China's Footwear Industry Overseas Market Line Needs To Be Fully Rolled Out.

Once upon a time, it would be impossible for many Chinese entrepreneurs to start their own brand overseas. However, as domestic raw materials and labor costs continue to rise, as well as a series of factors such as the reduction of overseas orders, many Chinese factory bosses find that the development of their own brands into international brands may be the only way out for enterprises.

"We want to sell to the international fashion industry." Recently, the nine Xing Holdings Limited Executive Director and chief operating officer, Qi Le people, said. The listed foundry manufacturer in Hongkong has been the focus of OEM for 29 years after its establishment. But 5 years ago, nine Xing began to seek to push its own brand shoes into the international market. In 2012, the company will plan to take a more bold move, namely, to open its StellaLuna store in Paris and London.

In fact, the road of "made in China" brand is not smooth.

"The main obstacle is the brand". When it comes to the difficulties that China will make to the international market, Lu Qiang, the senior brand expert and general manager of the original general strategy consulting company, said that the mature markets such as Europe and America have been carved up by many famous brands, and consumers rarely buy brand products that they have never heard of before. Especially when these products come from countries or regions that lack the "country" brand.

If the international marketing master Kotler PHILPS once predicted, "the next 20 years will be the fast growing period of Chinese brands", then the foundries may be the new force of Chinese brands.

　　 Transformation trend of OEM Enterprises

There has been such a story in the bookstore that two years ago, Hu Guohui, the special assistant to President of Foxconn, the chairman of the channel business group, painted a "U curve" for the company. What many people expected is that the bottom line of the U line, which represents the thinnest profit of enterprises, is Foxconn's most powerful foundry business.

In fact, even as the "king of foundry", Fuji Yasushiya, like all enterprises that are struggling with small profits, is eager for the brands and channels with higher profits at both ends. However, two years later, including flying tiger shopping and galloping horses, Foxconn's progress in channel and brand is not smooth. Not only that, but the size of the "king of foundry" has made Foxconn worse.

The attempt to transform the channels of OEM giants is not a case of Foxconn. Baosheng International Holdings Limited is a relatively successful example. Although the name sounds strange, but as the world's largest brand sportswear and clothing manufacturer Yuyuan Industrial (Group) Co., Ltd., a controlling subsidiary, it contracted most of the sports brands including Nike and Adidas. At present, through direct operation and merger and acquisition, in 2011, Baosheng international direct and franchise stores reached 2765 and 3282 respectively, with 24 production lines.

The successful experience of Baosheng international is attributed to the outside world: "trust yourself, and at the same time let go of the regional chain retailers who are in the process of creating the successful mode of Gome expansion in sports products by integrating the latter's channel resources."

Tracing back to the earlier stage of the transformation of Chinese foundry enterprises, the name of Anta should not be ignored. Before the Asian financial crisis, Anta and many shoe manufacturers in Jinjiang produced sports shoes for multinational companies, which is an ordinary OEM factory.

According to senior brand expert Chen Liang, when Anta boss Ding Zhizhong began implementing brand strategy in 1997, the market was almost monopolized by several strong brands in Europe and the United States. Ding Zhizhong opened up a new path to take marketing as a breakthrough. First, he signed an agreement with the Chinese national table tennis team, and invited world champion Kong Linghui to become the spokesman of the brand image. Starting from the small and medium-sized cities in China, he set up his own brand and sales network. Since 1999, TV ads with Kong Linghui as spokesperson appeared on CCTV. After two months of the advertisement, the ordering companies in the whole country began to swarm into Anta factory. At the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, Kong Linghui won the men's singles champion of table tennis, and Anta was also famous for the first World War.

Chen Liang believes that long term foundry has accumulated the foundation of improving product quality, technology and production equipment for Anta, and gained the original accumulation of production management experience. The key to occupy the market is to create an independent brand and succeed in marketing.

　　 " Licensing period "Or only input no output.

Although large and small foundries have the awareness or action of transformation, not every enterprise's pay will be rewarded.

"The transformation of foundry enterprises is not easy, especially the road to create independent brands is even more uneven." Zhuang Hua, a general manager of kovo Electronics Technology (Wuxi) Limited, told reporters that in general, in the process of creating a brand, an enterprise can withstand the transition period of not making money for about two years. It may take 5 years to form a brand team to start making profits.

