From our sourcing experience in Yiwu Market , we found that Yiwu is not a good place for everyone. Not every visitor left Yiwu with a   happy     smile.

Shoppers Who Want To Shop Cheap Items
Yiwu claims itself as “paradise for shoppers”, but that’s not a proper translation. The proper translation should be “paradise for mid-sized buyers”. The actual “paradise for shoppers” should be HK or Shanghai , Yiwu is definitely not on that list.
Even for locals like us who live here, it’s still hard for us to find a right place to go shopping in the weekend. We shop more online! Most shops   here only do wholesale, NOT retail.

Buyers Who Can’t Accept Over-one-carton MOQ(except jewelry)
This is a wholesale market. There is always an MOQ for each product if the products are not in stock. Even for stocks, suppliers also prefer you buy by cartons because stocks are all pre-packed.MOQ for jewelry can be as low as 10 dozens sometimes.
If a small shop is what you only have or that’s the only place you can sell, in my opinion, you don’t necessarily need to come to Yiwu. You may   simply buy it from your local wholesale market.
Theoretically, you can buy one carton from this shop and one carton from that shop here, but the overall cost plus shipping will be high.
Shipping by big containers is what the big importers from your country are currently doing now. They can save lots of shipping cost. If you can’t    fill up even a small container, you will probably can’t compete with them for price.
Besides the traveling cost may eat up all the profit you buy from your trip. (but if you’re also for a sightseeing trip all over China, then it’s another thing.)
If lucky enough, you find something new, I mean they never exist on your local market before, and there is a good profit, and you have the ability to sell lots of them. Then you’re a lucky dog. This kind of things don’t happen all the time though.

Buyers Who Only Look For Stocks
Except a few markets like jewelry accessories, fabrics.. the rest markets here don’t have so much stock ready for you to pick up and carry away.
The market here is more like a big showroom. Most of the products you see are just samples. You need to wait for 3-20 days, even 30 days, for your products to be delivered.

Buyers Who Only Want To Deal With Factories
As far as I know, now only about 30% of the shops in Yiwu Market are the office of their own factory, the rest are all representatives and distributors. If you’re only open to trading with factories, you won’t be very happy.
To summarize, the buyer who has the buying power to ship in by containers, no matter how many products are mixed in that container, will like Yiwu better. And those who know their market very well and are always open to new opportunities will also like Yiwu.