I was a mandolin player before I was a uke player, and Eastman mandolins are a great choice. They are made in China by a company with a long history of building carved-top musical instruments. Eastman started with violin family instruments, then adapted their methodology to make a series of archtop guitars which were a huge success. With the success of the guitars, Eastman moved into mandolins. I have owned several Eastman mandolins in all ranges, from the low to the high end, and all are quite good. In fact, cost seems to have little to do with sound quality; some of the best-sounding Eastmans I ever played were the "lower-end" models.
Eastman mandolins are completely hand-made, so there is natural variation between any two, so one may sound different from another. But for a reasonably-priced import mandolin, I think they are perhaps the best available.