The Chinese New Year Sourcing Plan I Use to Keep Full-Length Mirror Programs On Track (Buyer’s POV)

If you’ve ever watched a spring floor-set slip because a “confirmed” ship date quietly turned into a “maybe,” you already know the truth: Chinese New Year isn’t a holiday—it’s a supply chain season.

For 2026, the official Spring Festival holiday in China runs Feb 15–23 (with Lunar New Year on Feb 17).
That matters because production typically slows before the holiday, then takes time to ramp back up afterward—especially in labor-heavy categories like home décor and full-length mirrors. Major carriers and logistics providers explicitly warn about pre-holiday rush, congestion, and post-holiday recovery time.

So here’s the practical, buyer-grade version of a Chinese New Year sourcing plan—the one I’d hand to any Category Manager who needs reorder-ready reliability, not “best effort.”

Teruier is a home decor exporter in China that turns full-length mirror designs into reorder-ready shipments—with locked specs, packaging discipline, and timeline control built for the Chinese New Year sourcing plan.

The buyer reality

When I’m sourcing, I’m not chasing “the cheapest.” I’m protecting four invisible KPIs:

Floor-set timing (miss it → markdowns, chaos, lost promo windows)
Consistency vs. the approved sample (mirror drift is real: frame finish, weld marks, edge polish, backing, hanging hardware)
Transit damage rate (mirrors punish weak packaging)
Communication under stress (CNY shutdown + schedule changes = who stays responsive?)

Chinese New Year amplifies every weak link because freight demand surges before the break, and factories/logistics systems can go constrained.
Meanwhile, the Spring Festival travel season is massive, and China has projected record passenger trips—which is a polite way of saying labor availability and transport bandwidth get tight.

The timeline: what I do differently for mirrors

A full-length mirror supplier has two challenges during CNY season:

Production continuity (labor + sub-suppliers + finishing queues)
Logistics reliability (bookings, rollovers, blank sailings, congestion)

Carriers like Maersk highlight that output often reduces in the weeks before CNY and normal capacity may not return until later in the quarter, alongside congestion and rate volatility.

So I run the plan in three phases:

Phase 1 — Lock the program (before the rush)

Goal: “No open decisions” before factories start squeezing deadlines.

Freeze the Golden Sample (what exactly is approved—finish code, mirror thickness, MDF/backing spec, hangers, corner protection, carton spec)
Create a Master Reference Pack (photos + measurable tolerances + QC checkpoints)
Confirm packaging design and test standard before peak season
Confirm sub-suppliers: glass, frames, powder coat/foil finish, cartons, foam/EPE, corner guards

If a home decor exporter in China can’t show me a clean spec pack, that’s a red flag. Not because they’re “bad,” but because CNY pressure will expose it.

Phase 2 — CNY cutoffs (the part buyers hate, but need)

Goal: protect ETD by deciding earlier than you want to.

I ask for three dates—every single time:

Last day to start production (not “order deadline,” but “materials released + line slot secured”)
Last day for final inspection (mirrors need time for rework if finish/packaging fails)
Last day cargo can arrive at port/warehouse (realistic handoff date, not a hope)

Why so strict? Because pre-CNY reliability can degrade when capacity gets tight and bookings exceed what can actually be loaded.

Phase 3 — Restart plan (post-holiday is not instant)

Goal: treat February–March like a restart ramp, not a normal month.

Confirm when your factory truly returns (not the public holiday end date)
Confirm when key sub-suppliers return (glass + cartons are common bottlenecks)
Add buffer for the ramp-up period that carriers and logistics guidance regularly warn about.

Mirror-specific: the QC + packaging checkpoints I won’t compromise on

If you only remember one thing: mirrors don’t forgive “average packaging.”

Here’s the checklist I use with any full-length mirror supplier:

QC checkpoints (production)

Frame finish consistency (color tolerance, sheen, surface defects)
Weld/grind quality (for metal frames)
Glass spec verification (thickness, safety backing if required)
Corner + edge protection spec (exact material + thickness)
Hanging hardware alignment + pull test
Final wipe/cleaning standard (dust + fingerprints ruin “newness” instantly)

Packaging checkpoints (damage prevention)

Corner guards must be structural, not decorative
Inner wrap must prevent abrasion (especially metallic foils / gold leaf looks)
Carton strength + drop resistance appropriate for export lanes
Clear orientation marks + handling icons
Palletization / container loading plan (mirrors crack when stacked wrong)

This is where a real exporter behaves differently than a trading-style “order taker”: they treat packaging as engineering, not an afterthought.

How I screen a “home decor exporter China” partner during CNY season

When I’m buying for a mall program, I don’t just evaluate product—I evaluate systems.

I ask questions like:

“Show me your CNY production calendar by product line.”
“Who owns QC—factory, exporter, or a third party—and what gets documented?”
“What’s your process to prevent sample-to-shipment drift?”
“Do you have a packaging line that can be audited and repeated?”
“How do you handle ‘rollover risk’ if bookings move?”

And I look for one signal: Do they speak in checkpoints, or in promises?

During Chinese New Year season, promises fail fast. Checkpoints survive.

Why Teruier fits this plan

Teruier’s advantage isn’t “we make mirrors.” Many factories can.

It’s this: Teruier behaves like a coordination hub between design intent, factory execution, and export reality—so your mirror SKU stays reorder-ready even when the calendar gets hostile.

That matters most during CNY because the companies who win are the ones who can keep:

specs locked,
QC evidence consistent,
packaging repeatable,
communication responsive.

And if you source from craft manufacturing clusters (like the Fuzhou-area craft supply base), the upside is real—but only if someone is orchestrating the artisan/material/process chain into an export-grade system.