Editor's note:
Han clothes are like water, a dream for a thousand years. Whenever the weather is fine on weekends, many "little brothers" and "little sisters" dressed in gorgeous and elegant Hanfu, walk slowly by the Daming Lake in Jinan, with fragrant hair on their temples, wide sleeves and flowing clouds, and a jade stand in the wind. It seems that thousands of years have passed, and the ancient style is coming.In the eyes of the public, Hanfu is a niche. But data shows that the Hanfu industry has developed into a tens of billions market on Taobao. Nearly 20 million people visit Hanfu stores on Taobao every day, and thousands of Hanfu merchants are constantly transforming around market demand, just like the Internet industry is renovating.
Look at Caoxian County for three-point Hanfu. What is unexpected is that 1/3 of the popular online Hanfu costumes come from Cao County, Heze City. Today, Caoxian County continues to maintain its leading position as the second "super-large Taobao village cluster" in the country, and leads the country in the number of Taobao towns. Recently, Qilu Evening News and Qilu One Point visited Caoxian County, Heze City, where they met all kinds of e-commerce entrepreneurs who dare to strive for innovation, explored the real stories of the "return" of rural talents, and analyzed the rural revitalization code of Hanfu e-commerce... This article is The first in a series of reports.
Qilu Evening News·Qilu One Point Reporter
Ma Hui, Huang Xiang and Li Jia
Shu Mou Zhang Tao
In 2020, This is the year that Caoxian County, Heze City, broke out of the circle, and "Hanfu in three parts of the world" became its new geographical label.
Daji Town, Cao County, is one of the first batch of "Taobao Towns" in China and the only town in Shandong Province that is fully covered by Taobao villages. In large market towns that lack industrial support, every household once had no male laborers all year round. In order to support their families, they all went out to work. Later, Daji Town gradually found its own path to wealth - e-commerce, which started from the photo studio clothing in Dinglou Village.
Following the development trend, from the largest performance clothing processing and sales base in the country to a production and sales center for three-thirds of the Hanfu world, the local government will develop rural e-commerce as an important carrier of targeted poverty alleviation, stimulate online entrepreneurship, and drive Villagers start businesses and become rich. In this way, all 32 villages in Daji Town became Taobao villages, forming a "everyoneThere is something to do and every family can make money.” E-commerce merchants in big market towns have their own wish in the new year: to polish the sign of “Cao County Hanfu”.
The "Internet Temperament" of the Small Town
On February 24, the thirteenth day of the first lunar month, the weather forecast included snow, and the snow in Heze came as promised.
Driving into Cao County, Heze, it is not much different from other counties in northern cities. There are facades with various signs on both sides of the road. Close to the center of the county, there are more and more newly built communities and parks. Thriving.
What makes Caoxian County unique, apart from its roasted whole lamb and roasted beef, is its "Internet temperament". Wood products, performance costumes, and Hanfu are all leaders on Taobao. At an intersection on the East Ring Road in Caoxian County, a row of large red characters on "The Second Super Large Taobao Village Cluster in the Country" is particularly eye-catching. Among them, the performance clothing and Hanfu industry's annual sales are staggering, reaching 6.5 billion yuan in 2019. In 2020, despite the impact of the epidemic, there are still more than 3 billion yuan. In fact, this number is not easy. It adds up to one hundred yuan and two hundred yuan.
Daji Town is located in the southwest of Cao County, walking on Sangwan Road that runs through Daji Town.What I feel is full of confidence, and the signs on the roadside must clearly identify themselves: one of the first batch of Taobao villages in China, and the only town in Shandong Province with full coverage of Taobao villages. In the production workshop of Taobao Industrial Park in Daji Town, before the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, workers have already begun to rush to make clothes, orderly and busy.
It is this small town where our ancestors once relied on growing corn and wheat or working outside to maintain their economic income. "Seven or eight years ago, when I went home to celebrate the New Year, I basically didn't see any strong male laborers." A staff member of the Cao County County Government whose hometown is in Daji Town told reporters that in order to make a living, everyone went out to find a way out, or started a business. , or go to work. It is understood that many villagers had an annual income of less than 4,500 yuan and were considered poor.
Now, the e-commerce industry has lit up the hope of this small town. From time to time, slogans such as "Open an online store and sell it to the world, make clothing processing rich" appear on the walls on both sides of Sangwan Road. Every thirty to fifty meters is a warehouse or processing workshop. In addition, there are also various shops on both sides of the road. , from fabrics and accessories to processing and production, every link in the performance clothing and Hanfu industry chain can find an interface here.
The doors of those shops don’t have much sense of design, but everyone seems to be very good at focusing on the key points, such as "Taobao", "e-commerce", "Hanfu", "embroidery" and other key words. "For e-commerce companies, offline appearance is not important. The key is to let people know what we do." A boss who runs a factory in the town's industrial park told reporters.
The development of the e-commerce industry has also brought great convenience to the lives of villagers in Daji Town. The shops on both sides of the road are full of private cars, including C-class car brands such as BMW and Audi. Huawei mobile phone authorized stores and Meituan takeout services have also reached the town.
