Text/Xiabin
As "Made in China" continues to go global and its market share gradually increases, the capability and vitality of Chinese factories are directly related to the stability of the global supply chain.
Under the epidemic, how to sell goods, how to discover new business opportunities, and how to achieve transformation and upgrading?
From the "pallet" at the source of Chinese e-commerce, we may be able to see more clearly the transformation of tens of thousands of factories in China under the epidemic.
"Survive" to the huge domestic demand market
In the past few years, due to the impact of the epidemic, as a leading enterprise in the leather goods industry of women's bags in Shiling, Huadu, "the capital of leather goods in China", Obia's foreign trade orders have dropped sharply.
The company has a complete and high-quality whole industry chain, with five R&D teams in headquarters, Dubai, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Italy, four independent brands, exclusive stores in more than 20 countries, and sales in 68 countries, especially in There are thousands of dealers in the Middle East such as Dubai.
In addition to its own brand management, Obia has also successively produced OEM for more than 60 internationally renowned first- and second-tier brands in the world.
For a long time, Obia has always been a typical foreign trade enterprise, that is, the enterprise is domestic and the order is abroad.
The sudden outbreak of the new crown epidemic in 2020 has disrupted the sales of many foreign trade leather goods companies in Shiling.
The inventory that was specially prepared in the past has become a backlog of products stranded in the warehouse, and Obia is no exception.
Obia has 3 production plants in Hua, with a monthly production capacity of 30,000 leather bags.
After the resumption of work that year, Obia's order volume dropped sharply, only one of the three factories was in normal operation, and only 200 of the 1,500 workers were working, and they still needed to work in rotation.
Watching a large amount of raw materials hoarding in the factory, in order to get the workers and machines running again, Obia decided to switch to domestic sales.
However, for foreign trade companies that have been doing overseas markets and orders for a long time, how to win the domestic market is a difficult "hard bone".
Taking Obia as an example, all of the company's market shares at that time came from abroad, and its social accounts and e-commerce platform websites were only for foreign markets.
In order to quickly open up the domestic market, Obia settled in Alibaba's 1688 super factory.
"In China, we basically have no familiar customers. The original intention of entering Alibaba's 1688 super factory is to help companies open customer acquisition channels and open up the domestic market as soon as possible. Judging from the actual situation over the past year, the customer acquisition effect is far It exceeded our expectations." Liu Weijiao, head of Guangzhou Aobia Leather Industry Co., Ltd., said that many customers took the initiative to find us, and the orders came to the door automatically. The largest order amounted to more than 5 million yuan.
Liu Weijiao introduced that after more than a year of transformation and settlement, through the 1688 super factory, the annual sales of Obia's single customer can reach more than 50 million yuan.
In recent years, the country has also made an important decision to "stabilize foreign trade", and has launched a series of policy measures to "stabilize foreign trade", including the "Implementation Opinions on Supporting the Transfer of Exported Products to Domestic Sales" and other policies to bail out and benefit enterprises. It supports marketable export commodities to open up the domestic market.
Nowadays, more and more foreign trade factories have become "treasure factories" in the field of domestic trade by entering the platform. These foreign trade enterprises that are actively transforming and upgrading have realized the business model of "inner wall and outer wall".
Seize new business opportunities under the epidemic
On Alibaba 1688, which is known as the "pallet" of China's e-commerce source in the industry, about 500,000 factories support the shopping carts of professional "sellers".
Recently, 1688 started the "Factory Direct Picking Season", allowing the "Treasure Factory" to bring more abundant products and business opportunities.
In the 1688 exhibition hall, you can see more than 400 new products and popular models from 10 industries, focusing on the fields of home economy, camping, decompression and health.
These commodities are pallets specially organized by traders for content e-commerce such as Xiaohongshu, Douyin and Kuaishou, as well as buyers of cross-border, live broadcast, social and community e-commerce, reflecting current consumption trends and new business opportunities.
Yu Yong, vice president of Alibaba and president of 1688, believes that under the impact of the epidemic, merchants have become more and more aware that it is not the need to move their business online after the epidemic, but the rapid integration of online and offline businesses.
In Yu Yong's view, trade practitioners need to turn crises into opportunities.
