Top 5 Tips for Choosing a Product Sourcing Company Your Go-To Guide for Supplier Risk Mitigation | Page 4

As independent verification of standards, these are useful but make sure that
these are still within the validity period, they are verifiable by the governing
bodies (not fakes) and are evident on any visits.
4. Visit the site and meet the management
Sounds simple, but we have seen many businesses pay suppliers without visiting
the site and spending long enough with the management team. Understand their
product expertise and manufacturing capability and what drives the management
team (for example, is ethics important).
A lot of these can be addressed by having some kind of local presence on the
ground, with staff who can speak the language and visit the factory to make sure
that all is in order. We have seen factories change the signs on the side of the
building as soon as the potential client leaves! Not a good omen.
Onboarding a Supplier
This is where we see a number of companies making mistakes when
implementing a direct sourcing strategy. Any risk mitigation strategy has to be