The famous "costume town"
Speaking of the changes in the e-commerce industry in Daji Town, we must first start from the earliest Speaking of Dinglou Village, which is engaged in clothing, it was once known as the "No. 1 Taobao Village in Shandong". Most of the children's performance clothes sold online are made here.
As early as the early 1990s, individual villagers in Dinglou Village started a clothing trading business. They processed clothing for photo studios and theater troupes. Ren Qingsheng, secretary of the Dinglou Village branch, recalled that they used to pick up people to carry them and set up sales outlets in various cities. Later, when a Taobao store opened, surrounding villagers accidentally took photos and sold them online, and reaped the benefits. Soon, every household in Daji Town opened an online store.
In this way, it gradually developed from studio clothing to the production of performance clothing. Before getting involved in Hanfu, Caoxian County was the largest performance costume processing base in China. Both China Post and Yunda have set up sorting stations in industrial parks in towns. Logistics costs are low and delivery is convenient.
On the other hand, the Daji Town government is also encouraging villagers to open Taobao stores. In 2013, Su Yongzhong, then secretary of the Party Committee of Daji Township, keenly felt that this was an opportunity of the times. He immediately established an e-commerce development office to renovate roads, transform power grids, and build an e-commerce industrial park. He said: "It used to be that young people surfing the Internet were regarded as not doing their jobs. Now that rural e-commerce is developing, when people see young people sitting next to computers, they think they are doing business."
At first, for the newly started e-commerce For merchants, the government will help them apply for business licenses and fiber-optic home access for free, and provide them with e-commerce training to ensure that these new e-commerce merchants can get on the right track. More and more online stores are opening in the town, and they cannot do without this careful "care".
Currently, there are more than 16,000 online stores in Daji Town, more than 300 Tmall stores, and nearly 2,000 performance clothing companies, producing various performance clothing, photography props and dance shoes. Today, due to the emergence of "Taobao" and the government's e-commerce support policies, most migrant workers in Daji Town choose to return to their hometowns to start businesses. More than 700 college students have returned to their hometowns to start businesses, and more than 7,000 migrant farmers have returned to their hometowns to work.
“Many of the costumes worn by children in the Spring Festival Gala of Henan Satellite TV, Hunan Satellite TV, Liaoning Satellite TV and other local channels are from our Cao County.” Tang Tong, staff member of the E-commerce Service Office of Daji Town, Cao County Tell reporters.
According to public data, the sales of performance costumes in Daji Town exceeded 6 billion in 2019, accounting for 70% of the total online sales of e-commerce platforms such as Taobao and Tmall. It is a well-known "costume town".
Affected by the epidemic, the national theatrical performance market has shrunk extremely in 2020, and group activities are not allowed to be held in schools. The originally hot-selling children's performance clothing has been backlogged a lot last year, almost Every household has inventory.
PerformanceThe inventory backlog of services has led to a tying up of funds, which not only affects daily life, but also has a greater impact on the company's future development and layout. "A practitioner who has a backlog of children's camouflage performance clothing worth more than 2 million yuan said that this year's new models will not be too aggressive and will be updated little by little.
So local practitioners are looking for Looking for a way out, eager to survive the desperate situation
Hanfu, forcing industrial upgrading
However, the group of students who were at home during the epidemic last year suddenly suddenly The collective attention to Hanfu once again gave Caoxian County an opportunity. In other words, it gave Caoxian County’s e-commerce merchants another opportunity.
Hanfu, JK uniforms and Lolita skirts are known as the new "three bankrupt sisters". The price of Hanfu with different fabrics and printing techniques can range from a few hundred yuan to tens of thousands of yuan. But for newcomers who have just joined the industry, these popular Hanfus priced at 100 yuan each are economical and affordable. When you look carefully, you will find that most of them are shipped to Cao County, Heze, Shandong.
From performance clothes to Hanfu, the styles and patterns are more sophisticated. In large market towns, there are tens of thousands of embroidery machines. A practitioner told reporters that it is no exaggeration to say that they can copy whatever styles are on TV. So, soon, factories in Daji Town began to switch to the production of Hanfu.
Yin Qixing was originally engaged in cross-border trade in Urumqi. He had already settled in Xinjiang, and his Mandarin accent was assimilated by the local people. In 2018, he returned to his hometown to invest in an e-commerce business for performance clothing. During the epidemic, he quickly switched to the Hanfu business. Work started on the sixth day of the Lunar New Year this year, and workers have returned one after another. There is still a backlog of more than 1,000 orders ahead.
There are six embroidery machines neatly placed in Yin Qixing’s Hanfu factory. Press the switch, and the machine needle will automatically thread on the silk, and various patterns can be embroidered in just a few minutes. These patterned fabrics are then cut by skilled weavers and machines into complete Hanfu, which are eventually sold across the country.
According to a survey report, in terms of price, Hanfu with a price below 200 yuan has the highest sales, accounting for 67.6% of sales, followed by the 200-400 yuan range. Most of the Hanfu in this price range comes from merchants like Yin Qixing in Cao County.
