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Buying From China

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Buying From China

At eTech Parts, we know your time is an incredibly valuable resource. Time is the most precious resource you have at your disposal - which is why we do everything we can to make running a small business repair shop as easy as possible. We do the late night negotiating with Chinese vendors so our customers can quickly and easily get their parts without losing any sleep.     Anyone can buy from China, but not everyone has the time or patience for it. When purchasing replacement iPhone parts from China there are a lot of factors that come into play… international shipping charges and wait times, dealing with customs, the quality of the product you’ll receive, trusting new vendors will ship the quality of product you paid for, building relations with international vendors, and the time put into quality control and returns. Handling the bulk of that is what our business is built on and over the past six years eTech Parts has gotten pretty good at it.   China   Many of our customers have stated the reason they purchase from eTech Parts is because we're so easy to deal with; some of these same business owners have told us they simply don't have the time to dedicate to purchasing parts from China - and we're betting they're not alone. There are so many factors that go into purchasing parts from overseas vendors, so many that we've discussed this previously on our blog. But once again we must ask the question: how much are you really saving?  

Quality

Quality will always be a concern for repair shop owners as the quality of repair parts can greatly affect the success of a small business repair shop. Finding premium quality parts in China isn't difficult the first time, but finding a vendor who can maintain that same level of quality over a span of time can be tricky. Vendors might offer their best stuff the first couple months, but the level of quality may falter or diminish as time goes on. This can happen for many reasons, but oftentimes this is caused by a bad batch of parts and a lack of communication between vendor and customer. You find out pretty quickly the importance of building relationships with overseas vendors and the power of negotiation. Quality control can be a very time consuming job for business owners ordering parts from China. While there will always be some defective parts, we've heard horror stories (and have had some trying experiences ourselves) of shop owners receiving orders full of defective parts and not being able to return most or any of it. Sometimes vendors have strict return policies and won't accept much of the returned product, which is another great reason to build strong relationships with your vendors. Having a strong and open relationship with your vendors is key to avoiding serious pitfalls while purchasing repair parts, especially when doing business overseas.   ??????  

Time

Time is money, right? Wrong - time is much more valuable than money. Time is a precious resource and just imagine how much of your time it would take to find a reliable vendor, speak to said vendor (usually in the middle of the night), negotiate on price, verify quality of product, wire money to the vendor... And then you wait. Sometimes we have to wait up to 7 days for parts to arrive after ordering them in bulk, though we properly manage our time and inventory to decrease the chance of running out of stock during that time. Business owners who are new to purchasing overseas might not be prepared to wait a week or more for their order to arrive, which could lead to the worst case scenario of missing out on business. How valuable is your time? Well you could use this nifty calculator to find out but all you really have to do is ask yourself: is your precious time worth saving $1.50 per iPhone screen? We like to think it's much more valuable than that.    bottom line  

The Bottom Line

Bargaining over dollars and cents when you could instead be focusing on growing your business can greatly affect your bottom line. While there are many ways to cut costs and save money in business, your time as a repair shop owner might be better spent searching for ways to bring money and customers in the door. Wholesale companies like eTech Parts realize that margins are slim and every penny counts, but it's different for repair shop owners. Repair shops make a lot more money on the parts and services offered in shop so striving to make more money can often be more beneficial than striving to spend less. We understand the business owner who started his/her own repair shop and feels it's their duty to bargain and purchase parts straight from the source. We understand the do-it-yourself state of mind and we love seeing that trait in our customers! But just think of all the things you could do with that precious slice of time if you let someone else do the hard work for you. Let someone else source the quality parts you need, negotiate pricing until 3am, and deal with customs claims. Let someone else do the hard work for you and you'll suddenly find time to do all the things on your to-do list you've been putting off. Like learning that new repair, or focusing on a marketing campaign, or growing your social media presence. eTech Parts is committed to offering top quality replacement parts and the best customer service to repair shops across the country. We want to be your supply chain, a one-stop shop to make it easy for you to get your parts and run your repair shop the right way. We want to be your partner in repair - you can join our growing Repair Community by liking us on Facebook, following us on Instagram and subscribing to our YouTube channel as well. We're always looking for new and better ways to help your repair shop and to help the repair industry grow.