A brief that leaves room for interpretation produces quotations that cannot be compared. If five suppliers read your description five ways, you receive five prices for five different products. This guide shows how to separate what is fixed from what is open, and how to write the fixed part so it can be checked when the goods arrive.
A specification is a shared definition. Its job is not to describe your product beautifully but to make two quotations mean the same thing. Write it so a stranger could tell whether a delivered unit meets it, using terms that can be measured, counted or compared to a named reference.
Where you do not know a value, say so and state the range you will accept. An honest open item is better than a guessed number.
What the item must do, where and for whom. This lets a supplier propose alternatives within intent.
Dimensions with tolerances, material or composition, finish, colour reference, weight range. Give tolerances, not only nominal values.
Tests, ratings or documents you require, stated as evidence to be supplied. Do not state what a market requires; ask what the supplier can document.
Unit packing, labelling content, language of labels, barcodes if used.
Order size range, repeat pattern and samples needed. The basis on which prices are stated is set in the RFQ checklist.
'Durable', 'premium' and 'standard quality' cannot be quoted against.
Wishes and requirements in one list make suppliers guess which are which.
The same item has different feasibility at different volumes, so state the range you expect.
When the specification is written, LATYNEX's RFQ comparison turns it into a request and normalises the replies; the writing itself stays yours.
Those are your fixed items.
Those are open items; give the range.
A drawing, a photograph with scale, or a sample number that both sides hold.
Measure, count, test report, comparison with the reference sample.
Ask them what is unclear. Rewrite those lines.
Research reports what can be established from public and provided sources. It is not a guarantee about a counterparty's future conduct and not legal advice.
As long as it takes to remove ambiguity. A simple item may fit on one page.
Share what is needed to quote. Keep design details that are commercially sensitive for later stages.
Agree that with the supplier in writing. A change a supplier proposes should be recorded as a new revision.
No obligation. We read your request and reply with a straight answer.
Tell us what you need to find out and by when. We confirm scope before any work starts.
Request research