Every hose order you place sits on one of two clocks. Stocked lines run on a picking
clock measured in hours: ordered today, out today, with you tomorrow. Bespoke and custom-branded hose
runs on a manufacturing clock measured in a date somebody quotes you. Both are perfectly workable.
The trouble starts when a buyer plans the second one as though it behaved like the first.
This is a practical guide to holding both in the same stock plan – what actually
sets a lead time, where buyers lose days they did not need to lose, and how to make sure a
manufacturing schedule never turns into a stockout on your counter.
Express next-day on stockSame-day collectionBespoke quoted per job£500 min order (ex VAT)Pro-forma
Two Supply Routes, Two Planning Horizons
Before anything else, be clear which route a given line is on. The core hose range covers
the stocked families; anything made to your own spec or carrying your branding sits on the other
side of the fence.
Ex-stock
Catalogue lines held on the shelf at Mirfield. Ordered today, picked today, on express next-day delivery — or collected same-day from the counter. Your planning horizon is measured in hours, so the only real question is whether you ordered before the van left.
Bespoke & custom-branded
Hose made to your specification, or standard hose carrying your own branding. This is a manufacturing lead time, not a picking time, and it is quoted per job — the spec, the volume and the artwork all move the date. Plan it as a project, not a reorder.
The realistic middle
Most trade buyers run both. Ex-stock covers the unplanned work and the counter sales; bespoke covers the range you have committed to and can forecast months out. Problems start when a buyer treats a bespoke line as if it were a stock line.
What Actually Sets a Lead Time
On a bespoke job, manufacturing is rarely the longest part of the timeline. Four
things move the date far more than most buyers expect, and three of them sit on your side of the
desk:
Specification confirmation
Nothing is ordered until the spec is signed off — bore, wall, length, reinforcement, temperature and pressure duty. A spec that goes back and forth twice adds more calendar time than the manufacturing usually does.
Artwork and branding
Own-brand hose needs print artwork approved before anything runs. Supply it in a usable format at the quote stage rather than after the order and you take a whole round trip out of the timeline.
Volume and format
A single short run and a full pallet of coils are not the same job. Volume affects the date in both directions {MD} bigger runs take longer to make, but they also stop you reordering the same line three times in a quarter.
Your own approval loop
Sample sign-off, a director's signature, a customer's confirmation. This is the part of the lead time you actually control, and in our experience it is the part most often left out of the plan.
Most of a bespoke lead time is decided before anything is made. Confirm the spec and supply the artwork at the quote stage and you take days out of the schedule for free.
Building a Plan Around Both – Step by Step
1
Split the list in two
Go through what you buy and mark each line ex-stock or bespoke. Anything bespoke needs a date on the calendar; anything ex-stock needs a reorder point instead.
2
Set reorder points, not order dates
For stocked lines, work out how much you sell in the time it takes to get more in. Order when you hit that number, not on a fixed day of the month.
3
Get bespoke quoted early
Send the spec and the artwork to the team and get a lead time in writing before you build the order around it. A quoted date you can plan against beats an assumed one every time.
4
Bridge the gap with stock
While a bespoke run is in progress, cover the demand with the nearest catalogue equivalent. Ex-stock exists precisely so a manufacturing lead time never becomes a stockout.
5
Consolidate into one order
The minimum order is £500 excluding VAT, so batching lines together is cheaper on carriage and simpler to receipt than three separate deliveries in a fortnight.
Why Ex-Stock Is a Planning Tool, Not Just Convenience
It is tempting to treat next-day delivery as a nice-to-have – a way of rescuing
a bad week. It is more useful than that. A dependable next-day route on the catalogue means you can
run genuinely lean on stocked lines, because your effective replenishment time is one working day
rather than the several weeks a manufacturing route implies. That is cash you are not holding on a
shelf.
It also changes how you size a bespoke order. If you know the standard equivalent
is a day away, you can commit to a branded run without over-ordering “just in case”,
because the downside of running short is a stock line covering the gap rather than a lost customer.
