A Different Sourcing Company

Sourcing Nova’s story begins in 2005.  Five friends graduated from high school and set off for Shenzen, the fastest growing city in southern China, looking for employment and to start careers.  All five had solid ideas of their future – three turned to international trade and two entered the third-party logistics field.  Their goal was to gain success based on their solid education and stellar work ethic.

 

By 2008, the five realized their dream was just that – a dream.  They were all under the impression hard work would yeild success.  However, China’s workplace is different.  The bureaucracy of the workplace means no matter how hard you try and put forth effort, it is rare to be rewarded for such.

 

If your work efforts and ethics supercede others in the workplace, it is common to find yourself the target of office politics, shaming and mistreatment.  Should this happen, the best solution is to find other employment.

 

Such was the case with the three in the international trade industry.  All three cut their losses and went into business for themselves, specializing in finding manufacturers for international customers.  The trio were doing all of the services of a sourcing agency without realizing it.  They selected the name SOHO – Small Office/Home Office – before coming to the realization they were sourcing agents.

 

By this point, one of the five were still in third-party logistics, one, previously in third-party logistics, had left and was working in the e-commerce industry and one was building websites, data analysis and Internet marketing.  The last of the five was in logistics, taking care of international freight for the other four friends.

 

The five came together again in 2018 and began to share their combined experiences.  They all came to a similar conclusion: China is no longer the world’s leader of low-end, shoddy products.  There was a shift.

 

The five were dealing with customers, who, on a regular basis, were sourcing high-end, quality products with good profit margins.  The five all came to the same conclusion: They could start a business finding high quality products with excellent profit margins for international customers.

 

This was a great idea on paper, but the five faced a serious problem.  They were all skilled in their individual industries but looking for products in different industries was new and different.  What to do?

 

Their solution: The details are secondary to what is important – finding the best manufacturers in chosen industries so customers will have the finest products available.  Again, solid on paper, but how to find the manufacturers?

 

The five started with two important pieces of data.  The three who were working in procurement worked data analysis.  They would buy and read industry reports and white papers.  This way they learned about the industrial clusters within China and the best manufacturers in other industries.

 

The other two, familiar with logistics, used the data to verify each manufacturer within their network.

 

If you are in the U.S. or Europe, you are not likely to understand the sublties of Chinese business, specifically, guanxi, loosely translated as “business relationships.”  One of the two has worked extensively with China’s largest port – Shenzen Yantian Port.  His experience means a stellar understanding in industrial clusters and Chinese manufacturing.

 

The five solved the issue of finding top manufacturers and began to address the second issue: How to leverage these manufacturers into providing custom products for our customer base?

 

There was a period of trial and error.  Their solution was to start small with only a few leading manufacturers and industries and plans to add more as the company grows.  In fact, if you are a leading Chinese manufacturer, please leave contact information.  We would love to speak with you about future partnerships.

 

Move forward to 2019.  We have all looked carefully at China’s industrial base, read industry reports and been to industry expos and fairs.

 

In 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic had the team working from home.  It was during this time the website came to fruition and was successfully published.

 

In 2021, Sourcing Nova went live as a new sourcing company.