The key to countercyclical growth is to see opportunities amidst crises and turn crises into opportunities.
There are still plenty of opportunities ahead.
The first is the stay-at-home economy, because more and more people are willing to be alone.
"It turned out that we were superficial, and what we saw with the naked eye was the rapid growth of the pet economy and pet toys. But thinking about it, there are actually many opportunities when a person is alone.
The second is to please the economy.
In particular, the pleasing economy for women is becoming more and more prosperous, and women are the ones who plead themselves.
Whether it is a B-type buyer or a C-type individual buyer, more and more gifts are purchased.
The third is the health economy and the camping economy.
"This is a clear trend." Yu Yong said.
"We have been engaged in foreign trade for more than 20 years. We have been developing the domestic market since last year, and we just took advantage of the camping wind." said Xie Cuifen, sales director of Foshan Nanhai Jia Shifa Industrial Co., Ltd. The 1688 platform tested the water for domestic sales.
In the first quarter of this year, the domestic sales of the company's own brand Areffa increased by 1-2 times year-on-year.
"Several distributors come to discuss cooperation every day, hoping to get consignment sales." Xie Cuifen said excitedly that the current domestic camping equipment industry is just emerging, but the future has great potential.
At present, the company has plans to expand production capacity, build online and offline omni-channels, and increase investment in research and development.
Service specialization, special new enterprise upgrade
The "14th Five-Year Plan for Digital Economy Development" officially issued at the beginning of this year proposed that it is necessary to further promote the digital transformation of the industry and accelerate the cultivation of a group of "specialized, special and new" small and medium-sized enterprises and single champion enterprises in the manufacturing industry.
The national-level specialized, specialized and new enterprises known as "little giants" are the "pioneers" among specialized, specialized and new enterprises, and they are also the "main attackers" to solve the problem of "stuck neck" in the manufacturing industry.
The epidemic has accelerated the process of global industrial digitization, making the already clear transformation direction clearer, and promoting enterprise transformation with data as the source of power is the only way for small and medium-sized enterprises to grow into specialized, specialized and new enterprises. The key to the continued growth of a "little giant" enterprise.
"But they (specialized, special and new small giant enterprises) also face some problems in their development. Most of them are not due to lack of digital upgrading, but lack of talents to do it." Zhou Hui, senior director of Alibaba and general manager of 1688 industrial products industry It is pointed out that most of the specialized, specialized, and new factories are located in second- and third-tier cities, and there is a serious shortage of digital talents.
In Zhou Hui's view, it has become an irreversible trend for factories to move from automation to digitization and intelligence. How to help specialized, specialized, and new enterprises improve their digital capabilities, develop new markets, and integrate into the global industrial chain are all efforts to promote digital technology and the real economy. Enterprises that integrate and develop need to think about issues.
It is reported that the 1688 platform currently has 484 specialized, special and new small giant companies, 67 individual champion companies, and nearly 2,000 provincial-level specialized and special new companies.
In the process of contacting these specialized and new enterprises, Zhou Hui realized that almost all of these enterprises have their own factories, strong R&D capabilities, and many years of technology accumulation in the subdivision field, but they are very unfamiliar with digital transformation and upgrading.
"Overall, they have common pain points, including insufficient brand awareness, low level of digitalization, incomplete local closed-loop industrial chain, lack of experience in online market development, and lack of digital and e-commerce talents." The digitalization level of the new factory in terms of customer management system and internal process management is uneven, and there is a lot of room for digitalization in production.
In order to help the specialized, specialized, and new factories accelerate their digital transformation and upgrading, at the beginning of this year, the China Industrial Internet Research Institute under the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology signed a "specialized, specialized, and new" enterprise service framework cooperation agreement with 1688. E-commerce operations, online marketing and other aspects set up exclusive service packages for "specialized, refined and new" small and medium-sized enterprises to help enterprises improve their innovation capabilities and competitiveness.
Zhang Xiaotong, chief engineer of China Industrial Internet Research Institute, said that it is necessary to do a good job in "specialized, special and new" small and medium-sized enterprises from the strategic height of supporting the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry, building a new development pattern, and helping common prosperity.