A supplier’s customs record is the reference check nobody can arrange.
Certificates get bought. Factory photos get borrowed. Audit reports get aged. The one account of a supplier that was written by someone with no interest in your deal is their export declarations: every shipment they actually sent, to whom, how much, and at what declared price. In 38 of our 43 direct markets those records carry the company names, so you can look your candidate up before the deposit clears.
Six questions the shipping record answers about a supplier.
Vetting is not a feeling about a sales contact. It is six questions, each with a number behind it. Run them in this order and the shortlist ranks itself.
01Do they ship this product at all?
Filter their export declarations by your HS code. A supplier who quotes confidently on a category with no shipments behind it is a trading desk with a website, not a factory.
02Do they ship it at your volume?
Quantity per shipment, and per quarter. A factory whose largest declared consignment is a tenth of your order is about to learn your business on your money.
03Do they ship it consistently?
Cadence over time. Monthly shipments across two years read very differently from a burst last spring and silence since.
04Who else buys from them?
The named buyers on their outbound records — and whether those buyers came back. Repeat buyers are the only reference check that cannot be arranged in advance.
05What do those buyers pay?
Declared value ÷ quantity, per shipment. If your quote sits well above the band their other customers clear at, you now know it before you counter, not after.
06Where do the goods actually go?
Destination markets and port pairs. A supplier claiming years of EU experience whose declarations only ever leave for one regional market is describing an ambition.
Where a market’s feed does not publish names, the shipment facts are still there and we label the gap rather than papering over it. The full construction of our coverage — 43 direct feeds plus 184 mirror-derived countries — is on the global trade data page.
Four red flags a supplier profile will never show you.
A supplier does not have to lie to cost you a season. They only have to let you assume. Each of these is visible in the customs record in about ninety seconds, and invisible everywhere else.
- No shipments under the HS code they are quoting you on.
- A single buyer accounting for nearly all declared volume — you would be funding their diversification.
- Declared volumes that cannot support the capacity claimed in the pitch deck.
- A record that stops cold several quarters ago, with no explanation offered.
From vetting to leverage
Capacity, measured. Declared quantities across quarters tell you what this factory can really absorb.
Alternatives, found. Search the HS code instead of the company and every other factory shipping it appears — your shortlist, sorted by real volume rather than by ad spend.
A price you can defend. Open the negotiation at the band their other buyers already clear, not at their opening quote.
Supplier data, asked and answered.
What is supplier data?
Supplier data is what a company’s own export declarations say about it: which products it actually ships, in what quantities, how often, to which markets and named buyers, and at what declared value per unit. It is assembled from customs records rather than from company self-description, which is precisely why it is useful for vetting.
How do I verify a supplier before paying a deposit?
Look them up in the customs export records and run the six checks on this page: do they ship your HS code, at your volume, consistently, to repeat buyers, at what price, and to which destinations. Screen the company name against sanctions and restricted-party lists at the same time. Together that is a reference check no supplier can stage for you.
How is supplier data different from export data?
Same underlying records, opposite starting point. Export data is where you read a whole market’s outbound ledger to benchmark competitors and price bands. Supplier data is where you already have one company in front of you and need to know whether it is what it claims to be before committing. One is market research; this is due diligence.
Can I find new suppliers this way, not just check the ones I have?
Yes. Search by HS code and destination instead of by company, and the result is every factory with declared shipments in that category, rankable by volume, cadence and price band. That gives you a shortlist built from proven shipping records rather than from directory listings.
Which countries carry named suppliers?
38 of our 43 directly licensed markets publish named exporters and importers on the shipment record. The remaining direct feeds carry the shipment facts without names, and 184 further countries are covered through mirror derivation. The platform always labels which layer an answer came from.
Can I try it on a supplier I am evaluating right now?
That is the fastest way to judge us. Book a 30-minute live demo, bring the company name and the HS code, and we pull their declared shipping history on screen. Platform access is published openly at $1,100 for 6 months or $1,800 for 12 months; the demo costs nothing.
See what your buyers are buying.Then decide.
Everything we show you comes from official customs filings — records, not claims. 30 minutes. Your shipment. Your HS code. Real platform. If you don’t see something new about your market by the end of the call, we walk away. No follow-ups.