“We have suffered copyright losses before, but now we are all engaged in originality. We basically launch a new model every half a month. Recently, we are preparing to launch a CP model with a crane pattern. The price is less than 200 yuan. It is expected that This can be popular." Yin Qixing said that although the current audience likes to buy cheap Hanfu, if you plagiarize it, these Hanfu fans will not necessarily buy it. The Hanfu that had more than 1,000 orders before was also designed by myself.
However, most designers in Caoxian County are found and signed by merchants through the Internet (mainly Weibo), and they can collect some of the most popular styles anytime and anywhere, such as the popular costume drama "Zhuan". For the costumes in "Sister-in-law" and "Da Qin Fu", etc., I then contacted the designer, spent two to three thousand yuan to buy the copyright, and changed the pictures into design drawings for making clothes. "The cost of a good designer is not low, and it is difficult to attract them to a place like Caoxian. But only by finding a suitable partner and paying the design cost can we ensure a continuous flow of original products." Yin Qixing said frankly that this is a A path to continuous breakthroughs in the process of trial and error.
Yin Qixing also began to try to communicate with top original painters in China, paid more attention to product design, and began to build his own brand steadily. "Since we have chosen the path of Hanfu, we must make a truly recognized original brand." Yin Qixing said.
The poor villages have all become "Taobao villages"
The Hanfu industry has brought vitality to the town. It has brought the possibility of revitalization to plain villages that originally did not have many resources.
Getting acquainted with Hanfu has helped Li Yan, a post-95s girl, get rid of poverty, live in a two-story building, and have a career of her own. Li Yan's family lives in Dinglou Village. Her father works outside the home and her mother works at home. The conditions at home are very difficult, and they don't even see meat and fish a few times a year. Because of family difficulties, Li Yan dropped out of junior high school. Later, Li Yan went to work for a courier company and gradually gained a certain understanding of e-commerce and gained experience.Her cousin would also teach her a thing or two. Since many of her neighbors were doing e-commerce, she also came up with the idea of starting a business overseas.
First she followed the trend, and Li Yan sold homemade costumes online. But it didn’t take long for her to smell the business opportunities of Hanfu. “The style must be good-looking,” so she signed up for professional training in art and operations at the Tianhua E-commerce Industrial Park.
Like many of her neighbors who are engaged in e-commerce, Li Yan quickly made money, three to four hundred thousand a year. Not only did her family of four escape poverty, but they also lived in a two-story building. , Li Yan also bought a car for herself. "Performance costumes have been affected, so we focused on children's traditional costumes. Those fairy costumes and princess costumes are the most popular among online buyers." Li Yan, who is quite business-minded, said.
When there are many orders, she will invite some neighborhood women to help sew clothes like other factories. "Many of them are skilled workers. They can finish a piece of work in ten minutes and earn 5 yuan for each piece. They usually take care of the family and can't travel far. Being a needleworker can also help support the family." Li Yan said that she now attaches great importance to originality, and she has already obtained several design copyrights.
Wang Fengqing, who is in his 30s this year, just returned to his hometown from Qingdao to start a business last year. In a small live broadcast room, Wang Fengqing has to live broadcast on Kuaishou Live for 4 hours every day. From the first few days Ten people followed, and later he was able to sell more than 100 orders a day. Wang Fengqing's live broadcast e-commerce has also become a model for surrounding neighbors to follow. "Actually, Hanfu is the same as other product categories. As long as you find the direction and stick to it, you will definitely gain good results." Wang Fengqing said very simply.
Similarly, there are also e-commerce companies that are working towards the mid-to-high end, such as Qiyong. A Ming-style Hanfu with accessories he made can be sold for more than 70,000 yuan. "Because we only make one piece of this kind of customized high-end product, the cost of plate making, manuscript fee and proofing fee is equally shared, so the cost is very high." For Hanfu, Qi Yong has been studying for the past three years, from Hanfu form to drawings. From design to design, he perfected his knowledge structure bit by bit. He had read books such as "Clothes of the Ming Dynasty" and "History of Chinese Armor". He also privately studied the costumes of Duke Yansheng collected by the Confucius Mansion. He will also challenge some difficult armors. Many people can't believe it was made by a farmer after seeing it. The details are very realistic. For Qi Yong, he hopes that the quality of his products will become higher and a brand can be formed. He also hopes that the Hanfu industry in Caoxian County can collectively grow faster.
E-commerce has injected vitality into small counties. Currently, 20,000 people in Cao County have achieved targeted poverty alleviation through e-commerce, accounting for 20% of the county’s poverty alleviation population. 32 provincial-level poverty-stricken villages have been developed into Taobao villages, lifting the entire village out of poverty. Cao County’s new targeted poverty alleviation model of “e-commerce + industry + poor households” has been fully promoted in the local experience column on the official website of the Ministry of Commerce.
Today, for the people of Caoxian County who are engaged in the production of Hanfu, their road to upgrading has just begun, and they are full of confidence in future development.
