You went cheaper on sourcing to protect margin, then watched the product sit on the shelf.
The hidden risk
Cheap sourcing quietly trades quality away, and quality is what makes a customer buy — and buy again. Goods that don't move are dead stock: your real cost is the unit price plus storage, markdowns and frozen cash.
How to judge
Measure the true cost of a garment by landed cost times sell-through rate — not by the FOB number on the quote.
What the supplier must provide
Proof of quality consistency and reference customers who actually reordered — the ones a cheap supplier can't show you.
How DONGFAN handles it
DONGFAN controls consistency from PP sample through bulk so the product you pay for is the product that sells — fewer markdowns, more reorders, less cash frozen in dead stock.
Buyer checklist
- Compute landed cost x sell-through, not FOB
- Ask for reorder references, not first-order ones
- Check quality consistency across bulk lots
- Ask who owns the PP sample sign-off
- Weigh storage + markdown cost into 'cheap'
- Refuse quotes that can't explain their quality