The impending tariffs and the trade war with China have been an ongoing and popular topic in the press, and an especially important issue in our business. One of the benefits of this kind of activity is that importers are focused on reducing COGS (Cost of goods sold). A recent...
China has gone through some major economic changes in the last 2 decades. Some of which probably affected how you buy and what you buy in China. In a recent article from Stansberry Pacific Research’s Asia Wealth Investment Daily, we found a great review of some of these changes. Worth...
Four weeks ago, I shared with youMichael De Clercq’s blog about his predictions on a positiveoutcome of the additional tariffswith China. As you know, President Trump originally set a deadline of March 1st. We are now at that deadline and,a few days ago, we all learned that hepostponed this deadline...
We field a lot of questions about China sourcing and the management of the China supply chain, such as: How is it done? How hard is it? What are the pitfalls? etc. The best answers are provided by China sourcing specialists. To address some of these questions we thought we...
In the US, we celebrate the New Year on January 1st, with festivities on the eve of the new year. We all get together, throw parties, pour champagne, count down to midnight and take part in our own traditions. There are all kinds of traditionsthatmake us happy,bring good luck and...
We have written about the Chinese New Year (CNY), a.k.a. Spring Festival, every year for the last few years and how it can affect our China sourcing operation. As usual, a wave of closures and delays will hit importers everywhere. So, how do you prepare for this every year? Know...
China sourcing alone is a complex concept even before you get to logistics. Then you realize that there are so many moving parts to the logistics steps alone. According to an article we recently read in The Economist, giants like Amazon can now offer shipping products within an hour in...
As China opened up its economy in the late 1980s, many western consumer goods manufacturers set up plants or formed joint or cooperative ventures in China in an attempt to capture the opportunities of this emerging huge supply chain. While the production process could easily be built on the existing...