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I already wrote about my feelings regarding 80%+ of Chinese trading companies. The most disturbing for QC inspectors is when an order is split among several factories. But the real loser, in this situation, is the importer. Of course, … [Read more...]

If you work with several Chinese suppliers, you might have heard them complain about electricity shortages. You already heard about Chinese New Year, substandard quality, rogue factories... Here is one more risk in your supply … [Read more...]

I just found a good article on the China Works Blog, about the risks of asking the factory to shorten lead times. It seems to be a beginner's mistake, because importers quickly learn that pushing for faster production is not compatible with … [Read more...]

I heard the following argument several times: "it is not the Chinese factory's fault if they produced poor quality, if the buyer pushed the price to a point where costs were not even covered." My feeling is that, in such cases, … [Read more...]

I had an interesting discussion today about the new developments in the exports sector in China. Some purchasers are surprised by a change of attitude of some fairly large Chinese suppliers. They used to be hungry for new business, and … [Read more...]

Danny Coyle and Steven Weng just came up with a pretty good "Guide to manufacturing knitwear in China" (see part 1 and part 2), and I think their advice is applicable to buying any product here. They make a list of steps for knitwear … [Read more...]

In China, suppliers seldom speak out about their most important concerns, but they usually do something about it. Many importers feel that factories make them pay, in one way or another, for everything they resent. A few examples: A … [Read more...]

Some of my clients have many suppliers in China--somewhere between 5 and 20. I get to know a lot of things about them, and my clients are usually quite interested in what I can tell them. One question I often get is "can you rank them, … [Read more...]