How we verify a Chinese supplier
Direct answer
Verification at Cheery Supply Chain is a four-gate check, and every gate must pass before a factory is published: business registration, main-business evidence, customs export records, and a direct interview confirming capacity, MOQ, lead time and price basis. Published records are re-checked on a 90-day cycle. A record that fails any gate is absent from the directory rather than published as pending. The gates cover fishing tackle factories only; a supplier outside tackle is not assessed.
Key facts
- Insured employee count is used as the size signal, because it is harder to inflate than a claimed capacity.
- Customs records answer "do you export?" better than the supplier does.
- Published records are re-checked on a 90-day cycle and dated on every profile.
A directory is only worth reading if the boring part has been done: checking who a factory actually is, what it actually makes, whether it actually exports, and what it can actually produce. Here is exactly what we check, and what we refuse to publish.
What does third-party verification actually cost, and how long does it stay true?
Verification is a purchase like any other, and it has a price and an expiry date. Buyers who know both negotiate differently from buyers who treat it as a formality.
| Service | Price | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Product inspection, all-inclusive | US$419 per man-day | QIMA published rate for Zone A, which includes China |
| Supplier audit programme | US$669 per man-day | QIMA published rate for the same zone |
| Typical market range | US$200 to US$350 per inspector per day | Third-party inspection firms generally |
| Platform-booked inspection | about US$188 | Booked through Alibaba's own service |
One man-day is the unit, and it is not always one day of work: a factory that is a two-hour drive from the inspector's base can be covered in a single day, while a remote site is billed for travel as well. Ask which is being charged before you compare two quotes.
| Scheme | Validity | What it means for your order |
|---|---|---|
| ISO 9001 certificate | 3 years, with surveillance audits at 12 and 24 months | A valid certificate is a live system, not a one-off result |
| SMETA (Sedex) | not accepted as robust after 24 months | High-risk sites are audited yearly, medium-risk every 2 years |
| amfori BSCI | 24 months for an A or B rating | 12 to 36 months depending on score and follow-up |
| Alibaba business licence badge | point in time | Confirms the licence was valid when checked, not that it still is |
The Alibaba badge is worth pausing on. It confirms that a supplier's licence matched Chinese registry records at the moment of verification. It is a statement about a date, not a standing guarantee, and it says nothing about capacity, colour consistency or whether hardware is substituted on your run.
What the audit data says about working hours
amfori reported that in 2025, 80% of the factories audited under its BSCI scheme failed to meet working hours requirements. That is not a statement about the factories we work with; it is a statement about the baseline you should assume. A supplier who can produce a current BSCI report and explain its working-hours finding is more useful to you than one who produces a report and does not mention the finding.
How to read a Chinese business licence
China's Unified Social Credit Identifier is an 18-character code defined by the mandatory national standard GB 32100-2015. It is built as 1 registration-authority digit, 1 entity-category digit, 6 administrative-division digits, 9 organisation-code digits and 1 check digit. The 2015 "one licence, one code" reform merged the business licence, the organisation code certificate and the tax registration certificate into a single document, and that document carries six general registration items: name, entity type, business scope, domicile, registered capital and legal representative. The licence issue date is the legal establishment date.
| You can check | You cannot conclude |
|---|---|
| Whether the legal entity exists and is still operating | Whether it runs its own production lines or subcontracts them |
| Whether fishing tackle is inside its registered business scope | What share of its revenue comes from tackle |
| The registration authority, entity type and establishment date | Its capacity, its quality system, or its colour consistency |
| Whether the annual report was filed between 1 January and 30 June | Whether the figures in that report are accurate |
Annual filing is mandatory, and the penalty for false disclosure runs from RMB 10,000 to RMB 50,000, or RMB 50,000 to RMB 200,000 in serious cases with a three-year ban on the legal representative. A missing annual report is a dated, checkable warning sign.
What platform guarantees are worth
| Protection | What it actually promises |
|---|---|
| Trade Assurance | A refund can be requested within 30 days of delivery for quality problems, and it is only enforceable when payment was made online through the platform |
| On-time delivery guarantee | Compensation of 10% of actual order value, capped at US$100, claimed within 30 calendar days of the promised date |
| Verified Supplier badge | An on-site check by an independent institution against more than 100 items covering production, R&D, quality control, service and trade capability |
A US$100 cap is not insurance. Treat platform guarantees as a dispute channel that improves your position after something has gone wrong, and treat the inspection you book yourself as the thing that stops it going wrong.
