Doing Business In China

[WizardStan]

This might be a stupid question, but could the moulds have been made in china and then shipped to japan/Europe etc, would that have eliminated most of the cost?

It might have, but considering it is the moulds we're still waiting on, I don't see how it would have helped in any way.

 

[kingoddball]

Oh, so ronry! So Ronry!

Try Nth Korea next time: The first batch may rust!

 

[kloplop321]

"Without any experience of business in China, or any language skills, it has been a gruelling process."

lol funniest line in article...doh!

Surely the wooden bike was the funniest part? I had tears in my eyes.

Yeah same here!..

My mother commented in an email reply to me

Man! I laughed the whole way through. I was aware of this sort of stuff when I had the chance to start a knitting machine business by importing them from China. I knew I didn't want to mess with this sort of crap and wasn't upset when someone else thought they had seized the chance and elbowed me out. I didn't want it!
Here it is on this page. http://store.dknits.com/ The price is about 3 times as high as it used to be, which tells me they moved production out of china at some point.

I read an article recently that gave the opinion that the "rich" China perception is another bubble waiting to burst. Business practices like these would have to be part of that.

I pretty much concur with that.

 

[Prometheus]

Surely the wooden bike was the funniest part? I had tears in my eyes.

I rather liked the bright pink prototype, and Victor's apparently cheery proclamations, myself. :lol:

A brilliant read.

 

[gruso]

Someone in the comments recommended this book:

Poorly Made in China: An Insider's Account of the Tactics Behind China's Production Game

 

[Paradox]

awesome article

 

[droneb]

XD, thats why i said photos are needed, if they are resilent on taking them, then
there is something weird going on.

anyway they cannot show you photos of the friends factory to show the panda shape.

i have already dealt with them and thats why you need to understand how to play the game and you will get
nice products and quality.

Btw in this case scenario the fault is from both sides.

chris did know nothing and thats why he failed.
the factory did wrong by not delivering what was requested by the expected time and quality.


also i must say this was 1 of all possible case scenario, one of the worst, but on the other side, you cannot say all chinese bussines have the same result
if that was truth, you can be sure no one would do busines there. and if you remember japanese products were also low quality some decades ago so wypiwyg.!

 

[kloplop321]

As posted on slashdot...
"Barred from using lead in children's jewelry because of its toxicity, some Chinese manufacturers have been substituting the more dangerous heavy metal cadmium in sparkling charm bracelets and shiny pendants being sold throughout the US, an AP investigation shows. Charms from 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer' bracelets were measured at between 82 and 91 percent cadmium, and leached so much cadmium that they would have to be specially handled and disposed of under US environmental law if they were waste from manufacturing. Cadmium, a known carcinogen, can hinder brain development in the very young. 'There's nothing positive that you can say about this metal. It's a poison,' said the CDC's Bruce Fowler. On the CDC's priority list of 275 most hazardous substances in the environment, cadmium ranks No. 7. Jewelry industry veterans in China say cadmium has been used in domestic products there for years. Hey, at least it doesn't metabolize into GHB when the little tykes ingest it."

Seriously...?
"a market research and consultancy firm, said test results showing high cadmium levels in some Chinese-made metal jewelry did not surprise her. Using cadmium alloys has been "a relatively common practice" among manufacturers in the eastern cities of Yiwu and Qingdao and the southern province of Sichuan, Xu said."

Just a bunch of Copy-Pastya, but just proves a point here. Good thing they can't stick Cadmium easily in our cases

 

[Sugar_Kane]

Ah, touché, Stanley

 

[marshal]

As posted on slashdot...
"Barred from using lead in children's jewelry because of its toxicity, some Chinese manufacturers have been substituting the more dangerous heavy metal cadmium in sparkling charm bracelets and shiny pendants being sold throughout the US, an AP investigation shows. Charms from 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer' bracelets were measured at between 82 and 91 percent cadmium, and leached so much cadmium that they would have to be specially handled and disposed of under US environmental law if they were waste from manufacturing. Cadmium, a known carcinogen, can hinder brain development in the very young. 'There's nothing positive that you can say about this metal. It's a poison,' said the CDC's Bruce Fowler. On the CDC's priority list of 275 most hazardous substances in the environment, cadmium ranks No. 7. Jewelry industry veterans in China say cadmium has been used in domestic products there for years. Hey, at least it doesn't metabolize into GHB when the little tykes ingest it."

