The world's largest commodity market has plenty to sell and crow about
Silicone wristbands inscribed with "Paris 2024" hold the most eye-catching position at Lin Daoye's stall in the International Trade Market in the Zhejiang Province county of Yiwu. They are not for sale, but rather stand as a symbol of Lin's high-profile clientele.
Lin prides himself on the orders his plastics factory receives from the Olympic Games Organizing Committee. For the past 12 years, the wristbands they produced appeared for Games held in London, Rio de Janeiro and Tokyo.
"In the blink of eye, our line of wristbands with Chinese zodiac signs has passed," he said. "How time flies!"
Lin prominently displays 2024 Paris Olympic Games silicone wristbands in the showcase as the high profile of his customers.
Lin and his wife started Sanbao Plastics 15 years ago. The factory is based in the southern city of Dongguan. Five years ago, they opened a stall in Yiwu because the business environment there makes it easier to find new clients and receive more orders.
The stall is in the first section of five at the trade market, the largest commodity wholesale market in the world. Around Lin's stall are hundreds of stalls selling toys, many of them made for foreign clients from central Asia, the Middle East and Africa. The toy section is popular with foreign tourists.
"Last year, business was still quite slack in the aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic, but this year things are getting much better," Lin told Shanghai Daily. "The market here, as well as the whole city of Yiwu, is bustling again."
Lin shows a London 2012 wristband with the latest Paris 2024 model. The London Games were one of his earliest Olympic coups.
The order for 1 million wristbands from the Paris Olympic Organizing Committee came in last October. The first batch of 500,000 was delivered in December.
Apart from the authorized wristbands, Lin's factory has also prepared products featuring different national flags for the Olympics.
"Such products don't need authorization but are in great demand when it comes to global sports events like the Olympics and World Cup," he said. "People in Yiwu never miss the train."
Lin's factory has also produced national flag-themed wristbands to sell during the upcoming Summer Olympics in Paris.
That's true. According to the Yiwu Customs, the export volume on sports supplies reached 1.7 billion yuan (US$235 million), up 70 percent on the year. Meanwhile, the value of exports to France rose 42 percent to 540 million yuan.
In the Section 3 of the trade market, owners of stalls selling sports-related goods are also expecting to receive more orders in this year of the Summer Olympics. The Feng Zhonglai Trophy Firm is one example.
While Feng Zhonglai tends to the operations of his factories, his partner Feng Xiuqin sits in the stall to welcome clients. The store is full of different designs of medals and trophies, some with the engraved names of countries, some in the shape of sports items.
Feng Xiuqin said they don't really know which events will present trophies and medals, but when they receive orders, they produce items strictly to design specifications. The medals are made of relatively low-cost, electroplated alloy.
"Every time an Olympics rolls around," she said, "sports events increase around the world, and we receive more orders from abroad. You can see from the engravings that our products go to Uzbekistan, Kenya, Kazakhstan and many other countries."
In the Feng Zhonglai Trophy Firm, samples of trophies and medals are displayed to attract more orders. Their products are delivered to countries around the world.
For a long time Yiwu, a small city about 100 kilometers south of Hangzhou, has been a symbol of "made-in-China." Its commodity trading originated in the 1960s, when people exchanged goods at street corners. In 1982, the first commodity market was opened, and it expanded several times in the ensuing four decades. It holds more than 75,000 stalls selling more than 2 million varieties of goods.
The name Yiwu means "righteous crows," and the locals have plenty to crow about.
Last year, the export value of Yiwu merchandise rose 16 percent from the previous year to a record 500 billion yuan. The primary customers were Africa, Latin America, India and Saudi Arabia.
Yiwu International Trade Market is the largest commodity wholesale market in the world.
The toy section of the trade market is the most popular among expats and foreign visitors.
One secret to the market's success is the uncanny knack Yiwu vendors have to stay abreast of trends half a world away – no matter whether in sports, fashion, comics, Christmas trinkets or celebrity paraphernalia.
Lin said his factories always keep up with trends. Wristbands featuring NBA teams ("Lakers"), rap stars ("Eminem") and comic characters ("Superman" and "Batman") are very popular.
"I admit I know nothing about foreign celebrities," he said, "but our trade company partners always keep us abreast of trends. And silicone is environment-friendly, making these accessories even more popular in North America and Europe."
Lin catches trends by producing wristbands featuring celebrities and popular comic characters.
Now the brightest star in Yiwu product range is probably American pop singer Taylor Swift, now making headlines with her worldwide Eras Tour.
Her 152 shows across five continents have boosted demand for idol products among fans. The most popular are the Taylor Swift friendship bracelets.
The bracelets are made of polymer clay beads on which alphabet letters are carved, forming "Taylor Swift," "Eras Tour" or titles of her songs and albums. After Swift announced the tour, her fans suggested they exchange bracelets with each other during a show. The idea probably came from a song of Swift titled "You're on Your Own, Kid," in which the lyrics go, "So make the friendship bracelet, take the moment and taste it. You got no reason to be afraid."
And where do these popular bracelets come from? Yiwu.
In the warehouse of Shiyan Accessories, boxes of the bracelets await delivery. The products were handmade by workers in the company's factories in Zhejiang and Henan provinces.
"The orders were mostly from Amazon vendors, starting from late last year," said Yang Jingyu, founder of the company. "I lost count of how many bracelets we have sold, but definitely more than 100,000."
The Taylor Swift friendship bracelets Shiyan Accessories produces appear on Amazon shops and have become popular with the singer's worldwide Eras Tour.
Yang said before the bracelets became a hit, he had heard of the singer, but only by her China nickname "Mei Mei." Of course, he had never listened to any of Swift's songs.
"It's never news that we make products about celebrities, so usually we don't really care about who they are," he said.
Meanwhile, Yang admitted that the competition in the bracelets has become somewhat nasty in Yiwu.
"If you go to 1688.com, an online platform for us commodity manufacturers, and search for 'Taylor Swift friendship bracelets' you'll find dozens of results, all from different companies," he told Shanghai Daily. "Most of them are from small workshops in Yiwu, based in residential areas and comprising only five or six people. They can offer much more favorable prices than us because I have a whole company to feed, so I have to raise my prices a bit."
Therefore, Yang eyed new opportunities. In March, he made a bundle selling ear studs to the Middle East marking Eid al-Fitr, the holiday held at the end of Ramadan.
"Our pretty yet inexpensive accessories are so popular that we had to work around the clock to meet the soaring demand in March," he said. "I believe the Middle East market will be our main target for quite some time."
At a workshop of Shiyan Accessories, workers work around the clock to meet deadlines on all orders.
