New website business offers bidding options

Nick Mote, of Spokane, has launched a new online bidding business called Bidping.com that enables customers to post a needed product or service and then choose from businesses that respond. 

“Instead of someone either posting what they have to sell, or having to search for what you want, the customer goes onto Bidping and says what they need, and then the businesses come to them,” Mote says. 

Currently, Mote operates the website from his South Hill home, and the site had about 80 members signed up as of late November. He is the company’s only employee at this time, he says, and he also works full time for a manufacturing company.

The site generates revenue, Mote says, by charging businesses per bid. When a business wishes to respond to a customer’s posting, it must pay between 70 cents and $1, depending on how many bids it buys at once, Mote says. 

“On my site, at least businesses will know the customer they’re advertising to is ready to buy a product,” Mote says. 

Mote’s experiences in the manufacturing industry prompted him to create Bidping, he says. Manufacturers often will get requests for pricing from other companies that invite them to bid on a certain contract, he says. 

“I thought instead of big operators doing that, why not everyone else?” he says. 

Anyone can go to www.bidping.com and create a free account. A user can then post what they need, such as a car part or contractor for their home. Businesses that use the site can then see these postings, like classified ads, and respond to the user with customized proposals. 

“With this, people come to the customer and give them the best price and talk about how their solution will meet the customer’s needs,” Mote says. 

In the future, he says, he would like to hire more employees and also add more features, such as group buying, to the site. 

—Katie Ross 

 

Cd’A-based dive shop opens Spokane outlet

Divers West, a Coeur d’Alene-based dive shop, plans to open an outlet on Spokane’s North Side, says Melissa Flodin, co-owner of Diver’s West.

Flodin says Divers West plans to open the store this week in 2,500 square feet of leased space at 116 E. Wellesley, just south of NorthTown Mall.

The Coeur d’Alene outlet is located at 1308 E. Best.

Flodin and her husband, James Flodin, who bought the business in 2007, currently have no other employees, but they are looking to hire instructors at both stores, she says.

Divers West sells and services scuba-diving equipment and accessories and offers scuba instruction.

The company also hopes to expand its dive-travel business and currently is arranging a 2015 trip to Truk Lagoon, in Micronesia.

“We did one trip there this year, and it was very successful,” Flodin says.

She says she has been scuba diving since 2005, and her husband has been diving for more than 30 years.

—Mike McLean

 

Antique shop opens in Hillyard district

Tammy Stith and her husband, William Weech, have opened an antique store in Hillyard under the name Spokantiques.

Located at 5009 N. Market, Spokantiques sells items that include Waterford crystal, Swarovski crystal, Fenton glassware, and vintage clothing. Stith says the store also carries some porcelain giftware, handmade quilts, vintage linens, antique pictures, and paintings.

In addition, the couple is operating a separate business, Instant Auction Co., from their newly leased 3,800-square-foot space. Instant Auction, which Weech started 20 years ago, holds auctions about once a month at the store site.

Instant Auction sells items it takes on consignment for owners, and charges between 15 percent and 35 percent of the selling price, depending on the item, Stith says. Previously, Instant Auction operated in the South Hill area and rented space once a month from the Moran Prairie Grange.

Spokantiques doesn’t operate on a consignment basis, Stith says, but rather sells on a regular retail basis items that the couple has acquired from estate sales and other sources. Spokantiques occupies about 1,700 square feet of floor space in the front portion of the building, Stith says. 

She is the sole employee of Spokantiques, with some support from her husband, who primarily handles the Instant Auction operations. 

—Treva Lind

 

New Thai restaurant opens in U-District

PNP Investors LLC has leased the space near the Gonzaga University campus that Ionic Burrito formerly had occupied and has opened a new restaurant there named Our Thai House, says Juanita Allen, one of three owners of the new business.

Located 1415 N. Hamilton, the restaurant serves lunch and dinner and has more than 40 menu items with full meals ranging in price from $10 to $30, Allen says. The restaurant also serves beer and wine.

Allen says the restaurant, which employs seven people, is her first venture in the dining business. The other co-owners, though, each are experienced in running Thai restaurants, she says.

One partner, Phonthip Tungkana, also operates Phonthip Style Thai Restaurant, at 1006 E. Francis, on the North Side. The other co-owner, Amphonesy Moungkhoth, has been involved in other restaurants, including Linnie’s Thai Cuisine, at 1301 W. Third, on the west end of downtown.

Our Thai House occupies 2,100 square feet of space that had been the longtime location of Ionic Burrito before that restaurant closed last year and sold its assets to Rusty Roof’s Burger & Shake Shack, which briefly operated an outlet there.

Spokane commercial real estate agents John Powers, of NAI Black, and Pete Thompson, of Stonemark Real Estate Co., handled the lease.

—Mike McLean