What a wholesale sourcing brief has to contain before quotes are comparable: SKUs, specifications, carton marking, market paperwork and a reorder baseline.
One line per SKU, not one line per product family
Distribution orders go wrong at the level of the variant. A product described as available in four colours becomes four separate specifications the moment one of them uses a different material, a different pack quantity or a different carton size. Give every sellable variant its own row with its own code, its own inner and outer pack quantity, and its own barcode. The list you send out to quote should be the same list you later inspect against and reorder from, because a quotation structured differently from your stock file has to be re-keyed by someone, and that is where a variant quietly disappears.
- A row per sellable variant with your own SKU code
- Inner and outer pack quantities stated per variant
- The same list used to quote, to inspect and to reorder
State what the price is assumed to include
Two quotes are only comparable when they cover the same obligations, and the usual differences are not in the unit price at all. Name the Incoterm with a named place and the rule version, since a term without a place is incomplete. Say what packaging is included, whether the price assumes your artwork or the factory's generic packing, what the payment terms are, and what the quoted lead time is measured from — deposit received, artwork approved or materials in house are three very different starting guns. Build the landed cost yourself rather than accepting a single delivered figure you cannot take apart.
- Incoterm, named place and rule version on every quotation
- Packaging, payment terms and what starts the lead-time clock
- A landed cost you assembled, not a delivered number you cannot split
Carton marking and packing decided before production
Carton specification is the part buyers leave until last and then pay for repeatedly. Decide the units per inner and per outer, the carton dimensions and gross weight, the marking on each face, the pallet pattern if you palletise, and any market-specific labelling your own compliance requires. These figures also feed your freight booking, so a discrepancy between the declared and actual dimensions turns into a billing adjustment later. Where a requirement exists because of your market rather than the product, say so explicitly — a factory shipping the same item to domestic wholesalers has never had to apply it.
- Units per inner and outer, carton dimensions and gross weight
- Marking on each face, plus pallet pattern where relevant
- Market-specific labelling written as a spec line, not as a link
The paperwork your own side will need
A distributor's file is not only the invoice. Decide before shipment which documents you will need on arrival and who produces each one: the commercial invoice and packing list, the product description accurate enough for your broker to work from, any test reports or declarations your market requires, and the records that let you trace a batch if a customer complains. We describe the goods truthfully and pass the supplier's documents to you or to your customs broker. We do not give tariff classification, duty or clearance opinions — the classification decision is your broker's to make, and a supplier's guess at it is not a determination.
- Agree the document set and its owner before the goods move
- An accurate product description is not a classification
- Tariff, duty and clearance questions go to your own broker
Record the first accepted order as the baseline
Repeat business is the whole point of a distribution range, and the mechanism that makes it repeatable is unglamorous: the first delivery you were happy with becomes the reference for every later one. That means a sealed sample, a written specification, the approved packaging and the carton figures, kept together and checked against on each subsequent order rather than compared with the last shipment. Standards fall one acceptable step at a time when each batch is only measured against the batch before it.
- Sealed sample and written specification from the first accepted order
- Approved packaging and carton figures stored with them
- Each order checked against the baseline, not against the previous delivery
Authoritative references
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