What to ask your extruder beyond price and lead time
3 min read
Price and lead time are the easy questions. They tell you what a job costs today — not whether a supplier will still be the right partner on your tenth reorder. Use these questions to find out.
- Will you hold my tooling, and for how long?
A supplier who stores your die indefinitely treats you as a long-term account. Vague answers here often mean a recut charge — or a lost die — on a repeat run.
- How quickly can you quote and turn a repeat order?
If the spec is already on file, a repeat run should quote in a day and start in days — not weeks. Long repeat lead times signal a shop that treats every run as a new job.
- What is your minimum run size?
Many large extruders turn away runs under a few thousand pounds. If you run small quantities or need prototypes, confirm the minimum before you depend on a supplier who may decline your order.
- Who is my main contact, and what happens when I need a rush?
On short timelines, the answer to "who picks up the phone?" matters as much as price. Find out whether you get a named contact or a ticket queue.
- Can you handle secondary operations — machining, fabrication, finishing — on the same PO?
Managing separate vendors for extrusion, machining, and anodizing multiplies lead time and hand-off risk. A single-source shop keeps the whole order under one schedule.
- How do you handle a design change mid-run?
Profile adjustments happen. Ask whether the supplier can re-cut or modify a die quickly, and what that costs — upfront, not after you're committed.
- What does your quality documentation look like?
Mill certs and inspection records should be standard, not an upgrade. Ask what you get by default — and whether they can meet any traceability requirements your customers impose on you.
The suppliers worth keeping behave like partners: they hold your tooling, keep your spec on file, quote repeats fast, and are reachable when the timeline shifts. That is the relationship AES is built around.