The biggest challenge other than collecting money from clients, is finding the right suppliers and vendors. Most designers including us are anal retentive, obsessive compulsives and we want everything to be PERFECT. Unfortunately in the manufacturing business nothing is perfect.
You can try your very best to cover all basis, to make sure the materials you specify are in stock, the correct colors, weight and that the artwork you supply to your factory is PERFECT; everything they had asked for. You can even issue a Purchase Order (PO) that spells out exactly what you want, how you want your products to be made, produced, shipped and billed. You can call and follow up consistently with the sales manager in charge of your account. You can even call the production manager on the floor making your products. You can call before, during and after your products are made. You can even demand for photos of the product in production or pay extra for final samples to be shipped overnight to you so you can quality check before they complete production. You can even ask them to send up-to-date photographs of the pieces as they package the goods for shipping.
Somehow, somewhere, after waiting weeks to receive your final products, and waiting for UPS or FEDEX to deliver, your goods arrive at your warehouse, or home office. Such a long time sweating the details to ensure that no problems will be had, you finally open up the first box on the pallet and voila!! Labels appear strangely misaligned. Your prints are not the colors you specified; even though at press check, you approved the color proofs and loved them. Or the first 100 pieces of your products look good but the rest of the 900 look like someone ran over them with a lawn mower!
What do you do in situations like this? Tough one to answer. We still face issues like this everyday after years in business! 4 out of 10 factories/vendors are honest and sincere ethical businesses and hold the same quality standards as you. If these few do mess up on a print job, they will admit their mistake and offer to reprint. They will cover the cost of reordering paper and inks. They will even deliver the job to us in person. Or if some pieces are badly made, they will offer to remake or offer a large discount for the current order. The fact is they should be sincere and apologetic and resolute.
Unfortunately for the factories/vendors that do not offer any solutions to the problems they themselves have caused, when you have already paid them in full, we are very sorry to tell you “YOU ARE OUT OF LUCK!” You are stuck with inventory you cannot sell and may never move. Designers and makers have more leverage to negotiate a discount or refund, when you have not paid your factories in full or have only paid a 50% deposit. But we know most startups that have yet to set a business credit history, may encounter the no terms, and pay in full drama. It’s the reality of the trade. Factories/ vendors take, as much risk producing your goods in good faith you will send payment to their invoice.
In other cases it is not so much with the quality you are getting, rather the company’s questionable business ethics. For instance, both parties may have agreed to the pricing/quotation on a job, and then your factory/ vendor decides to up your price in mid-production. Not only will you be concerned with your profit margin, but also how you will be able to pay for the order? Can you still ship the orders or hold them until you find a new vendor? Can you start all over again; the negotiation process, the sampling process, and the production time? You may ask yourself, what if this new factory turns out to be like the original factory?
How about factories/ vendors that nickel and dime you? You receive your final invoice and you feel like you’ll have a heart attack because they’ve made up all these little extra charges. You may have thought some services were part of the job, but you were charged for them instead.
What if your broker goes missing? He has taken your order, and you had paid him the deposit money but the actual factory doing the work never received your order or payment or even heard of you or your broker?
These are all legitimate concerns that we still face today. You can try to prepare and do your very best to make sure nothing goes wrong during the production process. Nonetheless, mistakes may happen somewhere in the chain of command, either from the sales level, factory level, supply level, shipping level, ethics or quality arena. Over the years, we have built really strong relationships with our vendors and suppliers. It is rare to get the white glove service. When and if you do ever experience this, you will want to maintain that relationship, build and grow it further. Don’t let them go! Cherish them and hold them dear. It is sad to reward companies for functioning the way they are supposed to, but they are so hard to find these days. A simple thank you note or holiday gift basket will go a long way…
