Many companies have developed a new product and are preparing to start small-scale trial production to test the market before deciding whether to mass-produce it. At this time, how to choose a suitable mold factory is particularly important. I have worked in mold procurement for many years and have come into contact with hundreds of large and small mold factories. Here I summarize my experience and experience over the years and share it with you:
1) Which type of mold factory is better to cooperate with?
Currently, there are many foreign-funded, Taiwanese-funded, Hong Kong-funded, and domestic private mold factories in the Pearl River Delta region to choose from; the advantages and disadvantages of mold factories with various qualifications are compared as follows:
a. Foreign-funded mold factories have standardized management, perfect processes, strong service awareness, and guaranteed quality and service; but the high management and sales costs mean that the mold opening costs will be relatively high; if you are concerned about product quality and the company has strong financial strength, it is recommended to choose a large-scale foreign-funded mold factory! But in the reality of the industry, generally large-scale foreign-funded mold factories have fixed foreign customers and rarely accept orders from domestic companies; even if they accept orders from domestic companies, the quotation is often in line with the international market. Many domestic finished product companies cannot afford it. A set of precision large-scale automobile molds can easily cost hundreds of thousands or millions of yuan, which is also the direct reason why many domestic finished product companies are discouraged!
b. The management and process standardization of Taiwan-funded and Hong Kong-funded mold factories is slightly worse than that of foreign-funded mold factories. The on-site process guidance documents and personnel configuration are not as complete as those of foreign-funded mold factories. However, due to the early industrial development in Taiwan, Hong Kong and other places, they have been influenced by foreign capital for decades earlier than mainland enterprises. Their standardized management and design concepts are closer to those of foreign-funded enterprises in Japan, South Korea, Europe and the United States. Their quality and service are slightly inferior to those of foreign-funded mold factories, but they are still guaranteed. The price is moderate and not as high as that of foreign-funded mold factories. Therefore, some powerful domestic finished product companies prefer to choose Taiwan-funded and Hong Kong-funded mold factories with complete supporting facilities as long-term mold partners.
c. Most of the domestic private mold factories were founded by the first batch of people who entered foreign-funded enterprises and came into contact with the mold industry after China's reform and opening up. They can be regarded as the rising stars of the mold industry. At present, there are many such domestic private mold factories in the Pearl River Delta and Yangtze River Delta regions of mainland China. Most of these mold factories have insufficient start-up capital and limited financing channels. Many factories rely only on the limited salary income from working as the original investment capital. Compared with the above two types of enterprises, they have obvious shortcomings in hardware equipment, management process, design concept, business philosophy, quality awareness, etc. Many domestic mold factories even choose to purchase second-hand processing equipment with low performance and precision and second-line Class B materials to make molds and products. The rationality of their mold design, production accuracy, mold life and product reliability often fail to meet customer requirements; but this type of enterprise has an inherent biggest advantage, because the material cost and management and sales cost are low, and the mold price and product price quoted by them are definitely cheaper than those of foreign-funded, Taiwanese and Hong Kong-funded enterprises, which often attracts the attention of many mold purchasers.
(2) What scale of mold factory is better to cooperate with? Large scale, medium scale or small scale?
The choice in this regard depends on the situation. If we only consider the scale of the factory, everyone will definitely give priority to the larger the scale, the better, because the larger the scale, the stronger the strength and the more complete the supporting facilities! The size of the scale also indirectly reflects the degree of selection by customers! But on the other hand, the larger the scale, the higher the management cost, and the price advantage will not be very obvious. In particular, the prices of large foreign-funded mold factories are difficult to accept, and even exceed the cost of our quotation to customers. Whether the mold factory you choose regards you as an important customer, that is, whether it values you, is very critical. In fact, finding a supplier is like finding a partner, and you also need to pay attention to the right family. If your own enterprise's financial strength is not strong and the purchase volume is not large, you will blindly choose a large-scale mold factory to cooperate. Sometimes, the money is spent and the other party does not take you seriously. At present, many large mold factories do not accept or are not responsible for small orders because of this mentality, because you cannot meet their requirements in terms of order amount or order quantity, which will make you feel like you are touching someone's cold butt with a hot face, hahaha! This metaphor may not be appropriate, but it is also more appropriate and realistic.
