Wenling Footwear Industry Regenerates Under Pressure

2011 Wenling 6004 size shoes The total output of the enterprise is 1 billion 200 million pairs. 1 billion 200 million pairs, which symbolizes the 925 square kilometers of county level cities. footwear industry The production accounts for 1/10! 1 billion 200 million pairs of the whole country, which meets the demand of the whole world's 1/5 population. According to the 30 centimeter length of each pair of shoes, it can even circle around the equator 9 times. How about Wenling shoes? Where should Wenling shoe industry go? With these questions, journalists enter local shoe companies and investigate.

The footwear industry in Wenling started in the 70s of last century. At the very beginning, it was a start-up stage. Most of the enterprises were manual factories, and production was mainly imitation. The technology and equipment were relatively backward, and the products were basically sold domestically. By the end of the 80s of last century, the industry was expanding, and the number of shoe enterprises in Wenling increased sharply. A number of enterprises with better management conditions have invested in technological transformation funds and expanded their production scale, thus forming a certain scale. It is at this stage that the first joint-stock enterprise in China is born. From 1995 to now, the footwear industry in Wenling has entered a period of growth, and gradually formed the industrial cluster with the production, supply and marketing of the surrounding towns as the center of the town of Ze Guo, Hengfeng street and Chengbei street.

The complicated growth experience makes the regional brand of "Wenling shoes" more or less controversial. Most enterprises rely on "copy" to start, and quality is inversely proportional to output. The shoes made in Wenling were once regarded as "shoes of worship" once a week: they will be broken in a week. This view is not fully recognized by the industry.

"Even the" shoes of the week ", there are also reasons for its existence. Wenling City Shoe leather industry association Secretary General Pan Kecheng told reporters that the main attack of Wenling shoes is the low-end market, a large number of products exported to Africa and other relatively backward areas. Where people can't afford designer shoes, they prefer low priced Wenling shoes.

After more than 30 years of development, the local footwear industry has begun to take shape. Products from the past injection shoes, mainly to sports shoes, cold sticky shoes, children's shoes and other ten categories of thousands of products, some enterprises are making OEM for international famous brands, some enterprises play their own brands, and some enterprises directly supply to WAL-MART, Auchan and other supermarkets.

"Low quality" has become the past tense. A staff member of the shoe and Leather Industry Association told reporters that the shoes that his children wear now are bought from local shoe factories, both quality and style.

A series of titles can be used as evidence for the growth of "Wenling shoes".

In August 2007, the China light industry technology import and Export Association awarded the title of "China footwear export base" in Wenling.

March 2008, China Leatherwear The Association named Wenling as the "famous shoe city in China".

In 2009, the town of Ze Guo was awarded the "hometown of Chinese ethnic footwear" in Wenling. After being awarded the "export base for Chinese footwear (sports shoes)" in 2010, Chengbei street was awarded the honorary title of "China's shoe industry" and "hometown of children's shoes" in 2011.

Steady steps in difficult times

Industrial growth is not smooth sailing, starting from the 2008 financial crisis. Footwear industry in Wenling I have experienced one after another.

First of all, the sharp decline of foreign trade. The footwear industry in Wenling mainly exports to the Middle East, Africa, North America and Europe. At present, the global economy has been recovering slowly since the financial crisis, and some of the Middle East and African countries have weakened their demand due to political turmoil. A decline in market demand implies an increase in enterprise inventories and increased risks.

Foreign trade is hard to do, and some shoe bosses begin to fight in China, which has intensified the competition in the domestic market.

Coupled with the price of raw materials, labor shortage and other issues. footwear industry Profits have been squeezed to the limit.

"Shoe sole material TPR, the increase is more than 50%, coupled with the rise in workers' wages, small workshops make shoes less than 5% of the profits." A shoe boss counted the reporters.

But under pressure, Wenling shoes showed no signs of recession. "The industry is healthy and developing steadily." Pan Kecheng, Secretary General of Wenling shoe leather industry association, used 8 words to describe the current development situation of Wenling footwear industry. Before the 2008 financial turmoil, there were 4785 shoe companies in Wenling, 189 thousand employees and 22 billion 500 million yuan in output value. Nowadays, Wenling shoe enterprises It increased to 6004, with output value of 20 million yuan and more than 200 enterprises, with 13 yuan in output value, 234 thousand and 500 employees in footwear industry, and 27 billion 900 million yuan in output value.