Analysis Of Swimsuit Industry In Xingcheng

Xingcheng city in Liaoning Province is as famous as Jinjiang in Fujian Province and Yiwu in Zhejiang Province. It is one of the three major production bases of swimsuit in China. For every four swimsuits sold worldwide, maybe one comes from here. However, Xingcheng's swimsuit enterprises are also faced with the distress of insufficient development potential - lack of independent research and innovation ability, low brand recognition, lack of professional talents... In the face of these development bottlenecks, what should Xingcheng swimsuit do?

By the end of 2021, there were 4828 registered market entities in the swimsuit industry, with an average annual output of 170 million pieces (sets) and more than 60000 employees; The products are exported to more than 140 countries and regions, accounting for more than 25% of the international market share and nearly 40% of the domestic market; There are more than 30000 online stores, and the annual online sales volume reaches 4 billion yuan... All these brilliant figures belong to Xingcheng City, Liaoning Province, a small city in Northeast China. Swimsuits have become various in Xingcheng people's hands, but the development of Xingcheng swimsuit industry is not smooth sailing.

　　 Strengthen the ability of independent innovation

Liu Chunyu, general manager of Hengyi Garment Co., Ltd., has been engaged in swimsuit business since the end of 1980s. "At that time, most of them used foot sewing machines to make swimsuits. I often took a green train with a big bag on my back to sell swimsuits in Beidaihe and Dalian. No one would have thought that we had built a world-class industry for Xingcheng by using foot sewing machines."

Today, Liu Chunyu spends more time in choosing patterns and designing patterns for his own enterprises at well-known fashion exhibitions abroad.

"Most of our swimsuit enterprises don't have the ability to design patterns independently. We mainly go to France, Italy and other European countries to buy patterns." Liu Chunyu said frankly that many swimsuit enterprises lack the ability of independent design and R & D, and it is difficult to design products with alienation and originality on business trip, and the ability of independent innovation as a whole needs to be strengthened.

Sun Kaibin, general manager of Sanqi Garment Co., Ltd., said that in terms of swimsuit pattern, copyright protection of innovative design needs to be strengthened.

The workers in the city are making orders in the swimsuit industry park. "In recent years, we have tried to make up for the shortcomings in the pattern innovation and development by inviting designers, but we still lack the research and development innovation of new fabrics." Zhang Dongyuan, chairman of Xingcheng Starway group, said that the swimwear fabrics produced by Xingcheng are mainly made of traditional polyester and nylon, and are mainly purchased from southern provinces.

"Swimsuits, as close fitting sports clothes, have high requirements for fabric comfort and safety. Due to the lack of surface auxiliary materials resources, the innovation and research of fabrics in Xingcheng is not enough, and the innovation pace of new fabrics is slow. The color fastness, flatness, tensile strength and functionality of fabrics need to be improved." Zhang Dongyuan said.

Why does Xingcheng swimsuit have shortcomings in innovation and development? Yu Shuqin, honorary president of Xingcheng swimsuit Industry Association, said that most of Xingcheng's swimsuit enterprises are small and medium-sized enterprises, and lack of innovation motivation and ability. Innovation needs a lot of investment, and many enterprises are unwilling to carry out independent innovation to avoid risks. Swimsuit production is a labor-intensive industry. Due to the lack of independent R & D innovation, some swimsuit enterprises have even become OEM factories.

Innovation is the soul of enterprise development. Only by improving the original ability can the enterprise develop rapidly. Xingcheng swimsuit wants to solve the problem of weak independent innovation ability. On the one hand, it should change the concept and emphasize the originality; On the other hand, production and education should be integrated and coordinated development.

In the digital era, it is imperative to transform and upgrade the fashion industry in the digital and technological way. Hou Lingling, director of women's clothing direction of Dalian University of technology, suggests that traditional swimsuit enterprises should quickly change their concepts to meet the iterative needs of swimwear products in the new era. In order to speed up the transformation of Xingcheng swimsuit industry to data and intelligence, especially to promote the intellectual property infrastructure construction of enterprise swimsuit R & D and design, and support and protect the original design of enterprises, it is necessary to advocate originality and respect design, and use digital technology to present virtual swimsuit and fashion concept, and show the style of fashion industry.

