The workers in every factory change. Management and ownership rotate in and out. Someone new can make a mistake.
When you search for a supplier on Alibaba, make sure you filter for Trade Assurance. This means that if you pay the supplier 30% upfront for manufacturing your product, you do not pay the remaining 70% of funds owed until you click a button saying that the supplier built the product exactly the way you requested. You verify everything is up to specifications through a product inspection company.
Out of all the different kinds of inspections there are, checking the post-production results that reach your customers is most important.
There's a misconception out there that you need every single unit inspected. But that's not true! That's a waste of money and time (in most situations).
Imagine a factory churning out products in big boxes. 📦If one out of five is good, there's a miniscule chance that the other four products are bad when it's coming off the same line. It's better to thoroughly check one out of five than having every product inspected in a hurried manner. It's rare to have them all pass. The more units, the more likely a mistake will be made. One percent of a run with a flaw is not doomsday. Balance the fail rate in a way that lets you scale your company without hurting your brand. Look at the big picture.
Usually 20-25% of products are inspected.
Your inspector should not and cannot take 20% of the boxes at random and inspect those or just inspect the first 20%. You need to have every fifth or fourth one coming off the line inspected in order. If something went wrong at the factory a third of the way through, then having products from just the first third inspected means that 66% of your products would be defunct, and you wouldn't know it.
When you talk to the person doing the product inspection for you, you're going to tell them exactly what to test.
There may be a button, lever, or other moving part that needs to be tested. If it's a bottle, make sure it doesn't leak. Get specific! Have whatever is in your supplier contract tested by the inspector. If your manufacturer fails to live up to the contract, then you have leverage for them to redo it, especially if you have Trade Assurance. Have inspectors take pictures and/or video of the units.
That ensures a good product.
Who should you use as an inspector? Those change all the time. Reach out to our Just One Dime member community by becoming a member yourself and ask them who they're currently having good experiences with.
Have you ever lost money from bypassing a product inspection? Let us know in the comments below.
