Compared
The usual route
With Chaperon
01 Who are they, really?
What you can see
The usual route
A company name, a profile, and photos of a facility. The factory may be a trader. The agent may own the factory.
Chaperon
Network members will complete registry and background checks before they are eligible to apply. Individual identity verification is reviewed before approval.
How you check it
The usual route
A site inspection, scheduled in advance and prepared for. Typically $200-$500+ per visit, repeated whenever you need fresh confidence.
Chaperon
A record trail: registry data, export history, legal filings, and community reports. Use it to decide which suppliers are worth a closer look.
ChaperonedPlanned: a point of contact visits in person during onboarding.
How hard it is to fake
The usual route
High control by the counterparty. Staff, samples, and lines can be arranged for one visit, and that visit only tells you about that one day.
Chaperon
Low control. Filings, shipments, and disputes build up over months and years, and are hard to fabricate consistently.
Experience: claimed or shown
The usual route
"We've handled hundreds of orders like yours." Then every stage hits a problem nobody saw coming, and nobody is thinking past the step in front of them.
Chaperon
Applications will be ranked by category fit, submitted evidence, and background records. Sourcing agents and trading companies upload documents to support their experience claims. Post a toy order and the strongest toy-experienced applicants rise to the top.
02 Who pays them?
How they get paid
The usual route
An undisclosed commission or markup from the supplier. Their income rises with your invoice.
Chaperon
A flat matching fee paid to Chaperon, not a percentage of your order. A bigger bill does not increase Chaperon's fee.
Whose side they're on
The usual route
Yours in conversation, the supplier's in practice, and you have no way to see the difference.
Chaperon
Chaperon's fee stays flat. The platform does not earn more when your costs go up.
03 What happens after you commit?
When costs change mid-order
The usual route
The opening quote is low enough to win the job. After you commit, the number only ever moves one way, and there's no record of what was originally agreed.
Chaperon
Requirements, applications, scope, and quotes will be recorded before a preliminary cooperation is accepted, so a change is visible as a change.
When something goes wrong
The usual route
You get a story. Every mishap has a reason and none of them are ever theirs. If the serious conversation moved off-platform, the record is scattered across chats, screenshots, and memory.
Chaperon
Both sides will be verified, and the application, discussion, records, and reviews will stay connected to the match. That does not eliminate risk, but it makes claims easier to review when something goes wrong.
ChaperonedPlanned: your point of contact gives you a second read on what happened, so you are not relying only on the account of the person responsible for it.
What they have at stake
The usual route
Nothing. On most platforms they pay for access to your job, which filters for budget, not for conduct.
Chaperon
A voluntary security deposit can be displayed as a good-faith signal before they take work. Its role in a dispute will be set in the Network rules before launch.
Consequences afterwards
The usual route
You absorb the cost, the delay, and the missed launch date. They absorb nothing and move on to the next buyer.
Chaperon
Buyers will be verified too, so reviews come from real counterparties on both sides. The record can be reviewed before future matching decisions.
Why records need to stay on-platform
Large sourcing marketplaces often make money from listings, memberships, or transaction activity. That structure can pull serious conversations away from the platform once both sides find each other.
When applications, messages, proof documents, and reviews stay attached to the match, both sides have a record. Chaperon uses that record to make claims easier to check and counterparties easier to hold accountable.
