About us
Mermaid Supplies was owned by Henrik Ussing. Now it is owned and operated by Deniz Kayacik.
Background:
- Ever since early childhood Henrik has had a profound love for nature and natural history and throughout childhood and most of his adult life, he has been an avid collector of feathers, horns, teeth and ethnographical items of almost any kind.
Henrik himself started out as a knife maker some 20 years ago and enjoyed exhibiting his personal work at knife shows all over Europe.
All though being raises in a family with a long history of craftsmen, Henrik did not end up as a professional craftsman, but went on to be a BTB timber tradesman and compensated with knife making on the side to make up for the missing professional craftsmanship.
He quickly found out, though that it was more fun to find and resell hard to find material for knife makers and jewellery makers - and in order not to compete with his regular customers, he discontinued the knife making.
" There are so many skilled knife makers out there, so once in a while, it is tempting to be inspired and do a couple of knives again, but then again, seeing how high the bar is set in regards to quality and creativity, makes me quickly realize that I better let the makers do what they do best."
Today:
Nowadays, Mermaid Supplies operations is of course a lot of trading but also some craftsmanship - consisting of refining raw materials, making small handmade jewelry and creative objects always respecting the natural history of each single item.
"Except for a supportive family, the two things that I love best about my profession are the friendships that I have made across borders and cultures and the freedom of working professionally with the things I love.
Being a seasoned exhibitor at many shows across Europe, I have got to know many interesting people, many of whom have become good friends over the years.
- Working professionally with the things you love, and being able to combine trading, craftsmanship, recycling and natural history is the ideal subsistence for me."
Rules and regulations:
We do not ship any horn, bone or ivory material to the US states with special legislation towards such items.
We comply with Cites regulations and legislation.
We do not ship any Cites relevant items outside the borders of The European Union.
We only sell items that are relevant to Cites list II, appendix B, or items that are lower graduated on the Cites lists, all of which have been imported to The European Union in a legal manner.
Cites rules are harmonized within all of the European Union - and once these items have been imported legally into the European Union, you as a EU resident, do not need any original or copy of Cites permits.
- However, upon selling and shipping Cites list II, app. B relevant items, we supply the Cites Permit Number for the legality of the item.
A word from the new owner:
We, at Mermaid Supplies take an honour in supplying top quality material and good business manners.
"Nature made it - we took care of the quality."
We, ourselves, do almost any function in refining the material - and we only want to market high class material.
We shall not send any item that we would not use ourselves.
We love wildlife and nature and thus, support no killing of animals for the sake of their horns, hides or teeth as well as we do not support illegal logging of endangered species.
Remember to protect your health when working with our material. Wear respirator, protective gear and use a good dust removal system.
- have great fun - and maybe I will see you out there !
Deniz