In this case, most people will choose a small or medium-sized mold factory. In fact, everyone in the industry is generally doing this. After all, the prices of molds and products are more acceptable, and it is also easy to explain to the superiors. But soon you will find that the worrying things are coming again. Can the mold be completed on time and with quality? How about the mass production of the mold? How about the life of the mold? At this time, it is recommended that you must pay attention to a basic common sense, that is, you must choose a mold factory with complete supporting equipment, which is what we usually call "all internal organs", that is, it must have supporting precision CNC machining centers, slow wire cutting, EDM mirror spark machines, high-speed and high-precision injection molding machines, three-dimensional, two-dimensional measuring instruments and other important mold processing, production, and testing equipment. This must be the key to the investigation, evaluation and final selection; because if the above equipment is not available, it means that the mold factory needs to seek outsourcing processing during the mold manufacturing and production process. There are three main adverse consequences of doing so: first, your mold opening cost will increase, and the cost will increase; second, During the outsourcing process, the mold factory needs time to communicate and coordinate the transfer of workpieces repeatedly, which will prolong the mold delivery cycle and easily cause mold and product delays. Although the relevant penalty clauses for delays will be stated in the purchase agreement or contract, once a delay occurs, the fine cannot make up for the company's actual and long-term losses, which will make the purchasing staff feel uncomfortable and be chased and scolded by people every day. It's embarrassing. The most fatal point is the third point. The entire outsourcing process of the mold factory cannot be monitored in time. The processing is often undertaken by roadside processing shops that are smaller than the mold factory and have only one or two second-hand equipment. "Standardized management, process control, quality awareness, etc." are all clouds! Many molds that look good on the outside will be deformed, scrapped in advance before reaching the service life, run away, and some cannot even be mass-produced at all because of the carelessness, barbaric operation, repeated welding and other means and processing methods of these roadside processing shops! It's too painful! Therefore, I warn you not to blindly covet low prices and fall into the trap of these bad mold manufacturers!
(3) How to effectively reduce the cost of purchasing molds?
Personally, I think that we should first ask the marketing department about the expected order volume of the new product. Is it huge? In the development and review stage of the new product, if the expected order volume does not reach more than 500,000, it is recommended not to harden the mold, but directly open the soft mold, which is what we usually call the test mold. The cost of the soft mold is lower. If the market response is not good, some unnecessary costs of opening a hard mold can be saved; if the sales market of the product is opened in the later stage and the demand for the product increases dramatically, the second set of hard molds, that is, the copy mold, can be opened at any time during the mass production of the first set of molds. This will not affect the production and shipment progress of the product. There is also a more obvious advantage: during the opening of the first set of molds, the mold factory will summarize a set of design and production experience, which will be greatly improved when the second set of molds are opened. Good space, even if you don't ask for it, the mold factory will undoubtedly take the initiative to do it, because this will help them avoid detours and make the replica mold more perfect. On the other hand, if you start to make hard molds from the beginning of the product project without knowing the expected order volume of the product, it will only increase your mold procurement cost by at least 1/3. In addition, the mold cost needs to be taken into account during the engineering design stage. For example, using S136H, NAK80 and other steel materials as the mold core and using fine sprue mold base for the injection method will increase the mold cost to varying degrees. Of course, if the product requirements are high or the customer specifies the material and process to be used, it will be an exception.
(4) Finally, to summarize, to choose a suitable mold factory, you must pay attention to the following points:
a. Don't blindly believe in low purchase prices. As the saying goes: you get what you pay for. Behind low prices, there are often some unknown traps, either inferior products or shoddy work. You must know that any mold factory has to pay rent, water and electricity, support workers, and make profits? b. You must find a mold factory with complete supporting equipment, preferably a mold factory with Taiwan or Hong Kong capital and medium scale or above. I once had this lesson when I was doing procurement. At that time, I chose a small domestic mold factory because of the price. The entire mold department of this factory had only dozens of people, and there was not even a CNC. Other mechanical equipment was not complete, and the only few equipment were some old equipment that were patched together. In the end, the mold was made by them, but it was not mass-produced after repairs. My colleagues in the engineering department and I worked hard for several nights and returned in vain. I was also deducted all the performance bonuses for that month because of developing this mold factory. It was really unbearable to look back! ! !
c. Finally, it is recommended that you comprehensively consider the situation and characteristics of your own factory when choosing a mold factory, and make an objective assessment of the mold and product demand positioning with various departments of the company before making a reasonable choice, which may achieve a more satisfactory effect!
