Show Questions
More New Buyer Questions from the GS show in Hong Kong this last week.Q. What do we do about MOQ’s? Do we tell the factory that we want 100K or 1K?A. Just like you, if you were told that your price changed just before you made a purchase, factories don’t like bait and switch. If you really do want 100K but need to see 1K first, build that into your PO and negotiate with the factory to make the 100K piece order contingent on the quality of the first 1K. But don’t ask for a bid on 100K and then order 1K and leave them hanging. The factory most likely will not sell you 1K pieces at the 100K price anyway.Q. Do I need to speak Chinese to work here? What if English is my second language too?A. Certainly not. If you can it helps, just to listen in and find out more of what’s going on first hand. But it’s not necessary, no. If you don’t speak English well, and chances are your factory doesn’t either, then you need to just hire a translator. If you are doing a lot of complicated mold work or if your product is very technical you’ll want to hire an industry expert rather than just a kid with a college degree in English. You can always just "talk" with a calculator and calendar, but it will take much longer, leave you with a ton of questions and will be very difficult to confirm quality. Typically, show buyers employing this method are shipping to third-world destinations were quality is not their first concern.Q. I can’t come back to China so how do I confirm that quality is achieved?A. Unless you hire someone to check it for you or you come back yourself, you will never be able to confirm the quality. 3PQ is relatively cheap, a few hundred a day, to give you at least the peace of mind that you got the product in the correct quality/quantities and in the container like you ordered. Pro QC or a hundred other folks can do this for you. Don’t chance it.Q. I’m thinking about managing my own shipping to save money, how problematic is the Chinese Customs for exporting?A. Very. Why would you ever even consider this?! Unless you’ve got enough quantity to have your own in-house shipping department (and yes, it’ll take more than one person to do all your tariff codes, paper work, logistic coordination and VAT refunds), I think that you’re nuts to do this yourself. There are at least 10 if not 20 different people you have to coordinate with to ship any single shipment and with all the forms and info (in Chinese) you’ll never save time or money doing it yourself until, like I said, you’re big enough to have your own shipping department.Finally, I had a very nice conversation at the “Ask the Experts” Q&A Sessions yesterday with a rather worried new buyer. Basically he said: “I’ve made samples and placed two trial orders already with 4 different factories. I didn’t like the quality I got and I’m currently not working with any of them. But now I’m worried that they may be violating my IP.”My response: “Don’t worry, they are. You’re best case scenario now is to hope that they don’t’ file for trademark or patent registrations in China before you do.”Remember China is a file first country so you’d better be the one that files first! That means file BEFORE you give your art to the factory.