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How To Find The Right Supplier or Manufacturer
Purchasing and Supply Management 101
Here’s How to Do It Like a Pro
If you’re reading this, most probably you have just opened a new business or you are planning to change your current supplier/manufacturer. By now, you might have discovered that the process is not easy. I mean, having to think of a name and brand that is creative enough to attract customers, and has never been used before to avoid copyright claims is no mean feat. Just when you think you have it all figured out, then you are hit with tons of requirements and demands in order to successfully achieve your business targets. Now you are left wondering, when does it all end? Don’t worry! You are almost there in this tumultuous and exhausting journey. You’re only left with finding highly reliable and dependable suppliers and manufacturers for your business, and for this part we have you covered. This article will guide you in finding reliable suppliers and manufacturers for your business from a global mindset.
Don’t worry! You are almost there in this tumultuous and exhausting journey. You’re only left with finding highly reliable and dependable suppliers and manufacturers for your business, and for this part we have you covered. This article will guide you in finding reliable suppliers and manufacturers for your business from a global mindset.
Things to Consider in Advance
Well, when sourcing for a product supplier and manufacturer, many factors come into play, and you have to consider each and every one of them to increase your chances of success.
Consider Your Brand
As a seller, you have to consider your brand and the type of products that will fit it to a T. For instance, if your brand is aimed at attracting clients with a taste for luxurious or high-end clothes and apparel, you don’t want to source for a supplier that provides cheap and low-quality products.
Analyze your Venture Capital
You have to check the funds set aside for establishing your business, and how much it can afford you in terms of product volume and quality, delivery and warehousing costs, and product price. It wouldn’t be a good idea to make an order for maybe 1000 units of a certain item from a supplier, and when it’s time to pay up, you discover you can only afford to pay for 500 of them. This might cause you unnecessary embarrassment, and the hassle of having to get extra cash or request the supplier to take back some of the delivered products.
Set Priorities
You most definitely should prioritize the approximated customer traffic to your business establishment once you become operational. This is because a mismatch between customer traffic and available stock in your business might lead to risks like unplanned shortages or overstayed products that have expired. Case in point, you might decide to purchase 10, 000 television sets from your supplier, but end up selling less than 20 units for an entire fiscal year if your business is set up in a small town.
Conduct Background Checks
It would help a lot if you did a background check on a potential product supplier to determine if they are credible and dependable. It would do you no good if you end up unknowingly engaging a supplier that is facing financial problems and almost going under. That means you will be forced to go back to the drawing board and start looking for another option once the supplier goes bankrupt.
Besides, you can suffer massive financial losses if you end up trusting a product supplier you’ve never met, and pay upfront for delivery only to discover you have been scammed. Before deciding to engage a certain supplier, you could request a financial statement from the previous fiscal year. This will help you determine whether their business is healthy and fully functional. Also, you can search for the business website of the supplier on Google, and search for previous customer reviews on their page.
If possible, do a background check on several potential suppliers. Over-reliance on one product for a long time can be a real danger to your business! This generally happens when a retailer adopts an ineffective mindset while sourcing for suppliers. Learning to provide specific supplies to your consumers might work for a short time under certain conditions. But, what happens when your business is operational in a culturally diverse country with a shared economic structure?
Product Waiting Time
Different suppliers or manufacturers take varying lengths of waiting time before fulfilling orders for products. You might notice this difference even if they are dealing in similar products. Although the difference might be just a couple of days, it could mean a lot for your company. It is therefore vital to have this factor at the back of your head. Waiting times before the delivery of supplies are affected by a number of factors. For example, the distance between the origin of a product and the final destination might determine how long it will take to be delivered. Also, the customer service policy of an organization might impact how long it takes to do shipments to their clients. This implies that a customer-centered company with premium services such as express shipment might deliver faster than other companies with standard services only.
Know Your Market
Finally, you might want to have knowledge of the product suppliers that competitors within your market are consuming. When starting out as a new company within a certain market, you might need more time to gain the trust of consumers and build your client base by gaining some returning clients. The process might be more complicated if there are well-established competitors with widely accepted brands in the market.
To be able to keep your business afloat until the customers start coming in, you could start by looking for a supplier that offers products that are complimentary to the competitor’s products rather than similar. Once your business establishment is well developed you can try to add similar goods.
Take Note!
One of the worst things that can happen to your business once you open is customers flocking to your premises only to discover you are out of stock. The customers most probably won’t care that it’s the fault of the supplier, and it wont do any good to your brand. To avoid such situations, find out the capacity of the potential supplier in terms of vehicle fleet dedicated to delivery, warehousing volume, and the number of deliveries handled within a certain time frame.
