Order a sample before the production run, and decide how you'll test it

Picture a cart that looks perfect on the spec sheet and then leaks at the temperature you fill at. You want to find that out from a handful of samples a couple of weeks before you'd have placed the order, not from the first case of a 10,000-unit run.

What to look at

Check how your oil behaves at your fill temperature, and whether a 510 cartridge seats and fires properly on the batteries you stock. See whether the adults who buy from you can open the child-resistant cap, and how the print and color look next to your brand guide instead of on a monitor.

Decide what a pass looks like before it arrives

Before the sample ships, write down what passing means, so there's a test waiting when the box shows up. Something like this:

• Fill it with your own product at your normal fill temperature, on the equipment that will run the order.
• Hand it to your least careful packer and watch what happens.
• Put it next to a unit from the last approved batch.
• Write down the tolerances before you open the box. It's easy to talk yourself into a pass afterwards.

When one passes, keep it. Label it, date it and put it somewhere you'll find it again. That unit is now the standard the next delivery gets checked against, and "this doesn't match the sample" goes a lot better when you can put the sample on the table.

Asking is normal

Plenty of buyers feel that asking for samples is an imposition, or something only big accounts get to do. From the supply side it looks different. A handful of units costs very little next to a run that has to be redone, and a sample request usually tells a supplier you're serious about ordering.

Asking us for a sample

With a free account you can ask for a sample of any active product from its product page. Pick a quantity (up to 100 units), add a note about what you're testing, and it ships to your business address unless you give another one. You'll get an alert when it's approved and another when it ships, the carrier and tracking number show on the request, and the request stays listed on the product page with its status.

You can have one open request per product at a time. If plans change, you can cancel it yourself while it's still waiting or approved and ask again later. No account yet? The request form on the public product page has a sample option too. And for a custom or branded run, we'd start with a sample every time.