Sick of China

I’ve been an expat several times in my life, from studies in the UK to stints in Singapore, Taiwan and China. All were relatively short, so my sense of excitement and wonder never wore off. For that I am grateful.

I’ve known expats who stayed away for 15 years or more, and many were counting the seconds until they could return home. They were “Sick of China” (or India, or Mexico, or Japan…you get the idea). The thrill was long gone and the tedium and irritations of daily life – amplified a hundredfold due to their surroundings – were sadly all that remained.

In the last few years PassageMaker has picked up a wide variety of new clients, but the ones that make the biggest impression on me are successful mature companies who have been doing business in China for 15 years or more. Why would a profitable company with that many years under their belt turn to a “sourcing company” like PassageMaker?

If we were just a sourcing company, that would be a valid question. But PassageMaker brings real bricks-and-mortar to the equation and provides a much wider range of services than just sourcing. Our core services – Sourcing Feasibility Studies, Vendor Coordination, Assembly-Inspection-Packaging, Logistics, Factory Formation – are so flexible that we can easily tailor them to suit a client’s requirements, whether providing quality control for millions of dollars worth of electronics or creating a consolidation regime to control VAT and shipping costs. These mature clients see our services as not just a cost-saving move, but as a hassle-saving move. When you talk to them, you can hear that they are sick of the day-to-day attention success in China requires. They just want to go home and have us handle it for them.

Mike Bellamy has been in China full time for 12 years and is happy right where he is. PassageMaker is NOT sick of China, and we will be happy to take over for you whenever you wish.