwarder even if their rate was the cheapest?

Applications without answers will not be reviewed.