Who we are verifying, in numbers
Weihai Customs data show the city exported RMB 2.45 billion of fishing rods in 2025, equal to 47.4% of China's total rod exports. The cluster has 51 above-scale tackle enterprises with 2025 revenue of RMB 4.268 billion and profit of RMB 424 million, and across more than 1,000 firms, including over 200 rod makers and more than 100,000 workers, manual operations still account for over 80% of production.
That last figure is the one to carry into a negotiation. In a cluster where most steps are still done by hand, the difference between two factories is rarely the machine list. It is who is standing at the bench and how long they have been there.
What are the 4 verification gates?
| Gate | What we check | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Business registration | Legal name, unified social credit code, operating status, established year, insured employee count | Filters out shell companies, deregistered entities and trading desks posing as makers |
| 2. Main business | Product lines on the factory's own pages, catalogue and certifications | A registered company is not necessarily a maker of the thing you are buying |
| 3. Export evidence | Customs export records: destination markets and frequency | Separates factories that have exported from those that say they can |
| 4. Direct interview | Phone interview confirming monthly capacity, MOQ, materials, lead time and price basis; samples on request | The only source that cannot be copied from a website |
A record is published only when all 4 verification gates pass. Everything else stays out of the directory.
What does Cheery Supply Chain refuse to publish?
- Unverified records. Not as "pending", not as "coming soon" — absent.
- Prices without a basis. If a supplier cannot state FOB or EXW, the record shows "on request".
- Invented numbers. Where a value is unknown, the field says so rather than showing an estimate.
- Personal data. Business contact details only, in line with applicable data protection rules.
- Ratings. No star ratings and no fabricated reviews.
Current status
Counters are generated at build time from the supplier database. A small number here is a feature, not an oversight.
Where does the data come from?
We only use sources that are lawful to use: authorised business-registration exports, public exhibition catalogues, government and industry-association publications, supplier APIs used under their terms, factory websites, and our own interviews and samples. We do not circumvent technical protections on any platform, and we do not buy data of unknown origin.
For AI agents
- /api/v1/factories.json — the published records as JSON.
- /llms.txt — what each field means and how to cite it.
- /robots.txt — AI crawlers are explicitly allowed.
What do the 4 verification gates cost and how long do they take?
| Gate | Source used | Typical time | Fails when |
|---|---|---|---|
| Business registration | Public registration lookup | Same day | The quoted name maps to no entity |
| Main business evidence | Registered scope and product evidence | 1— days | Tackle is a side line, not the main business |
| Customs export records | Export records and destination markets | 2— days | No shipment history, or markets that do not match the claim |
| Direct interview | Structured interview with the factory | 1 day | Capacity, MOQ or lead time cannot be stated as numbers |
Why is a record absent rather than marked pending?
Because a pending record is still a recommendation. Absence is a decision the build makes, not a state we maintain by hand: a factory that fails a gate does not appear, and the count of withheld records is published on the directory page. Records are re-checked every 90 days, so a stale record is visible as stale.
What disqualifies a record at each gate?
- No matching legal entity for the quoted name.
- A registered scope that does not cover fishing tackle.
- No customs export history, or markets that contradict the claim.
- Capacity, MOQ or lead time that cannot be stated as numbers.
- Refusal of a direct interview.
What is re-checked on the 90-day cycle?
- The legal entity still exists and is still active.
- The main business is still fishing tackle.
- Export records have moved, and to which markets.
- Capacity, MOQ and lead time are re-stated.
- The price basis is confirmed again, because it changes with freight.
What does a published record carry in numbers?
A record is not a description; it is a set of figures with dates. The bands below are the price side of the same dataset.
