China textile wholesale for B2B buyers

In European textile wholesale you usually buy goods that have already been imported. Someone else chose the factory, paid the freight, cleared customs and added a margin before you saw the article in a catalogue. That is quick. Who sewed the shirts, however, you rarely find out, and when something is wrong nobody talks to the factory directly.

We take the opposite route. Your order goes to a producer our team in China knows personally, and that is where we negotiate the best possible price. For you it stays at one German contract, one invoice, one DDP delivery and one European contact. The chain of intermediaries you never see drops out.

DS Trading is a German company from Hamburg. Our co-founder Felix Sander works in China with a whole team that comes from sourcing and knows more than 100 producers personally, from teamwear specialists to factories that make polos, T-shirts and hoodies from cutting to packing. If you want to know how a producer stores blank goods or which fabric goes into your 190 g shirt, our team checks on site.

For many buyers, importing from China is a black box, especially with large quantities. With us, one European contact goes through the whole project with you and makes it happen. They get in touch on their own, with the production status, with the loading date and openly when something is not going to plan. Your trust comes first for us: with a quality problem we talk to you immediately and come by in person.

On price we are usually below sourcing yourself or other sourcing agencies. We have the step in China and the step in Germany in our own hands, check both sides and choose the cheaper option each time, from the factory to the freight route. With the producers we negotiate the best possible price for your quantity tier. You get DDP delivery and an invoice from Germany.

One focus of our wholesale business is blank goods: unprinted T-shirts, hoodies and polos that textile finishers, print shops and merch suppliers print or embroider themselves. For these buyers, other things count than for a fashion label. The goods must take finishing cleanly and turn out the same with every reorder.

For T-shirts the range goes from light basics at around 160 g/m² and regular-fit shirts at 190 g/m² to oversized shirts at 240 g/m², each in 100% cotton and EU sizes. Hoodies are usually between 300 and 400 g/m². We clarify in advance whether the shirt should have side seams or be knitted as a tube, and whether it comes with a neck label, a tear-away label or no label at all. If you sew or print your own label, you need a shirt without a fixed label or with a tear-away one.

Unit prices fall as quantities rise, and at many producers the largest sizes cost a little more. We show both in the quote per size and per quantity tier. That way you see before ordering how a size split with many XXL or 3XL pieces affects the total.

We also plan the packing around your further processing. Shirts can come individually bagged or bundled in tens, sorted by size and colour, with carton labels that show content and size. That saves time at goods receipt and at the printing press.

Besides blank goods, we supply clothing and accessories to your specification: knitwear such as T-shirts and hoodies, wovens such as jeans and shirts, sportswear, underwear, baby clothing, footwear, bags and caps. Further categories run through our producer network. So ask about articles that are not listed here as well.

Which duty rate applies follows from category, material, construction and origin. A cotton shirt is classified differently from a polyester one, and a knitted jacket differently from a woven one. We look up the code for every order in the EU TARIC database and do not work with a flat rate. National taxes are considered separately.

The minimum order is 300 pieces. That lets you test a new article without tying up capital in 1,000 pieces nobody has bought yet. Blank goods for finishers usually involve much larger quantities, and there the quantity tiers are worth a close look.

Before the series you receive a sample of the actual article; for blank goods that means the shirt in the fabric, cut and colour of the later delivery. This lets you test in advance how it prints. Sample and shipping are charged, and the amount is fixed beforehand. We only produce after your written approval.

Our quote gives a landed cost per unit. It contains the FOB price, freight, duty, import VAT, transport insurance if you want it, and delivery. You pay 60% on signing the contract and the remaining 40% as soon as the shipping document, meaning bill of lading or air waybill, is available.

Stock goods from a wholesaler arrive tomorrow, while production in China needs lead time. Depending on the article, production takes a few days to about four weeks, and unprinted basics are among the quicker articles. Then comes transport including customs and delivery: by sea expect 50 to 65 days until DDP delivery, by air about 15 days, by express usually about 5 days.

Around Chinese New Year there can be delays, because many producers plan their capacity well before the festival. Goods for spring are therefore better ordered a little earlier. Ahead of your own peak season, a delay can often only be made up by air freight, which changes your landed cost. If something like this is on the horizon, we tell you early.

For recurring blank goods we recommend batches: a base quantity by sea and reorders timed so that the next delivery is already on its way while the first one is still selling. The dates we plan for this are realistic, and we put everything into meeting them.

Buying directly makes visible the risks that a wholesaler otherwise carries, such as wrong goods or damage in transit. Our own team in China checks the goods at the producer twice, during production and before loading, each time against the approved sample and your specification. With blank goods it pays particular attention to colour shade, measurements per size, fabric weight and clean goods without marks. That way deviations already show up in China.

Each shipment can be insured against transport damage on request. On the commercial side, your contracting party is a German company: purchase contract under German law, invoice from Germany with a German VAT ID, place of jurisdiction Hamburg. If you waive our checks, the order becomes cheaper.

Textile finishers and print shops that process blank goods in large quantities and need consistent quality across many reorders. Merch suppliers who source T-shirts, hoodies, caps and bags for their own customers and want to plan dates reliably. Brands with an article that is reordered regularly and has so far come through a European intermediary.

It always starts with the same step. You name the article and the quantity, and we answer with the landed cost to your door and a realistic delivery date. Then you can see in black and white whether switching is worth it.