Wenzhou shoe industry was forced to fail to be alarmist

Today, small and medium shoe companies in Wenzhou are in an embarrassing development stage.

A friend recently inspected the footwear market in Guangzhou, Quanzhou, Fujian, Wenzhou, Zhejiang, and Baoding, Hebei. This friend made leather shoes wholesale in Changsha, Hunan Province. His feeling is that Wenzhou shoes are now not easy to sell. Just like him, some wholesalers in Guangzhou used to go to Wenzhou to get goods. Now they all go to Hebei, Henan and Hunan. To get the goods, because the same low-end products cost less than 10 yuan in pairs in some places.

In the past two years, the tanning industry in Hebei and Henan has rapidly emerged, coupled with low costs such as labor, water and electricity, and factories, and the advantage has been highlighted. The latecomers first took over, thus seizing a large share of the mid- to low-end footwear market. Similar to the development path in Wenzhou, most shoe companies in these places are also expanding on the basis of their own courtyards, using the “workshop type” model for production and management.

"As long as they work hard, Wenzhou's well-known shoe country status can be difficult to protect," my friend said.

The discourse of "Guangzhou shoes leading the trend, Wenzhou shoes leading the market" popular in the industry seems to have been challenged by the market. This is also true. At present, industry shifts and cost pressure have hindered the development of Wenzhou shoe companies. According to the survey data, the number of shoe-making enterprises in Wenzhou has shrunk to a large extent, from 5,000 in 2002 to 2,600 today.

So, where are the future of these Wenzhou small and medium shoe companies?

Going upward is a way out, but it's easier said than done. Wenzhou Pubei gathered a group of low-end shoe factories. Taking an A factory with an annual sales of about 20 million yuan as an example, it has six or seven sets of grinding tools, three assembly lines and more than 70 workers. At present, a set of grinding tools is about 60,000 yuan, and the assembly line is about 150,000 yuan. If you take the middle and high-end, the cost of upgrading your equipment will need to double, exceeding the net profit of this shoe factory for one year.
In addition to the high cost of upgrading, there is a problem that the enthusiasm of these manufacturers to upgrade and upgrade is not high. For example, the owner of Factory A said that the shoe market has limited capacity. They do 890,000 pairs of shoes a year and distribute it to dealers all over the country. They will not be able to sell any more, and the situation of other small factories is similar.

In addition, the design and research and development are also the soft underbelly of Wenzhou's small and medium shoe companies. “A boss from Wenzhou Cangnan, who was working on mid-to-high-end shoes, had failed to do a good job in the design of the open-book version. He also had problems with management. He closed down in two years.” A factory owner told me.

Of course, Wenzhou footwear is not an advantage. In terms of design, Wenzhou shoe companies still have a hand in hand. As the national shoe design center, Wenzhou shoes outstanding design level is still beyond doubt. "Fashion shoes, I eventually chose several manufacturers in Wenzhou." Friends said that although cheap, leather shoes design in other places is not comparable to Wenzhou. Next, how to make full use of the shoe design center platform, perhaps a breakthrough in Wenzhou shoe size.

While walking down, Wenzhou still has a loyal customer base. “I still like to do business with Wenzhou people.” A friend said that when he was purchasing goods from Hebei and Henan provinces and other places, the money was used in the past. The other person often said the following sentence: goods are sent to you; and the same situation, Wenzhou The reply given by the shoe factory is specific to a certain date and it is very fast. "Only the product is similar, I still want to choose the low price, the cost is the most realistic." Friends added.

On the one hand, the market share was robbed, and the transformation and upgrade of the small and medium-sized shoe enterprises in Wenzhou is imminent. On the other hand, they still have the weight in hand. In any case, ten years east of the river, ten years west of Hexi, the future of the footwear market will continue to shuffle. Although there is still a market for declining positions, it is clear that many well-established Wenzhou enterprises have been reluctant to re-enter their old roads under the pressure. They have tried to open up new markets at the high end. Kangxi Group Chairman Zheng Xiukang said that if the company continues to develop, the space is high-end, so as to become the internationally recognized brand in the future. The Aokang Group in the same city also used the 2008 Olympic marketing to achieve a triple jump.

In fact, the experience of Wenzhou is a microcosm of the current transition of China's economic industry.