Yalu Lights Up The 20Th Jiangsu International Fashion Festival With "Artificial Intelligence, Rethinking In The Digital Age"

From September 6 to 9, 2018, the 20th Jiangsu International Garment Festival&Expo (hereinafter referred to as "the Expo") was held in Nanjing International Expo Center. Yalu has participated in the first clothing expo for 20 consecutive years. Focusing on the theme of "people and intelligence, rethinking in the digital era of Yalu", Yalu has participated in the expo with its three business segments, namely Yalu men's wear, Yalu factory store and Yalu professional wear, in the integration of "people" and "intelligence". At present, Yalu is in the process of further innovation, transformation and development. Its operation plan is to digitally transform the entire end-to-end business chain from product design, planning to after-sales, enabling enterprises to achieve online and offline integration, efficient operation and improve the efficiency of the value chain.

On September 6, the "Jiangsu Textile and Clothing Annual Grand Ceremony" was held in Nanjing Jinling Hotel. Mr. Gu Zhenhua, chairman of Yalu Group, won the "Special Contribution Award" of Jiangsu International Clothing Festival, and Jiangsu Yalu Brand Operation Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Yalu Operation"), a subsidiary of Yalu Group, won the "Growth Brand Award" of Jiangsu International Clothing Festival. A total of 400 people attended the ceremony, including representatives of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, China Textile Industry Federation, China Garment Association, associations outside the province, provincial economic and information commission, municipal economic and information commissions, provincial textile and garment enterprises, and exhibitors.

The picture shows that Mr. Gu Zhenhua, Chairman of Yalu Group, was awarded the "Special Contribution Award" at Jiangsu International Fashion Festival

The picture shows that Yalu Operation Company was awarded the "Growth Brand Award" at Jiangsu International Fashion Festival

The picture shows the booth of Yalu Group in the 20th Jiangsu International Fashion Festival

The picture shows Ma Qiulin, Vice Governor of Jiangsu Province, visiting Yalu booth and guiding work

On the day of the opening ceremony of the 20th Jiangsu International Garment Festival, our reporter visited the booth of Yalu Group and exchanged the story of Yalu's participation in the 20th International Garment Fair, Yalu and the International Garment Fair with the person in charge of the enterprise. Twenty years ago, Yalu was facing a critical period of transformation from jacket business to down jacket business. At the same time, the Clothing Expo also began to step onto the historical stage. The Expo will build a platform for exhibitors and purchasers to display, negotiate, trade and cooperate, and deliver rich textile and clothing industry information. It is through the service expo platform that Yalu has deepened the communication with peers and supply chain partners, accurately grasped the market's cutting-edge development trend and product design philosophy, and strengthened the company's determination and confidence to transform and develop into down jacket business. In the following years, Yalu's down jacket business doubled every year. In 2000, Yalu became one of the industry leaders. "Yalu, the real down jacket expert" became a well-known slogan, laying a solid foundation in the down jacket industry. It is against this background that Yalu has become attached to the International Trade Fair and has been working together for 20 years. Over the past 20 years, Yalu has received support and love from government departments at all levels and industry associations. The service expo platform also provides Yalu with a lot of valuable market consultation, product insight, partner resources, etc. for each transformation and development. The Yalu International Garment Expo has witnessed the construction process of Jiangsu textile and garment industry and the development of Yalu.

The figure is Mr. Gu Zhenhua, Chairman of Yalu Group Interviewed by the host

Chairman Gu Zhenhua is one of the two entrepreneurs who won the "Special Contribution Award of Jiangsu International Fashion Festival" at this clothing expo. The person in charge of the enterprise talked about his own ideas. First, over the past 20 years, Yalu has always supported and worked hand in hand with the Fair, making certain contributions to the society; Second, Yalu entered the down jacket market in 1998 and became a leader in the industry, making great contributions to the development of the down jacket industry. Now there are a hundred varieties of down jackets in the market, and the fabrics, designs, colors and styles used are becoming more fashionable and comfortable. Down jacket has become a necessary item for common people in winter. Up to now, according to the data of 2016, China's down jacket production capacity is more than 300 million pieces, 100 million pieces are exported, and 200 million pieces are sold domestically. It is conceivable that Yalu entered the down jacket field in 1998 when the market was still small, and there were few people wearing down jackets. With the development of the industry to the current scale, the promotion of down jacket has played a great role in driving the upstream and downstream of the industry, textile industry, chemical fiber industry, agriculture, and breeding industry, which is inseparable from the efforts of Mr. Gu, the pioneer entrepreneurs who dare to think, do, and venture.

