Sourcing Partner Questions to Ask Before Ordering Bags

Why the questions matter more than the price

Every creator sourcing a campaign bag starts by comparing unit prices, and almost every sourcing problem that follows is caused by something the price did not include. A low unit cost can hide a higher minimum, a tooling charge that appears later, a sampling window that does not exist, an inspection standard that was never agreed, or a production slot that has not actually been booked. The price is the output of a set of terms; the terms are the thing to compare.

The second reason to ask is that the answers are themselves information about how the programme will be run. A production partner who returns a complete answer within two working days, with numbers, dates and named standards, is telling you something about how they will handle a technical query in week four of bulk. A response that answers three of ten questions and ignores the rest is telling you the same thing, less pleasantly.

This article is written as a questionnaire you can send. It covers ten areas and forty-eight questions, and the useful ones are the ones that require a number rather than an assurance. Where a question below has a standard answer on the programmes we support, that answer is given, so you can tell the difference between a considered response and a deflection. The crowdfunding bag guide covers the same ground from the planning side.

Minimum order quantity

500 pcs per style / colourway

Sampling

6-10 working days (12-15 for complex builds)

Bulk production

35-50 days after deposit + approved pre-production sample

Inspection

AQL 2.5 to ISO 2859-1

Trade term

FOB Xiamen

Payment

T/T 30/70

Production floor

4,950 m² SGS-verified, 137 staff, 7 lines, 149 machines

Monthly capacity

200,000 pcs per month

Programme contact

service@junyuanbags.com

Capability and scope questions

Start with scope, because a partner who cannot build your construction will still quote for it and then discover the problem in sampling. These questions establish whether the bag you have designed is within the range they actually run, and they are cheap to ask and expensive to skip.

The last two rows of that table matter for a specific reason. A campaign order of 500 pcs is small in production terms, and the question is whether it will be treated as small. A production floor of 4,950 m² with 137 staff across 7 lines running at 200,000 pcs per month has the headroom to schedule a 500 pcs order inside 35-50 days without displacing other bookings, which is exactly the answer a creator wants to hear and can verify. Our bag manufacturing page sets out how the capacity figures map to a schedule.

MOQ, pricing and payment questions

Minimum order quantity is the term most often misread. A minimum stated per style is not the same as a minimum stated per style and colourway, and the difference is a multiple of the number of colourways in the campaign. Ask the question in the form that exposes that distinction, and ask it before the tier structure on the campaign page is designed around an assumption.

Ask for the quotation to be itemised, because an itemised quotation is the only one you can negotiate and the only one you can compare against another. A single unit price hides the tooling, the set-up and the packing, and it makes a like-for-like comparison impossible. If two quotations differ by 8%, the itemisation will usually explain why, and the explanation is more useful than the difference.

Sampling and prototyping questions

Sampling is where a specification becomes an object, and it is also the stage most likely to slip. The questions below establish what a round includes, how long it takes, what happens if the sample is wrong, and what you will receive at the end of it. Ask all of them before the sampling slot is booked rather than during the round.

1. How many working days does a standard sampling round take? The answer should be 6-10 working days.
2. What extends it to 12-15 working days? The answer should name custom hardware, non-stock fabric or complex construction.
3. How many rounds are included in the quoted price, and what does a third round cost?
4. Are sample units charged, and is the charge credited against the bulk order?
5. Who pays sample courier, and how many sample units will I receive?
6. Will I receive a photographed measurement record with the sample, or only the unit?
7. What exactly must be approved to release bulk? Deposit plus written pre-production sample approval.
8. If I change the specification after approval, what is the cost and the calendar effect?

The measurement record in question six is worth insisting on. A sample that arrives with a completed measurement sheet, photographed against a scale reference at the stated points, gives you something to approve rather than an impression to form. Our sample prototyping page sets out what the record should contain.

Material and traceability questions

Materials are where most of the unit cost sits and where most of the surprises live. A fabric named loosely in a quotation can be substituted for something cheaper without technically breaching the agreement, and the substitution is only visible when five hundred units arrive with a slightly different hand feel. These questions close that gap.

• Will the fabric be named by denier, weave, finish and coating, with a supplier reference or swatch code?
• Is the fabric stock or dyed to order, and how many days does a custom dye add?
• Will the bulk run use the same fabric lot as the approved sample, and how is that recorded?
• Are hardware components named by reference, and are they catalogue or custom?
• What happens if a named material becomes unavailable after approval?
• Will I receive a material lot record and shade photographs at goods receipt?
• Are lining, interlining and webbing named with the same specificity as the face fabric?
• Is there a documented substitution policy, and does it require my written approval?

Compliance and testing questions

Compliance is not optional and it is not uniform: obligations differ by destination market and by product claim. A campaign shipping to backers in the US, the EU and the UK is subject to three overlapping sets of requirements, and the documentation has to exist before the goods ship rather than after a marketplace or a customs authority asks for it.

Ask for the documentation to be listed in the quotation rather than promised verbally, and ask what happens if a test is required and fails. The answer you want is a named test, a named laboratory or certificate scheme, and a stated position on who pays for a re-test. Where the campaign makes an environmental claim, the material customisation page covers what can be substantiated.

Capacity and scheduling questions

A production window that has not been booked is not a production window. This is the single most common gap between what a creator believes has been agreed and what has actually been agreed, and it is worth being blunt about it in the RFQ. Ask for dates, in writing, tied to the conditions that trigger them.

