Send me your product, target price, and timeline. I'll tell you honestly what I can do, what it will cost, and how long it takes. No commitment, no upfront fee. You pay only when you place an order.
Sourcing Office · All Categories · Shanghai, China
Factory prices from China.
Bigger margins for you.
I'm Gavin — your one-man sourcing desk in Shanghai. Tell me what you sell: apparel, electronics, tools, anything made in China. I find the original factory, negotiate in Chinese, inspect the goods, and ship to your door. You pay factory price — the margin stays with you.
01 Source
·
02 Negotiate
·
03 Inspect
·
04 Ship
Field Work · 001
1×
Single point of contact
100%
Categories covered
0×
Goods uninspected
A+
Freight partner grade
No. 01 — Scope of Work
Four services, one office.
Four jobs, one person on the line. No handoffs, no lost-in-translation, no markups stacked between you and the factory floor.
01
Factory Floor
Source Connecting
I locate the real manufacturer behind the listing — not a trader reselling someone else's goods.
- Factory audits & verification
- Direct owner-level contact
- Hidden capacity not listed online
02
Negotiation Desk
Price Negotiation
I negotiate the way a local buyer does — in dialect, in person — and bring the price to where it should be.
- True cost breakdown
- Volume & payment leverage
- Transparent quote comparison
03
Quality Check
Quality Inspection
Before a carton ships, I inspect it. My eyes, your standard. What doesn't pass, doesn't leave.
- Pre-production & in-run checks
- Final AQL random inspection
- Photo & video report, same day
04
Warehouse & Loading
Shipping & Forwarding
I book the best freight route for your budget and hand you clean, trackable delivery — door to door.
- Sea / air / rail / express
- Consolidation & repacking
- Customs & documents handled
No. 02 — The Field
All categories, covered.
Don't see your product? Good — that means it's the kind of niche the listings miss. Write to me; I'll find the workshop that makes it.
Machinery & Tools
CNC, hand tools, hardware
Electronics
PCBA, accessories, gadgets
Home & Kitchen
Appliances, ware, décor
Apparel & Textiles
Fabric, garments, home textile
Packaging
Boxes, labels, custom print
Auto Parts
Aftermarket, accessories
Building Materials
Fittings, surfaces, fixtures
Sports & Outdoor
Gear, fitness, camping
Toys & Hobbies
Kids, RC, puzzles
Beauty & Personal Care
Tools, accessories, packaging
Pet Supplies
Toys, feeders, accessories
Branded Goods
Shoes, watches, bags, perfumes
Chemical & Pharma Intermediates
Industrial-grade, factory-direct
Adult & Sexual Wellness
Discreet sourcing, plain packaging
Not on the list? That's my favourite kind of inquiry.
No. 03 — Method
How an order moves.
Four steps, clean and linear. You always know which step your order is on, and who's holding it.
1
Day 0–1
Brief & Quote
You send specs, target price, and quantity. I respond with the real source factory and an honest feasibility call.
2
Day 2–7
Sourcing & Negotiation
I go to the factory, negotiate price face to face, and bring back a transparent quote — factory cost, my fee, freight.
3
Production → Pre-ship
Inspection
During production and before loading, I inspect against your standard. Photo and video report, same day.
4
Ship day
Shipping & Handover
I book the route, handle documents and customs, and hand you tracking. Container sealed, cargo moving.
No. 04 — Pricing
No hidden markups.
No hidden markups.
Ever.
You see the factory price, the freight, the inspection cost — line by line. My fee is agreed up front. First inquiry is always free; you pay only when you place an order.
Small Orders
Starter
For first orders & small tests under USD 3,000.
$50–$150
Flat fee per order
- Supplier verification
- Price negotiation
- Pre-ship photo report
- Express shipping booked
Most chosen
Standard
Pro
For regular orders USD 3,000–10,000. Full-service sourcing.
3%
Of order value
- Everything in Starter
- Factory audit (on-site or video)
- Mid-run + pre-ship AQL inspection
- Sea / air / rail freight booking
- Customs & compliance docs
Volume
Enterprise
For large orders over USD 10,000 & long-term partners.
1.5%
Of order value
- Everything in Pro
- Dedicated production tracking
- Multi-supplier consolidation
- NDA & IP protection support
- Priority forwarder slots
First inquiry is free — always.
No. 05 — Alibaba vs Agent
A marketplace, or a partner?
Alibaba is a search box. A trading company is a middleman. I'm the person on the ground who fixes things when they go wrong — and they always go wrong.
Insider's Note — Why I Left
I used to work inside Alibaba.com. Day after day, I watched trading companies rent a factory floor for one afternoon, photograph it, and list themselves as "Manufacturer." I know exactly how that game is played — I left so I could be the one who protects you from it.
— Gavin · Ex-Alibaba.com · Now your man on the factory floor
What you get
Alibaba
Trading Co.
Gavin
Real factory verified
Listing could be a trader
Adds a markup layer
On-site audit, every time
Price negotiation
You vs the sales rep
Hidden margin built in
Face-to-face, in dialect
Pre-ship inspection
Not included
Rarely actually done
AQL + photo + video report
Quality fade protection
No mid-run checks
No one watching
Mid-run + pre-ship double check
Freight handling
You arrange it yourself
Marked-up freight quote
Transparent route & cost
Compliance docs (CE/FCC/FDA)
Your problem
Often missed
Pre-screened before production
When something goes wrong
You're on your own
They blame the factory
One call. I fix it.
Fee transparency
Price = factory + their margin
Margin hidden in quote
Factory price + agreed fee
No. 06 — Questions
What buyers actually ask.
