Chinese New Year Doesn’t Have to Break Your Delivery Dates—If Your Supplier Runs a Real Plan

Chinese New Year Doesn’t Have to Break Your Delivery Dates—If Your Supplier Runs a Real Plan

If you’ve sourced from China for more than one season, you already know the truth:

Chinese New Year isn’t the risk. The risk is uncertainty.
Unclear cutoffs. “We’ll try.” Silent factories. Rolled cargo. A scramble that turns your margin into air freight.

And the disruption is real because the holiday is real. In 2026, the official Spring Festival public holiday is nine days (Feb 15–23), with adjusted working days around it—meaning workforce movement and operational pauses are baked into the calendar.
Add the country’s annual travel rush—China has projected record Spring Festival travel volumes—and you get labor shifts that ripple across factories, trucking, and port operations.

So if you’re a procurement manager, supply chain lead, or category manager planning home décor orders, here’s the question that actually matters:

Does your supplier give you a “shutdown warning”… or a “delivery protection plan”?

Below is a practical, buyer-first timeline and checklist you can use immediately.

Why Chinese New Year hits home décor sourcing harder than most categories

Home décor supply chains are sensitive in three ways:

1. Fragility + packaging dependency
   Mirrors, glass décor, ceramic pieces, and mixed-material items don’t “ship fine” without packaging that’s been tested and repeated consistently.

2. Finish times and rework risk
   Paint, plating, welding, resin, and hand-finished details can bottleneck fast when output ramps down and then restarts.

3. Retail calendars don’t care
   Floor sets, promotions, planogram resets, and DC appointment windows don’t move just because a supplier’s workforce is traveling.

And zoom out: China remains a dominant manufacturing base globally—China’s manufacturing value-added in 2023 was estimated at about 28% of the global total, which is why this holiday creates global waves rather than local ripples.

The buyer’s CNY playbook: what “stable” looks like from a supplier

A “stable signal” supplier does five things consistently:

• Publishes a clear CNY calendar (order cutoffs, last ship dates, restart plan)

• Locks specs early (master sample + spec pack + packaging standard)

• Pre-buys risk items (materials/components with long lead time)

• Schedules QC before the rush (so you’re not inspecting in chaos)

• Plans freight capacity (because sailing schedules and space tighten)

Ocean carriers often adjust schedules around CNY, including blank sailings (skipped sailings) to match reduced export activity, which can reduce available slots and extend transit planning complexity.

Major logistics providers also warn that the period triggers factory shutdowns, demand spikes, and a capacity crunch that can cascade for weeks.

Translation: if your supplier isn’t planning early, you’re paying later.

A practical Chinese New Year timeline you can run every year

Think in “T-minus weeks” rather than exact dates (because each supplier’s region and workforce pattern varies).

T-10 to T-8 weeks: lock the SKU reality (not the moodboard)

Your goal: eliminate ambiguity that causes rework.

• Finalize dimensions, materials, finishes, and hardware

• Confirm carton marks + labeling requirements (retail/DC rules)

• Approve a master reference (golden sample or signed spec)

• Freeze packaging standard (foam density, corner protection, drop-test expectations)

Buyer pain this prevents: “Sample looked great; production drifted.”
That drift is most likely when teams are rushing pre-holiday.

T-7 to T-6 weeks: place POs like you mean it

Your goal: turn forecasts into secured capacity.

• Release POs with clear incoterms, ship windows, and inspection windows

• Confirm raw material ordering and supplier sub-tier readiness

• If you have multiple SKUs: lock a priority list (what must ship first)

Reality check: Many factories begin slowing down as the holiday approaches because workers travel and production lines thin out. The official holiday may be nine days, but operational disruption often spans longer due to pre- and post-holiday ramp-down/ramp-up.

T-5 to T-4 weeks: pre-book freight and protect your ship window

Your goal: avoid getting pushed into “maybe space.”

• Pre-book ocean freight (and confirm container type & pickup windows)

• Build a backup plan for priority SKUs (split shipments, alternative routings)

• Align with your forwarder on CNY-related schedule shifts

Carriers often publish CNY advisories and network adjustments (including blank sailings), which can change space availability and reliability around the holiday period.

T-3 to T-2 weeks: inspect earlier than you want to

Your goal: catch issues before the factory is half-empty.

• Pull forward pre-shipment inspections

• Require photo/video evidence for:

  • finish uniformity

  • corner protection + internal packaging

  • drop-risk points (mirror edges, hanging hardware, weld points)

• Confirm spare parts and rework time if defects appear

Buyer pain this prevents: “Inspection failed and there’s no time to fix it.”

T-1 week: ship what’s finished—don’t wait for perfect

Your goal: protect on-time delivery, not your supplier’s batching preference.

• Push partial shipments for priority SKUs if needed

• Confirm trucking/port handover dates in writing

• Lock documentation (commercial invoice, packing list, compliance docs)

Logistics providers routinely flag that pre-holiday demand surges can create tight capacity and delays—so the earlier you clear gates, the better.

Holiday + restart (T+1 to T+3 weeks): treat restart like a “new launch”

Your goal: avoid quality drift after the break.

• Ask for a restart plan (staff return rate, line start sequence)

• Request first-lot QC after reopening

• Expect a backlog clearing period (your supplier should tell you how they prioritize orders)

The Spring Festival period is associated with massive workforce travel and operational pauses, which is why restart pacing matters as much as shutdown timing.

The 9 questions a real supplier should answer (copy/paste for your next email)

1. What are your last order acceptance and last ship-out dates for my category?

2. When does your workforce begin leaving, and what capacity do you run at in the final 2–3 weeks?

3. What materials/components have the longest lead time, and when will you lock them?

4. What is your QC schedule (in-process + pre-shipment) before the holiday?

5. What packaging standard do you follow for fragile items, and what tests do you run?

6. How do you handle change requests inside the final month (and what’s frozen)?

7. What’s your post-holiday ramp-up timeline and first-lot quality control process?

8. How do you prioritize backlog (PO date, ship window, key accounts)?

9. What freight risks do you anticipate (space, blank sailings, port congestion), and what’s the fallback plan?

If the answers are vague, you don’t have a plan—you have hope.

What we do at Teruier (and what you should expect from any “reorder-ready” supplier)

At Teruier, we treat Chinese New Year planning like a service level—because buyers don’t get credit for explanations, only for arrivals.

Our standard CNY approach is built around three “stability moves”:

• A published production + shipping calendar with order cutoffs, inspection windows, and restart sequencing

• A master reference + spec pack so production doesn’t drift when teams rotate

• Packaging and QC checkpoints designed for real transit—especially for mirrors, mixed materials, and fragile décor

You don’t need a supplier who says, “Don’t worry.”
You need a supplier who says, “Here’s the plan, here are the dates, here’s how we protect your delivery.”

The takeaway

Chinese New Year is predictable. Your outcomes should be, too.

If you’re planning spring assortments, floor sets, or any home décor refresh that can’t slip, the win isn’t “ordering earlier.” The win is locking a system: specs, QC timing, and freight capacity—before the supply chain turns into a rush.