Directory Image
This website uses cookies to improve user experience. By using our website you consent to all cookies in accordance with our Privacy Policy.

Why choose an onshore vendor for metal fabrication services?

Author: John Scott
by John Scott
Posted: Jan 06, 2024

Everywhere you go these days, almost all the companies look for ways to minimize operational costs. Since labor costs continue to be a very large component of any business’s operational expenditure, many companies have found that getting work done from offshore vendors in Asia can provide them a cost advantage because labor cost in Asian countries tends to be much lower than in North America.

While this may seem very attractive on the first look, it is not such a great idea in the long term when you take a holistic look at the whole business process. There are a number of reasons why a vendor based in North America can offer you much better services and deals overall, than whatever you can get from offshore vendors. This is particularly the case with engineering work like metal fabrication as well as advanced items like manufacturing of a slide valve etc.

Cost Related Advantages of a Local Vendor

  • At the very beginning, it is important to address the ‘cost advantage’ that an offshore vendor may claim to have. In any engineering job, the scale and size of the order has the most important role in deciding the cost. Economies of scale come into picture regardless of where the business is being operated from. Ao as long as the metal fabrication order is large enough, even a local vendor can easily match an offshore deal.

  • Logistics costs play a very big part in the final costing of any engineering or fabrication work. Moving any item thousands of miles from a far away country will always cost more than moving the same volume of finished items. Even materials coming from offshore companies will also land at a port from which inland logistics cost is still to be covered. A local vendor will mean only local logistics costs are a concern.

Quality Related Advantages of a Local Vendor:

  • An offshore vendor may claim that they can deliver very high quality finished goods but when you are ordering complex engineering products like a slide valve, do you want to rely on someone who is so far that it will take you intercontinental flights to reach or someone whose establishment you can just drive to? You can easily keep an eye on what a local vendor is doing about your order than someone far away.

  • Complex engineering products also need a highly skilled workforce if you are looking for a high quality finished product. The workers in offshore mills generally have low or no skills or quality education except for whatever they may have learnt on the job. On the other hand a North American worker who has been through the comparatively better education system may cost more but will also deliver a better quality product.

Compliance Related Advantages of a Local Vendor.

  • Engineering items like a slide valve need to be manufactured as per certain predefined safety and compliance specifications and they are supposed to meet certain criteria before they can be sold in the market. A local vendor is not only aware of these regulations, they also have a ready infrastructure to ensure that they manufacture compliant products. There is no way to ensure that an offshore vendor will stick to the specifications and guidelines which may even result in rejection of complete batches of finished goods.

  • Like any other industrial business, the metal fabrication industry needs to make sure that vendors and companies follow certain labor and environmental compliances. While a local vendor will most certainly comply with these requirements, things will always remain uncertain about offshore vendors.

All in all, choosing the right local vendor will ensure quality products which meet all regulatory requirements and still manage to equal or even beat the cost advantage of offshore vendors.

About the Author

John Scott content writer and digital marketing graduate. Write about business tip, tech, technology topics.

Rate this Article
Leave a Comment
Author Thumbnail
I Agree:
Comment 
Pictures
Author: John Scott

John Scott

Member since: Sep 07, 2023
Published articles: 31

Related Articles