China Wholesale Is A Buyer Beware Market
Most people would describe China as ‘the world’s factory”, in fact, it’s most common these days for us to see ‘made in china’ stamped on everything from our favourite jeans to kitchen knives. Over the last decade, China has fulfilled its potential as the one place to go if you want to manufacture merchandise for the lowest possible prices.
The rate of growth in China is having an effect on the world in many different ways, as its demand for resources increases, and the amount of produce coming from China is rapidly taking over other markets. As China’s power as a manufacturer has grown over the years, so has its power in terms of sales and resources.
Reselling goods which are normallyobtained from China is also becoming very popular. People are looking into wholesale suppliers and buying cheap merchandise from them to resell to their customers.
Often the products which are sold by these wholesale distributors are in fact not authorised by the companies whose brand name they display. This is also known as the ‘grey market’ and increasingly, companies are looking to prosecute people who are listing items that they have not authorized that infringe copyright.
Often, when dealing with Chinese wholesale suppliers, you will find that their minimum quantities are quite high. This is because the wholesale supply in China is mainly a manufacturing industry, and this can often mean that smaller retailers are unable to obtain from them.
Perhaps the biggest caution for buyers is to make sure that the items they are purchasing are of good quality, and if they are a brand name, that they are genuine. If you are buying knockoff merchandise, not only could you end up with complaints from your customers, you could also find yourself facing the long arm of the law.
How Can I Find Reliable Dropshipping Sources From China?
If you are a rookie to the business of retailing, or have been around for a while, you should have heard of the phrases ‘drop shipping‘ or ‘direct fulfillment’ being bandied around in wholesaling circles. Basically, drop shipping is the practice in which the wholesale supplier will ship items that you have sold straight to your customer, without you ever seeing them. It’s a great system to use if you have time or money constraints, and especially if storage space for the merchandise you are wishing to sell is limited.
The biggest question that people have is how to find drop ship suppliers of the products that you planning to sell?
There is an increasingly popular trend for people to look into dropshipping from China, whereby an overseas supplier will fulfill the order that you have taken and deliver to your customer. But there are a few problems with dropshipping from China that you need to be aware of. Firstly, there is a interminable wait time than usual to have your merchandise shipped to your customers locally. This can lead to problems as your customers may not expect to be waiting long amounts of time for items they believe they are buying locally.
If you are prepared to do a little legwork, you can track down local drop ship suppliers that will be willing and able to work with you and provide low prices for high quality items. The advantages of working with a local supplier are enormous – in addition to better communications and increased reliability, the faster service will also be more appeasing to your customers than drop shipment from Asia can be.
Of course, domestic drop shippers are harder to find, as they don’t blatantly market their services like drop shipment from Asia. The whole process of dropshipping is ideal to retailers that don’t have any space to stock merchandise or don’t want to get involved with the time consuming tasks of storing, picking and delivering the goods they sell. The most typical users of dropshipping services are people selling products online, via catalogs, leaflets and direct mail marketing and one of the biggest growing areas of people using drop shipping services is eBay sellers.
In fact, the best and most advantageous way to succeed with using a dropshipping service is to firstly contact regular wholesale distributors and suppliers and ask them whether they have a drop ship service available. Some companies that you speak to may not be familiar with term, so be prepared to explain what you are looking for so they can best advise if they have the ability to perform.
Also, you need to be aware of the fact that dropshipping has many more advantages to retailers than it does to wholesale suppliers, because they are taking a substantial risk selling only one item at a time. So you might find that unless a wholesale supplier is already involved in drop shipping, they will be reluctant to start this service unless there are real business benefits which will make the process worthwhile.