The picture shows the scene photo of Yalu professional suit 3D measurement design

The theme of Yalu exhibition of this clothing expo is "people and intelligence". On the one hand, the brand is the embodiment of the user's mental model, the aesthetic of the product is art oriented, and humanity is always the most important; On the other hand, the digital new retail transformation of brand operators is an inevitable trend, and will greatly improve the efficiency of brand operators' value chain. How to integrate human nature and intelligence? The most important thing is to "focus on customers" in the new retail era, which will become more and more important. Imagine that an enterprise invests a large amount of digital expenses, but its products are poorly made. The efficiency of this enterprise cannot be very high. Therefore, what remains unchanged in this era is the original intention of creating good products and serving customers, and what remains unchanged is that technology can make efficiency change qualitatively. Yalu needs to "stick to the same and actively seek change".

The picture shows the on-site display photos of Yalu men's "Baikal Lake" series

At this exhibition, Yalu also launched the "Baikal Lake" series, which was inspired by the Baikal Lake Ice Challenge jointly completed by Yalu and Donghua University MBA; The design inspiration is that on the 2500 year old Lake Baikal, the blue ice cracks are silent, weaving time and stories deeply into the fabric texture. It reflects Yalu's focus on cold resistance technology for 46 years, which is warm on the Baikal Lake at minus 46 °, natural and comfortable like breathing, and its technology is ahead of its peers' brand strength. About the characteristics of the Baikal series products: under the extremely cold weather of minus 46 degrees in the Russian Baikal, there is an amazing and supernatural comfort; The down jacket that can quickly lock body temperature and breathe in 4.6 seconds has been popular throughout the Eastern Hemisphere for 46 consecutive years; Meet the blue eyes of Siberia, wear the Baikal Lake series, feel lightness and breath, and escape from the city noise.

The picture shows Cui Yesong, general manager of Yalu Operation, receiving an interview with Jiangsu Satellite TV

In an interview with the reporter, Mr. Cui Yesong, General Manager of Operation, expressed his views on the innovation of Yalu's business model in recent years. Since 2008, the traditional down jacket industry has encountered great challenges in its development due to the impact of temperature changes, overcapacity, online shocks and other factors. Since 2010, Yalu has started to do e-commerce business, and ranked first in Tmall's Double Eleven list, which is one of the brands that entered e-commerce earlier. From 2014, under the guidance of the development concept of "Four Focuses" (development as the leader, product as the core, people-oriented, and striver oriented), we reshaped the original business model, from the original single down jacket business to the four season clothing chain business model with Yalu men's wear, Yalu factory store, and Oloway as the core; Adhere to the product concept of "high quality, low price"; We will work hard to build a Yalu ecological chain platform, hand over the supply chain to our partners, and transform from relying on our own efforts to working together, sharing risks and profits. The years from 2014 to 2017 were three years when there was a flow depression offline. We seized the opportunity of this round of offline transformation and development (as well as famous, innovative and high-quality products and other enterprises), making our new business in the clothing sector usher in rapid development, achieving a leap in sales from 0 billion to 1 billion, and it is expected that the sales will reach 2 billion in 2018, Yalu clothing sector as a whole can achieve a sales scale of about 6 billion.

When talking about Yalu's plan for the future, Mr. Cui Yesong, the general manager of operations, said that this Expo has been endowed with new and profound connotation by the times, and keywords such as intelligent manufacturing and intelligent retail have become new hot spots in the industry. Yalu is also in the process of further innovation, transformation and development, of which the core is Yalu's "new retail" development strategy. In Ali's words, it is to build an end-to-end, global and efficient business chain driven by big data.

In the new retail period, when Yalu was asked how to understand and develop the "new retail" business, Mr. Cui Yesong, General Manager of Operations, said that new retail was very important to Yalu. From 2018 to 2020, we think it is a window period for brand merchants to have new retail opportunities. Traditional offline retail will encounter the ceiling of "flat efficiency" (for example, Yalu's flat efficiency is 20000 yuan/year). The new retail is a fundamental change to traditional retail, which can effectively break through the flat efficiency ceiling of traditional retail. For example, the flat efficiency of Hema Xiansheng can be five times higher than that of peers, and the flat efficiency of Xiaomi Home is 20 times higher than that of traditional retail. Therefore, in the future commercial competition, new retail will empower brand merchants, and their overall competitive advantage will become greater and greater, while traditional merchants will struggle. How can Yalu do new retail? We should focus on customers, take the product supply chain as the core, digitally transform the entire business chain from product design planning to after-sales, enable enterprises to achieve online and offline integration, efficient operation, improve retail efficiency, and break the ceiling of human efficiency, store efficiency, and goods efficiency. Now we have carried out many new retail related projects, such as building Yalu's smart logistics park and flexible supply chain, cooperating with Alibaba and Tencent to carry out new retail business, building digital stores, and so on.

