What a foreign buyer checks before they send your shop a drawing
September 24, 2026
A buyer in Germany or California with a drawing to place is not choosing a shop. They are eliminating shops. They start with ten names and want to be down to two by the end of the morning, and almost all of that elimination happens before anyone sends a file.
This is what they look at, in the order they look at it.
1. Can they tell what you actually run
The first thing a buyer scans for is a machine list. Not a count, a list: model, quantity, year, control. From that they work out whether their part fits and whether a second machine could run it if the first one breaks.
A page that says “modern CNC equipment and skilled engineers” tells them nothing and costs you the click. A table with eight rows does the work.
Include the largest part envelope with fixturing, not the table size from the brochure. Buyers with a 600 mm part check this line first and it saves both sides a week.
2. Whether you can measure what they need
This is the question that separates shops on tight work, and most shops underplay it.
List the inspection equipment: hand tools, height gauge, profile projector, CMM, roughness tester. Say whether calibration certificates exist. If you have a temperature controlled room, say so, because a buyer asking for ±0.01 mm knows exactly what that means.
A shop with a CMM and a habit of issuing reports can charge more and will win the parts that matter.
3. What you cut every week
Buyers do not want to be your first stainless job. Name the materials you run weekly, then name the ones you can run with notice. Being honest about the second group costs you nothing and builds the thing you need most, which is credibility on the first order.
4. Whether the reply reads like it was written by someone who looked
Here is the single biggest difference we see between replies that convert and replies that get ignored.
A reply that says “we can do this, please send your target price” is deleted. A reply that says “the four bores at ±0.02 mm will be done in one setup on the Doosan, the bead blast is subcontracted and adds three days, and if the corner radius can go from 2 mm to 4 mm the pocket runs about 20 percent faster” gets an answer within the hour.
The second reply proves someone opened the file. It costs fifteen minutes and it is worth more than any certificate on your wall.
5. Whether you asked anything
Buyers notice silence. A drawing with a blanket tolerance, no datums or a missing finish spec should generate a question. A shop that quotes without questions is either very experienced or not reading, and the buyer cannot tell which.
Two good questions in a first reply are a stronger trust signal than a fast price.
6. Whether the commercial basics are clean
Before an order leaves, a buyer checks:
- A company they can invoice, with a registration number
- A bank account in the company name, never a personal one
- Payment terms that are normal for a first order, commonly 30 to 50 percent deposit with the balance before shipment
- Who prepares export documents, and whether you have shipped to their region before
A request to pay a personal account ends the conversation in most procurement departments, regardless of the price.
7. Whether you will put things in writing
The three things a buyer wants agreed before production, and almost nobody offers them unprompted:
- What a first article means here: how many pieces, measured against what, reported how
- How long they have to approve it, and whether production may start in parallel
- What happens to an out of tolerance part: rework, replacement or credit, and who pays freight
Offer these in your first reply and you look like a shop that has exported before, whether or not you have.
8. Whether anything on your site is checkable
Photographs of machines that match the machine list. A dimensional report with the customer details removed. A part similar to theirs, described by geometry rather than by customer name.
Stock photos of a factory that is not yours are noticed more often than shops think, and once noticed everything else on the page is discounted.
What this adds up to
None of this requires investment. It requires writing down what is already true on your floor in a form a stranger can check in five minutes. The shops that win export work are rarely the cheapest, and they are almost always the easiest to verify.
If you want the requests to come to you, register the shop on the partner page. The questions we ask are published in full on the supplier questionnaire, so you can prepare the answers before you write.
Questions shops ask
Does a buyer need to see our factory before ordering?
Rarely on a first small order. What they want is evidence they can check from a desk: a machine list, an inspection list, a sample report and clear answers. A video call during production hours substitutes for a visit in most cases.
Do we need ISO 9001 to get export orders?
Not for most commercial work. It opens doors and it is treated as a baseline rather than proof. A shop with no certificate and a good dimensional report beats a certified shop that cannot produce one.
Should we publish prices on our website?
No. Publish capability and evidence instead: machines, envelopes, materials, inspection and the industries you already supply. Price belongs in a quote against a specific drawing.
Want the orders?
Register the shop and we bring export orders to you: a purchase order from us, a drawing that has been read properly, and payment on terms agreed in writing. No listing fee and no exclusivity.