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Economic Daily reporter Li Jing

In the 40-degree hot weather, down jackets are selling like hot cakes. Recently, Pinghu China Garment City, the largest down jacket wholesale market in China, held the second joint ordering meeting of original and carefully selected down jackets this year. In three days, 1.6 million pieces were sold, with sales exceeding 320 million yuan, up 129% year-on-year.

At Pinghu Jiuling Garment Co., Ltd. located in Pinghu Economic and Technological Development Zone, Jiaxing, Zhejiang, Chu Lihui, the person in charge, told reporters while trimming the threads that there are now six factories working overtime to produce orders for the company's order fair, and two to three thousand pieces of clothing are delivered to the warehouse every day. Because they have to rush to deliver 60,000 down jackets to customers in September, they are short of manpower recently, and they have to work "part-time". At the same time, as the secretary of the first party branch of Hongyu, Pinghu China Garment City, Chu Lihui also often organizes party member volunteers to visit the market. "We must always urge merchants to make good clothes and not destroy the brand of Pinghu down jackets." Chu Lihui said.

After more than a decade of development, Pinghu, a small city in northern Zhejiang that does not produce a single feather, has taken up about 80% of the country's down jacket market share. Currently, Pinghu has more than 1,000 down jacket companies of all sizes. In 2023, the annual shipment of down jackets will exceed 200 million pieces, with annual sales exceeding 45 billion yuan.

In spring and summer, we clear inventory, design, and renovate; in autumn, we launch new products and review orders; in winter, we strive to achieve annual sales... In the past, the winter clothing market was "one busy season to earn a year's income", but now we have to be busy from the beginning of the year to the end of the year, and the rest of the year is spent preparing for peak season sales. Currently, nearly 30% of the stores in Pinghu China Garment City are being renovated. "This is also to showcase our brand image and give customers a better shopping experience," said Xu Yao, the head of the Youji brand, which is currently being renovated.

Originality is the secret to "explosive orders" in the off-season. Over the years, Pinghu has continuously optimized the industry's talent training system, built a strong team of original designer talents, and gradually formed a diversified development trend of independent innovative design and independent brand creation. For example, Manbu Cha Cha is a "veteran" who has been in the clothing city since its inception. The stall is located in a prime location near the entrance of Gate 1 on the first floor, and the business has always been good. In 2022, the brand opened a new store on the third floor to do originality, attracting more high-end customers. Qiu Ting, the brand manager of Manbu Cha Cha, said that the brand will release hundreds of new models every year, and about 60 models will be put on the market after screening.

According to incomplete statistics, more than half of the more than 2,000 ready-made clothing stalls in the clothing city have independent research and development capabilities. Wu Xuequan, executive deputy general manager of Pinghu China Clothing City, told reporters that judging from the market feedback in recent years, original designs have become more and more competitive in the market, and only better quality and newer styles can promote long-term sales. In order to encourage originality, in 2021, the clothing city specially created an original design area on the third floor, screened high-quality merchants to settle in and gave certain rent discounts. In addition, the "Pinghu China Clothing City Style Registration and Filing System" was established to protect the original styles filed within the market, punish merchants selling "imitation versions", and the recognition of original filings has increased year by year. In the past two years, the number of new styles filed in the market has increased year by year, from 1,200 in 2021 to nearly 5,000 in 2023. From January to July 2024, there have been more than 2,000 styles, and the number of cases handled by complaints has dropped from 235 in 2021 to 103 in 2023.

Chen Jiali, chief engineer of Pinghu Economic and Information Bureau, introduced that in recent years, Pinghu has provided more than 100 million yuan in support funds for clothing brand support, exhibition and competition, and digital transformation. In addition to the efforts of the business entities, government departments are also constantly guiding through top-level design and policy support to promote the adjustment and optimization of the Pinghu down jacket industry structure and climb to the high end of the value chain. Wang Qinhua, associate professor of clothing design at Jiaxing Vocational and Technical College, analyzed that the front-end design must grasp the market trends so that the products will be popular in the market. The development of digitalization and informatization allows the market to predict the trends of the next season more timely, and helps counter-season research and development and sales, but the long-term development of the industry also requires merchants and relevant departments to strengthen the control of quality, especially in the domestic sales channel, to change the inherent idea of ​​some domestic consumers that "exported clothing is of better quality" and establish consumers' confidence in domestic brands.

Original title: Why are down jackets here selling well in the off-season?

(Source: Economic Daily)

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