How a visit works.

A buyer learns more in three hours on a floor than in three months of correspondence. This is what a visit here looks like, so you can decide whether it is worth the flight.

The route

We start at the materials store, then walk cutting, closing, lasting, finishing and packing in the order a shoe travels, and end in the meeting room with whatever you have written down. It takes about half a day at a comfortable pace, and it is the working floor on a working day. Nothing is staged, and we would rather you came on a busy one.

What to look at

Look at the queues between benches, not the machines. Look at whether inspection stations are occupied or decorative. Look at how components are stored and labelled, and at whether the floor is tidy in the corners a tour does not usually reach. Look at the people: whether they look at you, and whether anyone seems to be performing.

Watch the corners a tour does not go to. That is the honest part of any factory.

Questions worth asking

How long have the closing machinists been here. What was the last order that went wrong and what changed afterwards. What is the current defect rate at final inspection and how is it recorded. Which of these lines could run my style tomorrow, and what would have to change. Any supplier can answer the first question well; the honest ones answer the second one.

Practicalities

The plant is in Thuận An, Bình Dương, about an hour from central Ho Chi Minh City depending on traffic, and we can collect you. Closed shoes, no special clothing needed, and photographs are fine outside the areas where a customer’s unreleased styles are on the bench. If a trip is not possible, a live video walk covers most of it.

Ask for the visit before you ask for the quotation. It changes what the quotation means.