About Us

A STORY ABOUT US
PERUVIAN TRADING COMPANY…

was the natural result from the union of two free spirited hard working somewhat loony people like Patricia and Javier Dam.

Patricia is and was always an over achiever, graduating number “1” of her college class in Architecture becoming a bachelor and later a full fletch Architect in Lima, Peru. Creativity was always in her blood, she didn’t know at that time what life had in store for her.

In 1989 came along a scrimpy fellow from a faraway land with his unusual nomadic life style that was irresistible to her, his name… Javier.

Javier, also a Peruvian born, is a hard worker that never retreats from any challenges that life would throw at him, already running a business of his own in the US of A, goes to Peru on vacation and in a blind date set up by my sister in law I meet my future bride Patricia.

After a couple of travels back to Peru and some courtship, Patricia takes a chance with life and decides to venture north to start a new chapter in her and my life.

We continued with my business, traveling from college to college offering wearers from different sources that we were replacing more and more with goods bought in the Peruvian market, meeting knitters of different talents on the way setting up the foundation for a network of business partners for a solid future for all involved.

We started tempting with designs of the basic nature to test the market and we had a great one, the college market, little by little learning what they wanted and expanding the designs to secure their interest. Also parallel to this, every weekend we worked at street fairs in NYC also learning what the more adult and city like market demanded.

By 1993 we had our own designs, so after a nervous and overly thought process we decided to enter the wholesale market, August was the date at the International Boutique Show and our debut was such a success with buyers writing their own orders for the lack of hands on our part and we never looked back after that show.

We work with a network of head knitters and family groups in Lima, Peru, designs and yarn is distributed to the head knitters who live in the city’s outlying communities. They in turn, travel to the mountain side and gather the knitters to distribute the yarn in community centers and also traveled door to door to mainly women knitters who have expert intricate hand knitting skills.

These groups of knitters will get together in their community centers and exchange knitting technics, also with the support of the government and nonprofit organizations, master knitters will come to town and tech them the best and latest in mastering their craft.

These groups are made up of friends and relatives who arrive in the city and towns after the annual harvest because then work is not found on the fields but the populated areas. They work very hard, save money and return for the next year crops and harvest giving them the opportunity to maintain their lifestyles. Some of them become skillful enough that they themselves become the next head knitters generation.

PERUVIAN TRADING COMPANY and business partners are very fortunate to have found each other along the way and become a mutual binding, socially and financially motivated force of development for all parties involved.

We have been trading fair with our knitters before “fair trade” became trendy.

Peruvian Trading challenge ourselves to be always more creative, to reach and learn from people on the streets and from fashion trend books so we can come out with new designs and a fresh new collection every year that we  present in American trade shows, our customers are high end Boutiques and clothing catalogs from all over United States.

We also work with private companies, creating exclusive designs for their private collections; we currently are working with Cirque Du Soleil, Urban Outfitters, Free people, Garnet hill, Uncommon Goods and others.

It will be our pleasure work with your company and start an endeavor relationship between you, us and the Peruvian Knitters.

Peruvian Trading is so proud to know that we have been able to made a difference on their lives and grateful to keep growing on sales and most important as people through all this 22 years.

Respectfully

Patricia and Javier Dam
Peruvian Trading Company

Monroe, NY