Buyers who understand that tend to carry less inventory and miss fewer sales at the same time.
The other half of it is administrative. Because every order is settled before
dispatch, nothing sits waiting on an account approval or a credit decision – the order is paid and
it is picked. For anyone planning tightly, removing that variable matters more than it sounds.
Where Buyers Lose Time
Four habits account for most of the avoidable delay we see on trade orders:
Ordering to a diary date
Buying on the first of the month rather than at a reorder point means you are always either early and overstocked or late and short. Demand does not read your calendar.
Treating bespoke as a top-up
A custom-branded line cannot be pulled forward because a customer walked in. If it is your own-brand range, it needs its own forward order, sized to cover the whole gap.
Single-line emergency orders
Repeatedly ordering one item because it ran out costs more in carriage and admin than holding a sensible buffer ever did {MD} and it burns the minimum order on very little stock.
Not asking for the date
The lead time on a bespoke job is knowable. It is quoted. Buyers who ask up front plan accurately; buyers who assume a fortnight and get it wrong explain it to a customer later.
Delivery, Ordering and Formats at a Glance
The service facts you need to plan against, in one place:
| Ex-stock delivery |
Express next-day delivery on stocked catalogue lines across mainland UK. |
| Collection |
Same-day collection from our Mirfield (West Yorkshire) warehouse. |
| Minimum order |
£500 per order, excluding VAT. |
| Payment |
Pro-forma on every order — settled before dispatch, so there is no credit application or approval stage sitting between you and a despatch date. |
| First trade order |
£25 off for new trade customers. |
| Bespoke & custom-branded |
Made to your spec or carrying your branding. Lead time quoted per job — send the spec and artwork to the team for a date. |
| Coil formats |
Continuous lines are sold by the coil and priced per metre; mouldings are priced per piece. Two different reorder rhythms {MD} keep them separate on your stock sheet. |
Planning Bespoke as a Project
If you are a stockist or reseller building an own-brand range, the branded hose is
the part of your stockholding with the least flexibility and the most upside. Give it a proper
forward plan: agree the specification, get the artwork approved, take a quoted lead time from the
team, and size the run to cover the period until you would sensibly reorder — not the minimum you
can get away with. Then set a reorder trigger against it in the same way you would for a fast-moving
catalogue line, so the next run starts before the last one runs out.
Do that once and a bespoke range stops feeling risky. It becomes a scheduled,
predictable line item with a date attached, sitting alongside an ex-stock catalogue that absorbs
everything unpredictable around it.
Get a Date You Can Plan Against
Frequently Asked Questions
How quickly can you dispatch a stock order?
Catalogue lines are held at our Mirfield warehouse and go out on express next-day delivery, with same-day collection available from the counter if you are local or up against it. There is no payment approval stage to clear first — Hoses UK is pro-forma, so an order is settled before dispatch and moves straight into picking. For anything you buy regularly, that is a planning horizon of hours rather than weeks.
What is the lead time on bespoke or custom-branded hose?
It is quoted per job, because the spec, the volume and the branding all move the date. Send the specification and any print artwork to the team and you will get a lead time you can plan against before you commit. What we would advise against is assuming a figure — bespoke manufacturing is a project with a date, and it is far easier to build a stock plan around a confirmed one.
How do we cover demand while a bespoke run is being made?
Bridge it with ex-stock. The
wholesale catalogue is deep enough that most bespoke lines have a close catalogue equivalent — silicone, rubber, PVC and PTFE hose, ducting, couplings and clamps are all held. Ordering the standard line to cover the gap keeps your counter selling and your customers supplied while the branded stock is in production.
Do we need a credit account to get stock moving quickly?
No, and we do not offer one. Every Hoses UK order is settled before dispatch on pro-forma. There are no credit checks, no application to wait on and no approval stage that can hold up a despatch — which is deliberate, because it is what funds sharper pricing and deeper stockholding. The minimum order is £500 excluding VAT and new trade customers get £25 off their first order.