Seriously...?
"a market research and consultancy firm, said test results showing high cadmium levels in some Chinese-made metal jewelry did not surprise her. Using cadmium alloys has been "a relatively common practice" among manufacturers in the eastern cities of Yiwu and Qingdao and the southern province of Sichuan, Xu said."

Just a bunch of Copy-Pastya, but just proves a point here. Good thing they can't stick Cadmium easily in our cases

It's all very scary !

 

[Sugar_Kane]

Yet I expect that if you specifically requested pure cadmium childrens jewellery, it would be made of zinc

 

[hobbyman II]

I'm just trying to work out what cheap product I could order from China in order to have them "fob me off" with one made of pure gold :rolleyes:

seriously, while there are some cowboys in China due to the sheer size of the country, the Tong (something like the Mafia afaik), and government tendencies to look the other way as long as the dollars keep rolling in and complaints don't, plus their lack of ANY understanding of schedules, I suspect a percentage of this negative publicity may well be being promoted by Western companies that are trying to stay afloat.

that said, I have a fondness for having stuff made locally, it's not energy efficient to ship stuff half way around the world when you can just hire a van and drive down to your manufacturers to pick up your order.

 

[Yoyobuae]

What amazes me the most is this line:

"Some of their products contain 90 percent cadmium or higher," she acknowledged. "Usually, though, they are more careful with export products."

So they care more for exported products than for local sale ones? It's such a different culture.

 

[WizardStan]

What amazes me the most is this line:

"Some of their products contain 90 percent cadmium or higher," she acknowledged. "Usually, though, they are more careful with export products."

So they care more for exported products than for local sale ones? It's such a different culture.

Not worked in too many sales offices, I see. A surprising number of offices care more about their clients than their employees. The only difference is that the entire country is one giant corporation, and it's citizens employees.

 

[mali]

Did you hear about that melamine in milk powder scandal? Heavy stuff. Many babies died. They killed the people who did that, afaik.
It's an extremely different condition in China and it's not a free country. Personally I grin at every failed attempt of western companies who want to produce over there. I wish the Chinese people good luck and hope they'll overcome their suffering.

Sorry for dragging this topic down.

 

[Yoyobuae]

I'm not the one to be pointing fingers (doubt anyone is) as not long ago there was an incident on my own country (Panama) where a toxic substance contaminated cough med. It seems to have been an accident, but we'll probably won't know for sure (investigation progresses slowly/not at all around these parts).

But these incidents in China are far more disturbing, as they are caused intentionally. Made also far worst by the large scales being worked with.

 

[j.pickens]

Sorry to say, but the cough syrup problem in Panama was caused by intentionally contaminated glycerin from China.
Diethylene glycol is cheaper than glycerin, so the Chinese supplier substituted the toxic substitute.
365 deaths according to this article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/06/world/americas/06poison.html

Panama’s death toll leads directly to Chinese companies that made and exported the poison as 99.5 percent pure glycerin.

Forty-six barrels of the toxic syrup arrived via a poison pipeline stretching halfway around the world. Through shipping records and interviews with government officials, The New York Times traced this pipeline from the Panamanian port of Colón, back through trading companies in Barcelona, Spain, and Beijing, to its beginning near the Yangtze Delta in a place local people call “chemical country.”

 

[Yoyobuae]

:blink: I didn't know that. Unbelievable.

 

[marshal]

j.pickens> Thanks for sharing the article. It might be old news but the article is an interesting read.... and bloody scary.

 

[kloplop321]

Personally I grin at every failed attempt of western companies who want to produce over there.

Only problem is that when running only here it just isn't competitive to those who DO have something working in china