This article is a wrap-up of the series of articles that we have published over the past few months, on the topic of the verification & qualification of Chinese suppliers. Here is the list of articles: Background Checks … [Read more...]

This is the 10th part in our China supplier vetting series. We’ll cover requests for quotations, negotiations, and contracts. By now we covered pretty much all sorts of due diligence a paranoid importer might go through! And yet it’s not … [Read more...]

If you are about to select one Chinese supplier, and you know you will be tied to them for the foreseeable future, it is in your interest to spend some time and money to vet them. Here are a couple of examples: A company is about to … [Read more...]

In a previous article I described why and how a factory’s quality system can be audited. However, if you want to confirm a factory's reliability with high certainly, you might have to dig deeper. A quality audit will only focus on the … [Read more...]

This is another article in our "supplier vetting" series. So you vetted a potential supplier through background checks and a factory quality audit. Great. You might also have to check their social & environmental policies if you are … [Read more...]

This is another article in our "supplier vetting" series. So you asked potential suppliers a number of questions, then you visited them and noted your subjective evaluations... If you want to move further in the direction of working with … [Read more...]

So you have identified a potential supplier, you vetted their reputation & legitimacy, you asked them questions before a visit... and now is time to pay them a visit in China. I will cover the different aspects of the factory that … [Read more...]

Let's say you found a potential supplier, you communicated a bit with them, you vetted their company's legitimacy and reputation, and you want to move forward. Generally, the next step is to ask them a number of questions that will … [Read more...]