The cost quote you get from a Vietnam factory is rarely the number you actually pay. Landed cost, what the product costs once it is sitting in your warehouse, includes freight, duties, inspection, and the cost of fixing anything that goes wrong along the way. Companies that compare only the unit price often find the real savings are smaller than expected, or in some cases, disappear entirely.
Where the real savings come from
The genuine advantage is labor and production cost, which runs meaningfully below China’s across most categories, combined with duty reductions available under agreements like the EVFTA and CPTPP if your product qualifies. Together, those can add up to real, durable savings, not a one-time discount that evaporates once you account for everything else.
Where the savings quietly get erased
The costs that eat into savings are rarely dramatic. A shipment delayed at customs because of a documentation error. A production run that needs partial rework because a defect was not caught until it was already packed. A factory that quoted low and made it up on a change order once you were already committed. None of these show up on the initial quote, and all of them are avoidable with the right checks in place before production starts.
How we handle it
We verify supplier pricing against actual production capability, catch documentation issues before they cost you at customs, and inspect quality before problems become expensive to fix. The goal is a landed cost that matches what you budgeted for, not one that surprises you after the fact.