18 Tips: Managing Chinese New Year Shutdown

Some tips for planning for Chinese new year shutdown for importers in a year heavily disrupted by Covid-19.
Even if you don’t import from China, remember that suppliers all across Asia are highly likely to buy components from China. Therefore, they too could be impacted by a supplier further up the chain.
Remember, The earlier you begin planning, the better you will be.

Planning related

1. Some suppliers are still accepting orders over shutdown this time. Check with them once.
2. Confirm from your suppliers if manufacturing lead times will be longer in the run up to shut down because of increased orders.
3. Check different constraints such as minimum order quantities or batch sizes in run up to shut down.
4. Check if shipping times will be longer because of increased freight volumes.
5. Check if you have the warehouse capacity to handle your increased planned orders.
6. Check how much external storage you need. Negotiate terms please!

Internal Team alignment related

1. Check if you have sensible forecasts for any new products that you are planning on launching during the affected period.
2. Check the likely impact of any promotions planned for Spring 2021 with the sales & Marketing team.
3. Make an inward deliveries calendar and inform all relevant stakeholders
4. Heads up to warehousing and operations team to have resources in place to handle the additional volume once inventory is in warehouse.
5. Check with finance if there are any immediate budgetary restrictions.
6. Take into account different MOQs according to product lifecycle (if you plan to withdraw from the range or if any product may become obsolete, ensure you are ordering lesser)
7. Relook at the YoY performance base. Modify the forecast to take account of Covid related demand surges or troughs.
8. Validate your forecasts beyond the ordering horizon which includes shutdown.
9. Check the quality assurance process at your supplier. Having a quality management and thorough inspection plan in place will drastically reduce the risks of a delayed shipment due to quality issues.
10. Check which products quantities can’t be supplied due to supplier constraints. Ensure that you have the buy in of the business on how to reduce the order quantities.
11. Check with finance team for cash flow constraints.
12. Build alternative suppliers.