Pulled from real Reddit threads, buyer messages, and the questions I hear on every first call.
Because I'm the one person you talk to — from the first message to the final container. No account manager, no handoff, no "let me check with my colleague." The person who quotes you is the person who walks the factory floor and books your ship. If something goes wrong, you have one name, one direct line, one person who answers. That's the whole point of working solo.
Three checks: (1) I pull the business license and verify the registered scope — if it says "trading" not "manufacturing," that's a flag. (2) I visit in person or run a live video walk-through of the production floor, not the showroom. (3) I talk to the owner, not the sales rep. A real factory boss knows his machines, his capacity, his lead times. A trading office salesperson changes the subject.
Pre-shipment inspection is always included in my fee — I won't let a container leave without it. You can't opt out. The cost of one inspection is a fraction of one defective shipment reaching your warehouse. I've caught 4%+ defect rates the factory's own QC "passed." Skipping inspection to save a small fee is the most expensive mistake in sourcing.
Two ways: 3% of order value for standard orders (USD 3k–10k), or a flat $50–150 for small test orders under USD 3k. Volume orders over USD 10k drop to 1.5%. The first inquiry is always free — you pay nothing until you place an order. Payment terms: 30% factory deposit, 70% balance after inspection passes. My fee is invoiced separately, transparently.
Yes — small orders are where most buyers start. MOQ depends on the product and factory, but I negotiate it down for you, and can combine multiple SKUs or split orders across buyers to hit the threshold. Don't let a high-listed MOQ scare you off; the real number is almost always lower than what's published.
I sign an NDA with you, and only work with factories that sign one back. For higher-value IP, I can help you register patents or trademarks in China (CNIPA) and recommend factories with a proven track record of respecting confidentiality. Nothing is 100% in manufacturing, but I've seen what happens when buyers skip this step — and it's preventable.
Realistic timeline: Sourcing 3–5 days → Sampling 7–14 days → Production 15–45 days → Inspection 1–2 days → Shipping 15–35 days (sea) or 5–10 days (air). Total, first order: 6–12 weeks. Repeat orders are faster. Anyone who promises "2 weeks to your door" is lying or shipping by air at a huge premium. I'll give you a real timeline upfront and update you at every stage.
I check your destination market's requirements before production starts, not when the container is already loaded. CE for EU, FCC/FDA for US, battery documentation for anything with lithium — I've seen shipments flagged at customs two days before sailing because no one checked. That doesn't happen on my orders.
You can — and for a one-off small order, maybe you should. But Alibaba is a marketplace, not a partner. The price you see includes the factory's margin, the platform fee, and often a trading company's markup on top. There's no inspection, no negotiation, no one to call when the third shipment's quality drops. I find factories that aren't on Alibaba, negotiate the price down, inspect before shipping, and handle logistics. My fee is 1.5–3%; the savings and risk reduction are usually multiples of that.
Great — that actually makes my job easier. You've met the factory; I take over from there: negotiation, production tracking, inspection, freight, compliance. I can also run an independent factory evaluation report if you want a second set of eyes on the workshop you visited. Many buyers come to me after a factory trip that went wrong — I help them not repeat it.
No. 07 — The Route Out
The freight that actually moves.
A sourcing deal dies at the port more often than it dies at the factory. So I keep one of the sharpest forwarders in the trade on permanent standby.
Your goods don't sit in a warehouse waiting for someone to "find a vessel." My forwarder partner holds real booking relationships with carriers across sea, air, rail, and express — and routes your cargo the way a local dispatcher would, not a website form.
Port of departure
Sea Freight
FCL · LCL
Full container or consolidated, port-to-port or door-to-door. Best rate, reliable sailing schedule.
Air Freight
Express · Standard
When time matters more than cost. Direct and consolidated air, with proper AWB tracking.
Rail & Truck
Eurasia · Domestic
China-Europe rail for the middle ground, and domestic trucking to any port or hub in China.
Express Courier
Sample · Urgent
Samples, small parcels, urgent top-ups — DHL/FedEx/UPS channels at agent rates.
★ Forwarder Partner
One of the sharpest forwarders in the trade.
- Real carrier relationships, not just a booking screen
- Consolidation & repacking to cut your volume cost
- Customs clearance & full document set handled
- Door-to-door tracking, no black boxes
- Honest rate breakdown — you see what I see
No. 08 — Field Work
Not promises. Receipts.
A few snapshots from the floor — factory audits, negotiations in progress, inspection days. The full archive lives on a separate page.
View the case archive →
Inspection
120 beds passed visual inspection — assembly test caught a bracket that jammed.
Gas-lift storage beds inspected and assembled on-site. Caught a bracket design that jammed and caught hands. Factory reworked before shipment.
Read the case
Shipping
Loaded a 40HQ to the roof — 97.9% utilisation, zero damage.
Supervised loading of mixed chairs and bedding into one 40HQ. Saved 8 CBM vs. the forwarder's plan. Every unit arrived intact.
Read the case
Inspection
Carton weight was 60% off spec — and every seat pad had dents.
500 white folding chairs: declared 5.2 kg, actual 2.1 kg. Caught material downgrade and pad compression before shipment. Batch reworked.
Read the case
No. 09 — Write In
Tell me what you make.
I'll tell you if I can get you there.
No call centers, no forms to nowhere. Your message lands on my desk and I answer it myself — usually within a business day. No email harvesters, no spam — just a direct line to the person doing the work.
Planning a trip to China? Come visit. I'll meet you at the airport, walk the factory floor with you, and take you out for the best local food in Shanghai after. Sourcing goes better over a hotpot.