Starting out
How long a first order really takes.
A supplier quotes production time. A first order also contains specification, sampling, approval, registration in your own market, documents, a possible holiday period, loading, a voyage and clearance. Several of those cannot start until the previous one finished, which is why first orders take far longer than the quoted lead time.
Eleven stages.
Written in the order they actually happen. The point of the list is not the durations, which nobody can publish honestly, but which of them a buyer forgets to allow for at all.
- 01
Write the specification
Before approaching anybody. Skipping it does not save time, it moves the time to later where it costs more.
- 02
Find and check candidates
Register checks, questions, shortlisting. Runs in parallel with nothing and it is the stage buyers compress hardest.
- 03
Samples
Collection, shipping, evaluation and possibly a second round. Courier time each way, and this is where weeks go quietly.
- 04
Quote and negotiate
On specification first, price second. A revised specification means a revised quote, so this loops.
- 05
Contract and deposit
Proforma, terms, the account check, the transfer clearing. Days rather than weeks and it does have to finish before the next stage starts.
- 06
First article
One unit under production conditions, shipped, approved in writing. Cannot overlap with the run and buyers skip it to save exactly this time.
- 07
Production
The only stage a supplier's lead time describes.
- 08
Your own market registration
Runs in parallel from the start, and in several markets it takes longer than everything above it combined. Started late, it means a paid-for container in a bonded warehouse.
- 09
Documents
Some issued against the shipment and therefore only at the end, some needing to exist before production. Establishing which is which is early work.
- 10
Inspection and loading
Inspection before sealing, consolidation if several suppliers, and the container waiting for the slowest one.
- 11
Voyage and clearance
Plus any transhipment, plus the domestic leg at the Indonesian end that nobody prices.
What runs in parallel and what cannot.
Registration in your own market can and should start on day one. It depends on the product rather than on the shipment, and it is the single stage most likely to become the critical path if it starts late.
Document mapping can start immediately too. Knowing which certificates have to exist before production is the difference between a smooth shipment and a scramble at loading.
What cannot overlap: sampling before approval, approval before the run, the run before inspection, inspection before loading. That chain is sequential by nature and compressing any link moves the risk rather than the time.
Where the calendar actually breaks.
The Indonesian holiday period, which moves about eleven days earlier each year and closes production for weeks rather than days. A buyer who plans against last year's calendar walks into it.
The second sample round, which is normal and which nobody plans for. Assuming the first sample is right is optimistic on a first order with a new producer.
And the document that had to exist before production. Discovering it at loading is not a delay of days, because the certificate cannot be issued retrospectively for goods already made.
Questions buyers ask.
Can I just ask the supplier how long it takes?
They will tell you the production time honestly, and that is one of eleven stages. It is not evasion, it is that the other ten are not theirs. Build the calendar backwards from when you need the goods and add the stages nobody quoted.
How much buffer should I add?
Enough that an Indonesian holiday period and one repeated sample round both fit inside it without moving your date. On a first order that is more than feels reasonable, and buyers who added it are the ones who did not spend the last month on the phone.
What is the fastest a first order can realistically go?
Faster if the product is something the producer already makes, the packaging is theirs, no registration is required in your market and nothing needs approving. Every one of those conditions you cannot meet adds a stage, and custom anything adds several.
Read next.
How to import from Indonesia
Six steps, and the order of them matters more than the detail. What goes wrong at each, and where to read the detail on products, documents and destinations.
When Indonesia stops working
Idul Fitri, Nyepi and Chinese New Year decide whether an order ships on time. How the holiday decree works and why next year's dates are not real yet.
What a sample actually proves
The narrow question a sample answers, and why the sealed duplicate you never open is worth more than the one you evaluate.
Approving the first piece
One unit made to your specification, approved in writing before the run starts. The last cheap moment in the process.
Export documents, by category
Four categories, four different sets of paperwork and almost no overlap. Built from the reference pages, so it cannot fall behind what is published.
How to read an export quotation
Nine things a quotation has to say before it can be compared to another. What each line means and which absences matter.
What it takes to start
Not a figure, a structure. Which costs come before revenue and how long money is tied up.
Choosing what to import first
Some products are far harder to start with. Which forgive a beginner and which do not.
Sourcing from Indonesia?
Tell us the product, the quantity and the destination. We come back with what it involves before anyone talks about money.