Sher-Wood's suppliers were located in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Zhongshan City near Hong Kong. They were producing tennis and badminton rackets. Developing the expertise in composite technology and relevant sporting goods production. Sher-Wood began to cooperate with them about 10 years ago when it started selling composite sticks. For years, these suppliers manufactured one-piece and two-piece composite hockey sticks for hockey companies around the world. Gradually, they accumulated manufacturing capacity and R&D capability. Sher-Wood's mains supplier in Zhongshan City operated two shifts for 10 hours a day, six days a week. Their annual capacity was more than 1 million units. Moreover, they possessed an R&D team with 10 to 15 engineers, which was able to produce a prototype within one day with full information. On the contrary, it would cost Sher-Wood four to five months with a team of two to three engineers to produce a similar prototype. More importantly, as a consequence of their long-term cooperation, the main supplier had developed a certain feeling about hockey so that language and cultural barriers were not problems any more. “They were becoming a partner rather than one section within the supply chain,” said Eric Rodrigue, Sher-Wood’s marketing vice president.