For interior designers: how to refer a client to procurement
The fastest way to add value for clients who are furnishing a room — without managing sourcing yourself.
Interior designers get asked about furniture sourcing constantly. It's part of the job. But managing procurement — suppliers, purchase orders, lead times, delivery coordination — is a separate job that many designers don't want to take on, or don't have the supplier relationships to do well.
DAF is a procurement firm. We handle the sourcing end. If you have a client who needs furniture and you're not managing the procurement yourself, you can refer them to us.
What the referral looks like
You send us the client's name and email. That's it. We reach out, handle the brief, draft the plan, manage sourcing, and deliver.
You get 15% of our service fee when the deposit clears. No tracking links to manage. No invoices to chase. We pay you when the deposit lands.
On a $60,000 project at supplier cost: our fee is $12,000. Your referral cut is $1,800 — for one email.
How the fee works
Our fee is 20% of supplier cost. Your referral fee is 15% of that — paid when the client's 50% deposit clears.
- $30,000 supplier cost project → $6,000 DAF fee → $900 referral
- $50,000 supplier cost project → $10,000 DAF fee → $1,500 referral
- $100,000 supplier cost project → $20,000 DAF fee → $3,000 referral
What stays yours
The design relationship is yours. We don't pitch design services to your clients. We handle procurement — sourcing, orders, logistics, delivery — and refer back if they need anything beyond that.
Some designers use us as a permanent arm of their sourcing workflow: they spec the room, we source it. Others refer clients who are furnishing independently. Both work.
What we need from you
- Client name and email — we'll reach out directly
- Optional: budget range and room type, if you know it
- Optional: any style direction or existing specs
You can fill out the referral form on the site or email us directly at hello@davidandrewfurniture.com with the client's contact details.
If you want to talk through how this would work for a specific client or project, email us. We can walk through what the plan would look like and whether procurement makes sense for the scope.
A furniture procurement service used to mean a middleman. In 2026 it means the party that eats the freight surge, negotiates directly with the workshop, and shows the client one line at the bottom. Here is what the fee actually covers, priced against live 2026 freight and duty data.
Read →Most hotel owners approach FF&E procurement like furnace maintenance — a cost to absorb, not a lever to pull. The five tactics below shift it. Lock the spec before the brand, consolidate RFQs, lock lead times Day 1, demand transparent pricing, and budget by lifecycle rather than refresh cycle.
Read →A furniture dealer marks up wholesale cost — typically 30–50% — and you pay the difference. A procurement agent earns a flat fee on supplier cost and has no incentive to inflate the line items. Here is how the two models actually compare on a real project budget.
Read →Send the brief. Get a costed plan inside a day. 20% flat.
Trade pieces between year three and seven. $499 founding rate.
Hotels, restaurants, offices, schools, healthcare, civic.
DAF Global Connect sourcing. Vetted per brief. Named on every plan.