Xingcheng swimsuit enterprises also need to give full play to the role of colleges and universities to form a collaborative innovation mechanism of government industry university research linkage. "At the same time, we should provide technical services in structural technology and product design, improve the core competitiveness of enterprises' independent research and development, and realize design innovation, technological innovation and concept innovation; we should grasp the discipline characteristics and rely on the advantages of university education resources to support the development of swimsuit industry." Hou Lingling said.

Facing the bottleneck, Xingcheng is trying to make up for the shortage. At present, Xinghua has formed three major bases of R & D and professional operation. Among them, the R & D base cooperated with Beijing Institute of fashion to create Beifu Industrial Park; The operation base cooperated with Alibaba to create 1688 strength industrial park and 1688 cross-border e-commerce trading center; The production base takes Starway and Yinghua as the leading enterprises to drive the development of other enterprises.

　　 Enhance brand influence

"Now I wear this red swimsuit is very stylish, but also very preferential, after placing an order, you can ship it soon!" Xiaodi was busy with the live broadcast in the shaking sound studio of the official flagship store of yimeishan. The sales volume of the shop on that day had reached more than 50000 yuan. With the help of live delivery, Xingcheng Haisheng Trading Co., Ltd. (formerly yimeishan Garment Co., Ltd.) has become a new force of local swimsuit.

E-commerce live broadcast has expanded the enterprise market and improved the brand awareness. At present, more than 60% of Xingcheng's swimsuit e-commerce shipments come from Huludao e-commerce live broadcasting base. In the live broadcasting base, 157 Xingcheng swimsuit enterprises live broadcast every day, and the live broadcast sales in June alone reached 53 million yuan.

In order to expand brand influence, we should not only rely on e-commerce live broadcast, but also promote the construction of brand incubation base.

Liaoning Yinghua Textile Clothing Group Co., Ltd. has a history of making swimsuit for more than 30 years. The "van der an" brand jointly created by Liaoning Yinghua Textile Clothing Group Co., Ltd. and Milan design team in Italy is one of the most famous swimsuit brands in Xingcheng. Yinghua started to build "small town brand Park" in 2019, and has entered the trial operation stage. The first phase mainly adopts the self operation mode to introduce the whole industrial chain into it, and at the same time, it introduces international and domestic famous brands to settle in. The brand park has discussed with 4 Spanish brands and more than 10 domestic brands. Next, it will promote the incubation of swimsuit brands with the help of big data analysis platform, do a good job in creative planning and publicity of Xingcheng swimsuit regional brands, and gradually build Xingcheng into a national swimsuit brand incubation center.

In recent years, Xingcheng swimsuit brand has achieved certain results, but the brand influence still has a lot of room for improvement. Zhang Dongyuan believes that the majority of Xingcheng swimsuit brands are ordinary brands, and few well-known brands; Brand positioning is not clear enough, brand recognition is low.

"The characteristics of Xingcheng swimsuit enterprises are small and beautiful. Most of them are small in scale and the industrial chain is not perfect. For example, there are almost no printing and dyeing factories and inspection factories here, and many large orders can not be accepted. This has affected the brand awareness of Xingcheng swimsuit to a certain extent." Sun Kaibin said.

Brand building and brand building need to be promoted.

"We need to constantly build regional brands and enhance the influence of swimsuit brands." Yao Yue, vice mayor of Xingcheng City, said that it is necessary to organize and improve the creative planning and publicity of Xingcheng swimsuit regional brands, adopt the government guidance and market operation mode, and promote the swimsuit Expo and swimsuit exhibition to be more international, market-oriented and professional; Promote the holding of various professional swimming events and water sports, and further expand the influence of regional brands. Organize enterprises to participate in well-known professional exhibitions at home and abroad, and continuously expand the influence of Xingcheng swimsuit industry.