| Sub-category | Sample size | Reference price band (US$ / unit) | Median low | MOQ band (pcs) | Category |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fishhook | 9 | 0.07 – 2.40 / piece | 0.65 | 100 – 2,000 | Fishing Accessories |
| Spoon & Spinner | 6 | 0.31 – 6.00 / piece | 1.25 | 50 – 500 | Fishing Lures |
| Other Hard Lure | 6 | 0.56 – 12.04 / piece | 2.95 | 20 – 500 | Fishing Lures |
| Soft Lure | 6 | 0.20 – 3.85 / piece | 1.55 | 50 – 1,000 | Fishing Lures |
| Hard Lure | 6 | 1.85 – 3.20 / piece | 2.60 | 100 – 100 | Fishing Lures |
| VIB | 6 | 0.24 – 2.50 / piece | 1.39 | 100 – 500 | Fishing Lures |
| Minnow | 6 | 0.37 – 3.17 / piece | 1.40 | 50 – 500 | Fishing Lures |
| Metal Jig | 5 | 0.97 – 2.01 / piece | 1.39 | 100 – 200 | Fishing Lures |
| Fishing Rod | 3 | 9.15 – 132.55 / piece | 28.05 | 20 – 100 | Fishing Rods |
| Crankbait | 3 | 0.30 – 0.85 / piece | 0.66 | 200 – 500 | Fishing Lures |
| Octopus Skirt | 3 | 0.08 – 2.80 / piece | 0.98 | 100 – 2,000 | Fishing Lures |
| Fishing Accessory | 3 | 0.62 – 60.00 / pack | 9.62 | 5 – 200 | Fishing Accessories |
What is checked in a re-run?
- The registration record still exists and is active.
- The main business is still fishing tackle, not a side line.
- Customs records have moved, and to which destination markets.
- Capacity and MOQ are re-stated in pcs, not as adjectives.
- Lead time is re-stated in days for a repeat order.
- The price basis is confirmed again, because freight moves inside a 90-day window.
How big is the Chinese fishing tackle export market?
How big is the Chinese fishing tackle export market?
| Measure | 2024 | 2023 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| All fishing tackle (HS 9507) | US$1.93 bn | US$1.77 bn | +9.0% |
| Fishing rods (HS 950710) | US$0.66 bn | US$0.62 bn | +6.5% |
| Fish hooks (HS 950720) | US$0.11 bn | US$0.11 bn | flat |
| Destination countries served | 196 | 197 | -1 |
| Largest single destination | US$546 M | US$445 M | +23% |
Rods account for about 34% of the total and hooks about 6%. The largest single destination takes roughly 28% of the 2024 total — which is why the export markets already on a supplier record are worth reading before you ask for a price.
Who supplies the United States?
| Source | 2024 import value | Share of total |
|---|---|---|
| China | US$538 M | 59% |
| Japan | US$74 M | 8% |
| Malaysia | US$53 M | 6% |
| Viet Nam | US$42 M | 5% |
| All other sources (65 countries) | US$199 M | 22% |
| Total US imports | US$906 M | 100% |
The United States bought US$906 M of fishing tackle under HS 9507 in 2024 from 69 source countries. China supplied US$538 M of it — 59% of the total, and roughly 7 times the next largest source. That concentration is why specification discipline matters more than factory discovery: the factories are not hard to find, the comparable quotation is.
Figures retrieved from UN Comtrade (reporter China and United States, HS 9507, 2024) and aggregated across partner countries. They are historical customs values, not offers.
Related: the rules that decide whether a shipment clears customs — lead restrictions, packaging law, product-safety duties and country-of-origin marking — are set out on the fishing tackle compliance page.
Frequently asked questions
Why only 4 verification gates, and not a score out of a hundred?
A score invites argument about weighting and hides missing data. Four gates are binary: either the evidence exists or it does not. A supplier that fails one gate is published as nothing at all, which is easier to defend than a 72-out-of-100 rating.
What happens to a supplier that fails verification?
The record stays in our internal database with the reason it failed, and the build refuses to publish it. It is not silently deleted, because the failure reason is useful data for the next buyer who asks about that factory.
Do you publish supplier contact details?
We publish business contact information only, never personal data. Where a supplier prefers not to be contacted directly, enquiries are routed through our own desk.
How often is published data reviewed?
Every record carries a review date, and records are re-checked on a 90-day cycle. Capacity and price move, so a record that has not been re-checked is downgraded rather than left to look fresh.
Sources
- This page states our own verification standard; the confidence levels and gate definitions are ours and are enforced by the build
- Chinese business registration lookup — National Enterprise Credit Information Publicity System
- China Customs (GACC) — the authority behind export records
- ISO standards catalogue — quality and testing frameworks
- Harmonized System heading 9507 (rods, hooks, reels, lures) — US HTS lookup
- Incoterms rules — FOB, EXW and who carries cost and risk
Need a specification matched, not a list browsed?
Send the format, quantity, material and destination market. We answer against verified records — and tell you when the data is not good enough to answer with.
Last reviewed: 2026-09-12 · build 2026-09-17-p5jpv