Trade fairs and factory visits
At a fair you need four sentences: 我可以看看吗？ (may I look?), 这个多少钱？ (how much?), 起订量是多少？ (what's the MOQ?) and 可以寄样品吗？ (can you send a sample?). At a factory the useful one is 我可以看看生产线吗？ — may I see the production line?
What actually happens
The Canton Fair (广交会) in Guangzhou each April and October is the largest trade fair on earth, and the pattern of a sourcing trip around it is well worn: three days of booths, a shortlist, then factory visits an hour or two outside the city. It is one of the few business settings where a handful of Chinese phrases pays for itself immediately, because you are having the same short conversation forty times a day.
At a booth, the useful skill is triage. Most exhibitors have an English-speaking sales person, but not at every stand and not always free. The four questions above — look, price, MOQ, sample — filter a hall quickly, and asking them in Chinese gets you taken seriously in a way that flipping a catalogue does not. Collect cards, write the date and product on the back after you walk away, and photograph the booth number with the sample.
A factory visit is a different exercise: you are checking that the company you are talking to is the company that makes the thing. Ask to see the production line and the QC bench, ask what else they make, and ask who else they supply. 贸易公司 (trading company) versus 工厂 (factory) is the distinction the whole visit exists to settle — both can be fine partners, but the price structure and the accountability are different.
What they'll say back to you
Understanding the reply is the half of the conversation phrasebooks skip. These are the lines you will actually hear in this situation — learn to recognise them, not to say them.
What to say
At the booth
Product questions
At the factory
Following up
The bit that isn't language
Bring a lightweight roller bag to the fair and wear shoes you would walk ten kilometres in — the Canton Fair complex is over a million square metres. The people who leave on day one with a sore back and a full tote bag see about a third of what they came for.
Quick quiz — 5 questions
Five questions built from the phrases above: you get the English, you pick the Chinese. No sign-up, no score kept — just a check that they have stuck.
How do you say this?
Common mistakes
| ✗ What visitors do | ✓ What works | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Collecting a hundred cards and sorting them later | Annotating each one within a minute | By the evening of day one, every booth looks the same. A product word and a booth number on the back of the card is the difference between a shortlist and a shoebox. |
| Taking "we are a factory" at face value | Visiting the site | Many exhibitors are trading companies, which is not disqualifying — but you should know which one you are buying from before you agree terms, because it changes price, lead time and who is accountable for a defect. |
| Leaving inspection until the goods are made | Agreeing 验货 up front | Raising third-party inspection at the end reads as distrust. Raising it as standard procedure at the start is unremarkable and gets accepted without friction. |
Trade fairs and factory visits — frequently asked questions
When is the Canton Fair and do I need Chinese to attend?
It runs in three phases each April and October in Guangzhou. You do not need Chinese — most exhibitors staff their booths with English-speaking sales people — but a handful of phrases speeds up triage enormously when you are visiting dozens of stands a day, and it changes how seriously you are taken.
How do I tell a factory from a trading company in China?
Ask 你们是工厂吗？(nǐmen shì gōngchǎng ma) at the booth, then verify with a site visit. A real factory can show you a production line, tell you its daily output and worker count, and will have a business licence naming manufacturing. Trading companies are not a problem in themselves — they just add a margin and a layer.
What does 验货 (yànhuò) mean?
Goods inspection — checking a production run before it ships, usually by a third-party inspection company. Agree it as part of the terms at the beginning of the relationship. Introduced early it is routine; introduced late it reads as an accusation.
Can I take photos in a Chinese factory?
Ask first: 我可以拍照吗？(wǒ kěyǐ pāizhào ma). Many factories restrict photography because other customers' products are on the line, so a refusal is not necessarily a warning sign. Photographing your own samples and the QC area is usually fine.
Next
Before you fly
Work through the whole trip in Ready for a trip to China in 30 days, play Travel Survival Sprint to make the phrases automatic, practise saying them aloud in Airport Roleplay, or look up anything else in the Chinese → Pinyin translator.