Experts from China textile construction and Planning Institute suggested to further promote the construction of enterprises' own brands. In line with the support concept of supporting the excellent, strengthening and supporting the key points, comprehensively evaluate the cultivation list of brand enterprises according to the brand value, output value, tax, employment, etc., and concentrate on cultivating leading enterprises to form the demonstration leading effect. On the one hand, encourage leading enterprises to become stronger and bigger brands. We should clarify the brand positioning, shape the brand personality, benchmarking well-known brands at home and abroad, improve the level of R & D and design, and optimize product quality and marketing channels. On the other hand, enterprises should be encouraged to merge foreign brands, make use of international resources, create international brands and drive product exports; At the same time, enterprises are encouraged to introduce foreign brands.

The relevant person in charge of Xingcheng Bureau of industry and information technology said that it was necessary to guide enterprises to adjust the product structure, enhance the cultural connotation and scientific and technological content of swimsuit according to the popular styles, colors and fabrics in the market, pursue the clothing grade, further enhance the popularity of Xingcheng swimsuit in the country, and attract more upstream and downstream enterprises to settle in Xingcheng.

　　 Breaking the bottleneck of talent shortage

Lin Zuguang, general manager of Xingcheng Yuzi Garment Co., Ltd., is a "post-90s generation". After graduating from an advertising design major in a university in Beijing, he chose to return to his hometown of Xingcheng. At the 2015 China International Beach swimwear Culture Expo, his brand "new elegance" was rated as "China's top 10 swimsuit e-commerce brands". At present, he has developed and designed more than 100 swimsuit design patents granted by the State Intellectual Property Office.

However, there are not many talents like Lin Zuguang who know both technology and management in Xingcheng. Lin Zuguang frankly said that the "labor shortage" is the problem he is facing. "Even if the company did not employ more than 7000 yuan in the past eight years, the average labor cost of the company was still increased by 7000 yuan."

Liu Chunyu also faces the same troubles. "In order to improve the originality of design, the company hired a designer from Fujian with high salary a few years ago, but he resigned soon. It's really difficult to retain high-end talents."

Yu Shuqin said that there are many family enterprises in Xingcheng, and there is a shortage of high-end management personnel. Many enterprises have not formed a modern enterprise management system; There are few professional design talents and lack of innovation in product design; The loss of technical personnel is serious, skilled sewing workers and sample clothing workers are also increasingly lacking, these are the talent problems faced by Xingcheng swimsuit enterprises.

Experts from China Textile Construction Planning Institute believe that there are three main problems in the current employment of Xingcheng swimsuit industry: first, it is difficult to introduce and retain professional management and technical personnel; Second, the labor force is insufficient; Third, there is a gap in the succession of the older generation of entrepreneurs. The lack of professional and technical personnel, especially senior R & D personnel and management personnel, is mainly due to the lack of comprehensive competitiveness of Xingcheng City, the small scale of leading enterprises of swimsuit, the lack of well-known brands, and the lack of attraction to talents. Xingcheng local labor aging, the introduction of foreign labor shortage, enterprise employment aging problem is prominent, less migrant workers. In addition, the older generation of swimsuit entrepreneurs have a little lack of business motivation and a weak sense of modern management. Therefore, there is an urgent need to cultivate successors. However, some of the successors of the next generation are not willing enough, and some are still young. In the future, there will be a gap in the handover of "top leaders" of Xingcheng swimsuit enterprises.

How to find a breakthrough point for the problems existing in industrial employment?

On the one hand, industrial development should have high-quality talent reserve. Hou Lingling believes that the upgrading and development of swimsuit industry needs high-end management talents, design talents, professional and technical talents and skilled industrial workers. The government, universities and industries should work together to create a sustainable development mode of personnel training, give full play to the advantages of colleges and universities, cultivate all-round talents for enterprises, and improve the overall quality of personnel.

On the other hand, we should attract talents by enhancing their popularity and influence. "Give full play to the influence of Xingcheng international swimsuit show, hold swimsuit design competition and related supporting activities, and select excellent fashion design talents from them and sign cooperation agreements. Encourage international new designers, national excellent fashion designers and top ten plate makers of Liaoning Province to settle in Xingcheng, establish swimsuit design studio, improve product quality and create new swimsuit Still. " Hou Lingling said.

(source: Economic Daily)