I used to grind punches to form for dies such as yours, so I know that a lot of lips...a WHOLE LOTTA LOT...of lips have to be stamped and sold just to get to the break even point.
A company here in town buys their dies from China, because the up front cost is so cheap. Unfortunately, they have to be tore apart and rebuilt to before they can make good parts. My brother was the one tasked with doing this, and he used to scream and holler that management needed to track the cost of the die during it's lifetime, how much work had to put into it, how long it lasted, how many pieces it scrapped, how much production time lost. Then the "bargains" could be compared with a die that worked right out of the crate.
Obviously, the guys who got a big "Atta boy!" for buying such bargains fought that idea tooth and nail.
In the end, my brother got fed up and moved on to South Carolina.