If you have found Chinese suppliers that you can rely on, you should make sure they like you. I am not saying that you should become “good buddies who go to parties together” (don’t do it!), but it is good business practice to do certain favors.

An easy relationship with the salesperson and/or sales manager who follows your orders can help smoothen small issues (e.g. production difficulties, price hikes from sub-suppliers…). Conversely, in an adversarial relationship, these same small issues can quickly escalate into major obstacles.

One of the best perks you can find, to motivate your supplier’s contact persons, is to invite them to your office. The Chinese (with the exception, it seems, of Shanghai residents) usually love to discover other countries. It gives them something unique to tell their friends–it gives them a special status.

They will probably need a visa (see this interesting comparison of countries on The Economist that I found in my Twitter stream), so you will have to prepare a convincing letter of invitation. About 95% of the paperwork will be done by their side, or course.

They should probably pay the plane ticket, but you’d better pay their expenses once they are in your country (in their eyes, you are the guest).

What should you show them?

• Your office and your key people. (If you want to look bigger, get some more people in for the occasion–companies do it all the time in China!)
• Any place of “special interest”, as they like to say. This way they will have a story to tell their friends. They will take hundreds of photos of themselves.
• Places with lots of people. They usually like to watch local people and beautiful girls. My Greek client took a supplier on an expensive island (Mikonos), in a location with few people and lots of gays. It was not a success…

What should you NOT show them?

• Anything related to your customers. Hide the files with customer names, for instance.
• Any repacking/relabeling that you do in-house, if it gives them information about your pricing or your customers.
• Any finishing/assembly that you do in your country, if it gives them information about the use of the complete product.