For years, a global lighting manufacturer relied on a single overseas supplier for die cast components. The arrangement had worked well enough, but it carried growing risk. With no alternative source, the company had no negotiating leverage, no supply chain backup, and no way to know whether they were getting the best possible value.
The financial model made things worse. Every time a shipment arrived at port, full payment was due immediately, before the product was needed and before it ever hit the floor. Freight, warehousing, and inventory management all fell on the customer's team.
When their sourcing team set out to find a qualified second supplier for a brand-new die cast program, the goal wasn't simply to check a compliance box. It was to find a partner that could genuinely improve how they operated.
Going to market on a new die cast component isn't simple. The sourcing team needed a supplier that could match the incumbent on total delivered cost, not just unit price, and earn engineering approval across roughly 15 decision-makers spanning procurement, engineering, and senior leadership.
They also needed someone who could handle logistics in a way that reduced operational complexity rather than adding to it.
The incumbent had years of trust behind it. Any new supplier would need to earn credibility quickly, and offer something genuinely different.
Rather than competing on unit price alone, the winning approach centered on the full cost of ownership: the costs that don't show up on an invoice but absolutely show up on a balance sheet.
No payment until release. Instead of paying at port, the customer pays only when inventory is pulled. That protects cash flow and eliminates the cost of holding product before it's needed.
Inventory held on their behalf. A 12-month release window removes warehouse management and carrying costs from the customer's operation entirely.
Logistics matched to their actual footprint. When shipments were confirmed to route through Portland, AFC's Sherwood, Oregon facility created a direct port-to-warehouse path, cutting the inland freight leg the incumbent was routing through Southern California.
Supply chain resilience. With a qualified second supplier in place, the sourcing team gained leverage, redundancy, and the confidence that comes from not having all eggs in one basket.
The proposal cleared engineering review and all 15 stakeholders. At each stage it ranked at the top, not because the price was lowest, but because the total picture made more business sense.
The sourcing team awarded the initial program, valued at $400,000, structured around the full value of the offering rather than a race to the bottom on unit cost.
Within weeks, four additional projects within the same program were submitted for quote. And because the manufacturer's five business units each make independent sourcing decisions, strong performance in one location creates a natural pathway to enterprise-wide adoption: a potential five-times multiplier on the initial program value.
This die cast win didn't happen in isolation. It grew from a hardware and components relationship that had itself expanded significantly, from a modest starting point to a $3 million annual contract spanning five business units, because the customer's team came to trust that commitments made would be commitments kept.
The die cast opportunity was a direct result of that trust, earned one visit at a time.
For manufacturers sourcing components internationally, the unit price on an invoice rarely tells the whole story. Freight, storage, carrying costs, payment timing, and single-source risk all contribute to the true cost of a supplier relationship. And they add up in ways that are easy to overlook when that relationship is comfortable and familiar.
When those costs are made visible, and a partner can credibly take them off the table, the conversation shifts from "can you match their price?" to "why haven't we done this sooner?"