Reshoring

Outsourcing Your Manufacturing: Pros and Cons

Proficient Sourcing LLC exists to help you find excellent suppliers so your outsourcing will be successful.  There are many factors involved with outsourcing, and it’s always educational to check the internet to see the pros and cons. Fortunately, we found no new revelations.  But depending on your business there are certainly many things to consider. In most cases we know, an OEM seeks manufacturing resources not available within the company, or perhaps beyond current capacity. … Read More


Inclusive Economic Growth via Manufacturing?

A McKinsey & Company article of Jan 12, 2022 is labeled as part of the Davos Agenda.  This alone gives us pause.  Do you trust the Davos crowd for sound advice?  Please let us know your view on this subject. In any case, among other things, this McKinsey author bemoans the decline of US manufacturing, as it’s driven inequality and hurt its global competitiveness.  Further, revitalizing manufacturing could add lots of well-paying jobs with digitization… Read More


Supply Chain Under Strain

Proficient Sourcing LLC provides OEM’s access to a network of outstanding manufacturing suppliers.  As almost all are midwestern, we offer an alternative to companies being subjected to supply chain difficulties with overseas suppliers. The January/February edition of Expansion Solutions magazine has an excellent summary article “A Supply Chain Under Strain”.  The article points out several key supply chain points. Everyone involved with foreign suppliers is aware of the potential for sea, air, rail, and road… Read More


China: Big Problems Lurk!

  China has very big demographic problems. Is this situation meaningful for us folks interested in US manufacturing at present or soon? We shall see. All of a sudden, a large number of news sources are reporting a potential demographic crisis beginning in China. We wonder what this means for OEMs with Chinese manufacturing. The government has a very major issue dealing with these things and still maintaining a manufacturing powerhouse. Apparently, for the first… Read More


Manufacturing Outlook for 2023

Making sense of economic forecasts is risky business, but we looked at many claims of such expertise concerning manufacturing.  This is a summary of one such source from Hitachi Solutions.  Their report contained several factors widely reported in other places. As we all know the trifecta of problems, labor issues, supply chain and inflation remain as a combined big deal.  How these will shake out over 2023 remains to be seen.  The Hitachi report lists… Read More


Pandemic Effects on the Economy

Recently we found “The Economic Disaster of the Pandemic Response”, a talk by Jeffrey Tucker from October 2022.  Mr. Tucker is a writer of some note, but evidently a strong conservative.  Whether or not his remarks are 100% accurate or not is beyond our ability to determine, but it makes a lot of sense.  We’re no fan of central planning, especially for the national economy, which created a number of problems in this case. The… Read More


Reshoring: 2022 News

Proficient Sourcing can help almost anyone considering reshoring manufacturing in 2022 and beyond.  We can help by offering candidates for all manner of manufacturing with a network of companies, all of whom have a history of happy customers—without cost or obligation.   Here are many of the capabilities we  offer. A particularly good example would be large iron/steel castings, which our source can now provide at nearly equivalent costs compared to Asia, given current shipping costs,… Read More


TARGET PRICE: Good idea or not?

Last year we introduced a potential supplier to an equipment OEM.  The OEM has several fairly large machine parts they want to source to new machining sources.  The desired vendor will be capable of handling thousand pound steel parts, which require complex machining operations.  Not quite 5-axis, but their parts have very intricate details. This means a complex quoting procedure, and perhaps if the OEM would provide some sort of cost parameters it would help… Read More


Need Improvements to Your Supply Chain?

We’re all about improving your supply chain.  Whether reshoring something or any of a myriad of possibilities, if you want excellent candidates for your outsourced manufacturing, we can probably help. Key areas of success have been large metal parts, such as machine bases, fabricated and molded plastics, domesticating ferrous (and large!) castings, tanks, pressure vessels, and even micro machined precision items.  We can also offer special ISO candidates for specific industries.  Here’s a partial listing of our… Read More


Supplier Visits: Important Clues About Prospective Suppliers

Several years ago a Business Leader Post article recommended visiting suppliers as often as feasibly possible.  The main reasons appear to be relationship building and the opportunity to discuss cost/scrap/quality and other production details that may be problematic. Proficient Sourcing’s business is finding excellent sources for your manufacturing needs (mostly metal and plastic machining/fab work).  To fully appreciate what a supplier can contribute to your business, a visit to the facility making your items can be… Read More