Chuang Hua, the parent company of kovo electronics, is a foreign trade enterprise mainly engaged in electrical foundry in Suzhou. In 2005, the annual sales of the vacuum cleaner in the OEM produced by the company reached 800 million yuan, but from 2002, the development of the enterprise seemed to touch the ceiling. According to Zhuang Hua, competitors are springing up like mushrooms, numerous small and medium-sized enterprises that scramble for orders and compete for the market. "And the loss of talents to these small businesses is the processing enterprises, who naturally pay high salaries to whom."

In fact, talent competition, bargaining power reduction, rising cost and loss of orders are the reasons for domestic manufacturers to seriously consider transformation.

"The road to OEM is only one way to go. It's the most important thing to do is to grab someone's cake and grab it, so the enterprise can't see a sustainable future." Chuang Hua frankly.

　　 Group brand Ideas sprout

In the press interview process, entrepreneurs and industry observers who have the above views are not few. Not only the small and medium-sized foundries of Chuang Hua may encounter difficulties, even the listed companies such as nine Xing holdings will also face many challenges.

"OEM manufacturers will continue to rely on traditional customers while trying to build their own brands, and these customers may not be willing to see the business and industry keep abreast of themselves." Christian Helsen, a consumer industry expert at Hong Kong University Science & Technology, thinks that

Based on the above reasons, Christian said that OEM manufacturers may not be able to change their business models. At the moment, there are few Chinese brands that go overseas.

Fortunately, in recent years, domestic organizations and standards such as GMC quality manufacturers alliance have begun to emerge, which means that another brand idea of "made in China" to expand overseas markets is sprouting.

" Made in China " In fact, there is no shortage of quality products. Pan Jianyue, general manager of global market group, said, "however, in the current international market," made in China "is hard to fight alone. If a group of excellent manufacturers can unite to set up industry screening standards and thresholds, build a group brand with high demands and high standards may be a more practical way.

In this regard, Lu Qiang agreed, and explained that some countries or regions through long-term efforts, enterprises in certain aspects of the formation of a very high reputation, such as "made in Germany", "German technology" means reliable performance, Italy leather shoes, Swiss watches in the international market also has a strong appeal.

In Lu Qiang's view, China's enterprises have not yet established a national brand, "if we say reluctantly, low cost is the meaning of" made in China ". To form a national brand with appeal, we must realize the success of many enterprises in the international market.

"At present and even within the next 10 years, the internationalization of Chinese enterprises can not rely on national brands, but only rely on their own strength to build brands, so the difficulty will be greater." Lu Qiang said frankly.

　　 Brand war products or remain King

although Made in China The brand advantage is not big, but this does not mean that the transformation factory has no way to go.

Lu Qiang believes that if China's own brand enters the international market, if it is Southeast Asia, the Middle East, Africa and other places, it might as well be used by TCL, Lenovo and other private brands, because in these areas, "made in China" is still very influential.

As for the developed countries such as Europe and the United States, they are divided into two brand strategies. The first is to use private brand and then use low price as a means of competition. For example, the slogan of HUAWEI in the United States is "everything is the same, except the price". The premise for doing so is that the gross profit of these industries is high, otherwise the tactics of low price can not be used. The second way is to acquire local brands, such as TCL's acquisition of Schneider, Thompson and Lenovo's acquisition of IBM in order to enter Europe.

However, whether to use its own brand or buy the brand? Chen Liang believes that it depends on the industry characteristics and the gross margin of the industry.

Chen Liang told reporters that, in general, such as color TV, PC mature industries, gross profit has been very low, product homogenization is obvious, the cycle of building brands from scratch is very long, for enterprises, the opportunity cost is very large. Chen Liang's proposal is that it is better to buy local famous brands directly, but this requires the enterprise itself to have a high level of management, otherwise it will be difficult to succeed.

As for the industry with higher gross margin, Chen Liang believes that the strategy of private brand is more applicable, because even in price war, enterprises still have the ability to invest in promoting brand.

"In the future, Chinese enterprises do not adopt low price tactics and rely on quality to enter the high-end market, that is the real" Chinese creation ". Chen Liang said.

In this regard, Lu Qiang reminded that the use of private brands, enterprises must also have their own unique ability. For example, HUAWEI has all the intellectual property rights of the product, so it is not inferior to the main competitor in the measurable product function, but the price is much lower, so it can use its own brand to open a way out.

In Lu Qiang's view, enterprises that are really promising in the international market should be like this: relying on R & D to make products get the advantage, and then drive brands through products. When customers accept products, they will naturally accept the brand.

"This path, though slow at the initial stage, requires enterprises to invest continuously in research and development, and work in marketing for a long time, but this is the most promising." Lu Qiang said.