The best is the enemy of the good

Today’s case is a vivid example of a wrong approach to launching your first product. 

This sad story happened to one of our UK customers. She spent more than 2 years developing her first product together with a Chinese agent and a design agency in the UK. Finally, golden samples were produced and the product went into mass production.

At this point everything went sideways. Some of the crucial points that had been carefully thought out at the development stage were completely neglected by the factory during manufacturing. This led to systematic defects in the product.

And to make matters even worse, the client paid the supplier fully through wire transfer before the inspection, so it’s literary impossible to get the money back or force the factory to improve the product quality.

The moral of this story is:

• If you are launching your first product – do not overcomplicate it. Better pay more attention to packaging, logo, inserts and work on marketing strategy. No matter how long you work on the sample with a professional engineer, in the end it will be produced by some poorly trained migrant workers with no emotional or professional attachment to your product.
• Do not pay the supplier in full before the final quality control check. The rule of thumb is to pay a 30% deposit and the rest only after the goods are produced and inspected. The benefits are obvious: the supplier doesn’t receive payment until the inspection is performed and he is motivated to eliminate all the defects as quickly as possible.

Or at least use Alibaba trade assurance which will keep your money within the platform until you confirm that you’ve received your products. In case something goes wrong you have much better chances reject the goods and get back your money.