How to get LOW MOQ’s with Your Branding from China

The problem small, bootstrapped e-commerce entrepreneurs face is that when they want to brand products, they need to buy a LARGE minimum order quantity (MOQ). If you do not have a large budget to brand products, this then can be a major problem for e-commerce entrepreneurs.

What Is Minimum Order Quantity (MOQ)?

Minimum order quantity is the fewest number of units a business is willing to sell to a single customer at once. While a retail store may be happy to sell a single t-shirt, it isn’t profitable to sell a single product for a factory or wholesaler. They will require a minimum order of hundreds or thousands of units, depending on the product. When placing an order with manufacturers and wholesalers, they will require a minimum order quantity (MOQ). That means manufacturers, suppliers and wholesalers will turn away some customers if they are not willing or able to meet the minimum order quantity. This means that products costs can often costs several thousand or hundreds of thousand dollars. How then do smaller e-commerce brands do private labeling?

The Solution?

Below are a few examples or case studies. These look at a comparison if you were to go to Alibaba, 1688 or other supplier’s vs what we can achieve for you at E8 Sourcing.

We searched a few suppliers on Alibaba and 1688 for a thermal lunch bag. We wanted it in a grey color and branded it with the E8 Sourcing logo. We also look for features like a large capacity, water resistant with three layers of thermal insulation.

The salesperson at Alibaba came back and said that for private label their MOQ is 500 units with a PU logo printed on the bag and cost is $3.85/unit. We have a real screenshot below from our chat and of course you can verify by talking to Alibaba suppliers yourself and then talking to us to compare, we encourage that.

With 1688 supplier’s, generally they have no English-speaking staff and cannot accept money outside of China. Their MOQ was 500 units with the printed PU logo on the bags and cost was $2.50/unit

Our MOQ at E8 Sourcing’s is only 50 units with a heat printed logo on the bags for $2.40/unit. Not only are we highly competitive in our pricing, but also, we have unbeatably low MOQ in this example. If you take Alibaba’s 500 units MOQ @ $3.85 per unit, that’s a total of $1,925.00. Our 50 units MOQ @ $2.40 per unit total is $120. That’s a MASSIVE SAVING of $1,805.00.

We searched a few suppliers on Alibaba and 1688 for compression socks. We wanted it in black with green and orange color and branded it with the E8 Sourcing logo. We also look for features like durability, anti-slip and made with a combination of Nylon and Spandex.

The salesperson at Alibaba came back and said that for private label their MOQ is 300 units with a PU logo printed on the bag and cost is $2.50/unit. We have a real screenshot below from our chat and of course you can verify by talking to Alibaba suppliers yourself and then talking to us to compare, we encourage that.

With 1688 supplier’s, generally they have no English-speaking staff and cannot accept money outside of China. Their MOQ was 300 units with the printed PU logo on the bags and cost was $1.70/unit

Our MOQ at E8 Sourcing’s is only 50 units with a heat printed logo on the bags for $2.50/unit. Not only are we highly competitive in our pricing, but also, we have unbeatably low MOQ in this example. If you take Alibaba’s 300 units MOQ @ $2.50 per unit, that’s a total of $750.00. Our 50 units MOQ @ $2.50 per unit total is $125. That’s a MASSIVE SAVING of $625.00.

We searched a few suppliers on Alibaba and 1688 for a bike light. We wanted it in a black color and branded with the E8 Sourcing logo. We also look for features like USB rechargeable, water resistant and easy to install.

The salesperson at Alibaba came back and said that for private label their MOQ is 1,000 units with a PU logo printed on the bag and cost is $3.45/unit. We have a real screenshot below from our chat and of course you can verify by talking to Alibaba suppliers yourself and then talking to us to compare, we encourage that.

With 1688 supplier’s, generally they have no English-speaking staff and cannot accept money outside of China. Their MOQ was 500 units with the printed PU logo on the bags and cost was $2.70/unit

Our MOQ at E8 Sourcing’s is only 50 units with a heat printed logo on the bags for $3.80/unit. Not only are we highly competitive in our pricing, but also, we have unbeatably low MOQ in this example. If you take Alibaba’s 1,000 units MOQ @ $3.45 per unit, that’s a total of $3,450.00. Our 50 units MOQ @ $3.80 per unit total is $190. That’s a MASSIVE SAVING of $3,260.00.

First, we order the products from a supplier that’s usually difficult to find for non-native Chinese. These suppliers could be from 1688, from Yiwu Market or other reliable suppliers we’ve worked with before or know how to find. It’s important that they have the products in stock, this allows us to move with speed but maintain quality.

In the meantime, we would have the logo and packaging printed from our printers. The logo printing depends on the type of logo that will be printed on the product, these can be heat printed, PU, embroidered, laser, engraved, UV crystal etc.

The packaging also varies for example eco-friendly, printed pouches, boxes, drawstrings, self-sealing polybags etc. The product will either be sent to the logo printers, or the product and the printed logo will be sent to a third-party service for professional branding.

The printed product packaging is sent to the warehouse and await the product. Clients can have it shipped separately or have us insert the branded products into the custom packaging. As you can see, there are many steps that goes in branding products and that’s why it’s usually required for you to purchase large MOQ’s. We however understand the hustle of entrepreneurs starting out and wanting to bootstrap their e-commerce business and perhaps even test many products. If you would like us to help you with ordering from China and have your products private labelled and looking amazing, click here to complete our form to take the next step.

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