We are a Canadian company that started importing and wholesaling electric bicycles and scooters three years ago. After the first shipment we realized that our business would be endangered if we continued to import mass production items and if we didn't instead find reliable manufacturers. The problems we encountered were: - Shipment of products and quantities were different from what we had ordered - Unprofessional workmanship, resulting in poor manufacturing and assembly of products - Use of low quality parts from unreliable suppliers - Inefficient communication due to the fact that we were sometimes dealing with mediators or small workshops that were presenting themselves as manufacturers - Dealing with products, designed and engineered for the domestic market in China, that were not suitable for markets in North America and Europe We spent the next two and a half years searching for reliable manufacturers, improving the existing models, developing new ones and establishing a quality control branch of our company. - We met personally with more than 50 prescreened manufacturers and visited their factories - After we were convinced which factories had proper facilities and qualified workers, we ordered samples from 18 manufacturers in order to test their performance. - We visited a number of electric bike suppliers of motors, controllers, parts and accessories, tested the performance of the electric parts and made suggestions to our manufacturers that they use the best ones - After testing numerous types of e-bikes, e-scooters, e-skateboards, electric mopeds, ATVs, pocket and off road motor bikes, we decided to work with a very limited number of manufacturers. We made some changes to some of the models they make. - Additional changes were suggested to some of their products based on the feed back from our retail and wholesale customers. - An independent quality control person was hired to monitor the quality of all products prior to their shipment from China. - In cooperation with UBC our company engineered new electric vehicles. In the summer of 2005 our company will sell an electric scooter, electric bicycle and electric skateboard designed and engineered in Canada. We are confident now that we can provide products from the best manufacturers in China and we are proud to be a part from their manufacturing process.