1. What starts the bulk production clock? The answer should be deposit plus written pre-production sample approval.
2. What are the start and completion dates for my slot, once those conditions are met?
3. How long is bulk production 35-50 days.
4. Is the slot reserved now, or only when the deposit lands?
5. What is the monthly capacity, and where does a 500 pcs order sit relative to it?
6. What happens to my slot if my approval slips by two weeks?
7. Will I receive weekly production status reports during the run?
8. What is the position on a partial air shipment if part of the run is needed early?

Question six is the one creators forget and the one that hurts. A slot booked for a campaign that then slips its sample approval by three weeks does not simply move three weeks; the production partner has other bookings, and the slot may no longer be available. Ask whether the slot is held, for how long, and under what conditions.

Quality control and inspection questions

Quality control is a set of decisions made before production, not an activity performed at the end. The questions below establish what standard applies, who performs it, what report you receive, and what happens when the result is a fail. Ask for the defect classes to be defined jointly before the run starts.

Ask also for the in-line defect log to be shared during the run rather than only at the end. An in-line check catches a defect trend while it is still correctable on the line, whereas a single gate at the end leaves sorting finished goods as the only remedy. Our QA and QC page shows how the classes are structured.

Shipping and responsibility questions

Trade terms allocate cost and risk, and they are frequently misunderstood at exactly the point where the misunderstanding costs money. FOB Xiamen means the goods are delivered on board the vessel at Xiamen with cost and risk transferring there; everything after that is the buyer's arrangement. Confirm it explicitly, and confirm what is included on each side of the line.

• What trade term applies? The answer should be FOB Xiamen, or a stated alternative.
• What is included on the seller side up to loading, and what becomes mine at that point?
• Who arranges ocean freight, insurance, clearance and inland delivery?
• Will I receive carton dimensions and a packing list before the freight booking?
• What is the position if goods are damaged in transit, and whose insurance responds?
• Can you ship directly to my fulfilment warehouse, or only to the port?
• Will I receive loading photographs and a container or carton count at dispatch?
• What documentation accompanies the shipment: packing list, commercial invoice, certificate references?

Communication, change control and re-order questions

The last group covers what happens after the order is placed: who you talk to, how changes are handled, and what a second run costs. These are the questions that determine whether a re-order is a confirmation or a fresh negotiation, and they are worth asking during the first RFQ rather than after the campaign overfunds.

Ask the re-order question at the first quotation, with the likely variants named. Pricing a second quantity band and any stretch-goal colourway during the original RFQ costs nothing, and it means that when the campaign overfunds the re-order is a confirmation rather than a negotiation conducted under time pressure.

How to read the answers

Three signals separate a considered response from a deflection, and none of them is the price. The first is specificity: a number, a date and a named standard rather than an adjective. The second is completeness: all ten areas answered rather than the three that were easy. The third is whether the answer distinguishes between what is included and what is not, which is the mark of a quotation that will still be accurate in week six.

One further signal is worth noting because it is easy to miss: whether the response asks you questions back. A partner who returns three queries about your tech pack has read it. A partner who returns a price without a single query has either understood everything immediately, which is possible, or has not read it closely, which is more common and more expensive later.

There is a fourth signal that only appears once you have two responses in front of you: consistency of structure. Two quotations that both itemise tooling, state the sampling window as a range of working days, name an inspection standard and define when the bulk clock starts can be compared line by line. Two quotations that differ in structure cannot be compared at all, and in that situation the lower number is not the better offer, it is simply the less complete one.

Finally, treat the response time itself as data. A considered reply to a ten-section questionnaire within two working days tells you the enquiry is being handled by someone with authority to answer. A reply that arrives a week later, answers four sections and asks you to call, tells you how a technical query will be handled in week four of bulk, which is when it will actually matter.

Send it as one RFQ

The most efficient way to use this list is to send it as a single document with your tech pack attached. Ten sections, forty-eight questions, and a request for the answers in writing. You will receive either a complete response that lets you compare two partners properly, or a partial one that tells you what you need to know without spending a sampling round finding out.

• Attach the complete tech pack: dimensions, materials, hardware, branding method, packing specification.
• State quantity per style and colourway, with the 500 pcs minimum understood.
• State the target delivery month and destination market, so freight and compliance can be quoted.
• State the inspection standard you expect: AQL 2.5 to ISO 2859-1 unless there is a reason otherwise.
• Confirm trade terms and payment: FOB Xiamen and T/T 30/70, or a stated alternative.
• Name any stretch-goal or re-order variants and ask for them to be priced in this RFQ.
• Ask for the response in writing, with the ten sections answered in order, within a stated number of days.

That request takes an hour to assemble and it is the highest-return hour in the whole sourcing process. It is also the point at which a campaign stops hoping its reward will arrive and starts knowing it will, on dated terms, at a cost that has been modelled. If you are comparing formats before you send it, the custom bag categories page and the Indiegogo page cover the range and the platform differences.

• Bag manufacturing for campaign creators
• Crowdfunding bag sample prototyping
• Kickstarter campaign bag QA and QC
• Low minimum bag production for creators
• Material customisation for Kickstarter bags
• Custom bag categories
• Custom bags for Kickstarter campaigns
• Request a quotation

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