Understand listed prices, MOQs, tiered quotes, Incoterms, shipping costs, and practical ways to negotiate Chinese supplier orders.
Bulk orders are where your real pricing power shows up on Alibaba. A supplier who can't move on a 100-unit order has far more room when you're buying 1,000 or 10,000. The discount is there, waiting to
DDP stands for Delivered Duty Paid, and it's the shipping term that takes the most work off your plate. Under DDP, the supplier is responsible for getting the goods all the way to your door or warehou
The two most common shipping terms on Alibaba are EXW and FOB, and the difference between them decides who pays for each leg of getting your goods to the port. For beginners, EXW sounds simpler until
It's one of the most common shocks for new Alibaba buyers. You find a product listed at a dollar, send an inquiry, and the supplier comes back with a price two or three times higher. The first instinc
Tiered pricing is the pricing system where the per-unit price drops as your order quantity rises. Buy more units, pay less per unit. It's the visual ladder you see under an Alibaba product, a price sh
The honest answer is: you can often still buy, but not the way you pictured. If a supplier's MOQ is far above your quantity, the terms change, or the route changes, rather than the order simply being
It looks absurd at first. You find a product for a dollar and the shipping is six dollars. But the moment you understand what freight actually is, the surprise disappears. Shipping isn't a service you
Negotiating a better price on Alibaba is one of those skills where a handful of proven moves gets you most of the gains. You don't need to be a fluent negotiator, you need to understand what actually
The short answer is: the price on an Alibaba product page is a starting point, not a final quote, and in many cases it's not a price you'll ever actually pay. Treat any listed number as an invitation
MOQ stands for Minimum Order Quantity, and it's the smallest number of units a supplier is willing to make and sell to you at one time. It's the first number you should check on any listing, because i