China Sourcing - Blog Archives

Best Practices in Manufacturing Sourcing: Single Point of Contact

by Gary Young on July 19, 2019 with 2 Comments

Avela Corporation has been sourcing China manufacturing for our clients since 2002. When you have been doing something like this for so long, you accumulate a lot of experience that guide your best practices in manufacturing sourcing. We plan to share these with our readers from time to time and we will start with the topic of the value of … Read More

China’s Outsourcing

by Gary Young on June 1, 2019 with No Comments

Some of my previous blogs have discussed how the landscape is changing for China manufacturing. With offices in Houston and Shanghai since 2002, Avela Corporation has been on the ground in China and witnessing remarkable change. The average quality of life in China has increased with country’s embrace of capitalism. Chinese manufacturing wages have gone up, and so has Chinese … Read More

Benefits of US-China Trade Negotiations

by Gary Young on April 7, 2019 with No Comments

Avela Corporation finds Chinese manufacturing sources for our clients, so you can imagine we are asked a lot of questions regarding the so-called trade war between the US and China. Our first response is to point out that it is it isn’t really a “trade war”—that’s a term used in the media to create sensational headlines. “Trade negotiations” is the … Read More

Middlemen in China Manufacturing

by Gary Young on March 28, 2019 with 2 Comments

Avela Corporation is a sourcing company, but we are often asked if we are middlemen. We are not. But before we go into the difference between a sourcing company and a middle man—also known as a trading company—allow me to explain why middlemen exist on the China Manufacturing scene. Probably the biggest reason for a middleman is that less than … Read More

Quality Control in China Manufacturing

by Gary Young on March 23, 2019 with 1 Comment

At Avela Corporation we pride ourselves on the value we bring to sourcing manufacturing in China. Among the many benefits of working with a sourcing company such as ours, Quality Assurance and Quality Control rank high. QA and QC have always been a challenge in China. This is not to say that Chinese manufacturers are incapable of meeting high standards … Read More

Managing Change in China Manufacturing

by Gary Young on March 15, 2019 with No Comments

Opportunities abound in China. For our clients, it holds the opportunity to have their products manufactured at the level of quality they need and at price that allows them to be competitive in the marketplace when, for one reason or another, those opportunities are not available from domestic sources. For average Chinese people, the coming of Capitalism to their economy … Read More

Alibaba—the Elephant in the Room

by Gary Young on March 8, 2019 with No Comments

With over 17 years of experience as a premier sourcing company for Chinese manufacturing, we at Avela Corporation have heard a lot about Alibaba. When we hear about it, it is usually from perspective clients who have had bad experiences with businesses they have met through that portal, or they have simply outgrown it. Either way often leads them to … Read More

Five Common Pain Points for Importing

by Gary Young on February 28, 2019 with No Comments

Avela Corporation has been sourcing manufacturing in China for our clients since 2002 and we have pretty much heard it all. Clients often come to us after having tried to “go it alone” by dealing with a trading company that they may have met at a trade show, through a website on Alibaba or elsewhere. If all goes well, things … Read More

Having the Right Mindset for China Trade

by Gary Young on October 19, 2017 with No Comments

As a sourcing agent for manufacturing in China since 2002, one thing stands out to me as most important in dealing with China: mindset. Mindset, attitude, frame of mind, outlook, manner, aptitude, disposition, inclination—there are a lot of words to capture what we are talking … Read More

Observing Change over 16 years of China Sourcing

by Gary Young on August 8, 2017 with 3 Comments

My first visit to China was part of a trade mission trip in 2002, just a year after it entered the World Trade Organization. Back then the place pulsed with potential as the country embraced capitalism as the keystone of its economic reform. As a sourcing agent for manufacturing in China, the intervening years have been a whirlwind as I … Read More

China Sourcing – Blog