The picture shows all the staff of Yalu Clothing Expo pavilion

Extended reading:

Founded in 1972, Yalu started from the production and sales of men's clothing. After more than 40 years of development, it has now become a comprehensive enterprise group with multiple fields and businesses such as clothing, chemical fiber, finance, real estate, docks and logistics. Since 1998, Yalu has transformed into a down jacket business and become one of the industry leaders. Since 2014, Yalu has developed the four season clothing chain business with men's clothing as the core. In just three years, the new business of this sector has grown from zero to 1 billion, and the sales scale is expected to reach 2 billion in 2018. In 2018, Yalu was rated as "the 19th among the top 100 enterprises in the garment industry in 2017" by China Garment Association; At the same time, the intangible assets of Yalu series brands reached 18.526 billion yuan, ranking 266 among the most valuable brands in China's top 500.

Since 2012, the business situation of the clothing industry has undergone dramatic changes in the face of the impact of such complex factors as the amplification of downward pressure from the macroeconomic environment, the impact of the Internet, and overcapacity in the industry. The major clothing brand enterprises based on the traditional distribution model have experienced a large-scale trend of store closure, which has greatly affected their business development. In recent years, China is creating the world's largest middle class. While consumer demand is upgrading, effective supply is insufficient. In addition, since 2016, the wave of "new retail" has also swept the whole clothing industry.

Facing the new situation, new challenges and new opportunities, Yalu Group actively transformed and established Jiangsu Yalu Brand Operation Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Yalu Operation") to seek development through innovation: on the one hand, it reshaped the original business model, from the original single down clothing business to the Yalu men's wear, Yalu factory store Four season clothing chain business model with Orway as the core; On the other hand, it has transformed from a traditional manufacturing enterprise to an asset light service enterprise, integrated the upstream and downstream industrial chains through brand operation, and established a win-win ecological platform for suppliers, franchisees, consumers, employees, enterprises and society; Most fundamentally, Yalu always adheres to the ingenuity spirit of the old Yalu people, takes products as the core, and takes "increasing varieties, improving quality, and creating brands" as the starting point. By integrating resources, Yalu continues to optimize the supply chain, and strives to create high-quality and inexpensive products that meet the needs of new consumers.

Since the transformation started on October 1, 2014, Yalu's operation has incubated six business divisions after just over three years of development. It has achieved a sales scale of more than 1 billion yuan in 2017 and is expected to reach a sales scale of 2 billion yuan in 2018.

At present, Yalu's operation is in the process of further innovation, transformation and development, the core of which is Yalu's "new retail" development strategy. Yalu Operation takes the customer as the center and the product supply chain as the core to digitally transform the entire business chain from product design planning to after-sales, enabling enterprises to achieve online and offline integration, efficient operation and improve the efficiency of the value chain. It is expected that Yalu operation will usher in a new round of development in the next three years.

Yalu's three major businesses are Yalu Men's Wear, Yalu Factory Store and Yalu Professional Wear. Yalu men's clothing is a four season men's clothing chain brand under Yalu Group. Since its launch in 2014, its stores have developed rapidly and covered all provinces in China except Tibet, Taiwan and Hainan. In recent years, based on big data driven precision selection, efficient supply chain, intelligent logistics system and new retail, Yalu Men's Wear has provided customers with cost-effective products and consumption experience. Yalu Men's Wear now has a series of products for business, fashion, outdoor, sports, etc., and is committed to becoming a national standard brand for men's wear. Yalu factory store is a new marketing model created under Yalu brand operation, covering two main products, Yalu down jacket and Yalu men's clothing. Through the integration of advantageous resources, it extends the categories of women's clothing, children's clothing, home textiles and accessories, thus forming a comprehensive vertical shopping platform from the factory directly to consumers. Yalu Factory Store creates a super first-class one-stop shopping experience for consumers with high-end and comfortable shopping environment, a variety of high-quality goods with high cost performance ratio. Yalu professional clothing takes "excellent professional quality" as its core business philosophy, combines advanced garment production technology with high-quality fabrics, and ensures that every garment is a high-quality product with fine workmanship, beautiful shape, and body shape and industry characteristics. Make the slogan of intimate, decent, safe and fashionable professional clothing brand.

In recent years, Yalu's new clothing business has achieved its own leapfrog development through innovation, and actively engaged in public welfare undertakings, such as sponsoring CCTV's large-scale poverty alleviation program Never Leave Behind, contributing to the cause of targeted poverty alleviation in the motherland and creating more value for the society. (Reporter Liu Jingmin takes video/clips Cao Yang)