Most production businesses are closer to a supplier problem than they'd like to admit, and most don't find out until it's already happened. Relationships that were built informally, without proper documentation, and concentrated in the hands of one or two contacts tend to hold up fine for years, right up until they don't, and then production stops overnight.

I've rebuilt sourcing networks from nothing after exactly that kind of collapse, working under real pressure to get a brand back into production before the damage became permanent. I also work with an established set of manufacturing partners across Europe, and, just as importantly, a process for vetting new ones and managing existing relationships so they don't erode unnoticed.

If you haven't chosen your first manufacturing partners yet, the priority is making that decision properly rather than under time pressure, because the cost of getting it wrong compounds fast. If you already have a supply chain running, the more useful step is an honest look at where it's grown thin, which relationships are genuinely solid and which are one bad month away from causing a real problem.