This article is from the WeChat public account: wowjiemian , author: Liu Yujing, reporter: Zhang Qin, editor: Han Xiang teeth, thematic map from: field shooting
“From the mountains in the northeast to the factories in Yiwu, one Christmas tree after another is transported to Shanghai to dream for the people in this city at Christmas.”
In Pudong, Shanghai, in a rented house of less than 40 square meters, Liu Min just stuffed a 1.5-meter Christmas tree. This is her fourth Christmas in Shanghai. Liu Min came to Shanghai from Foshan, Guangdong, and is currently a programmer.
The scent of pine fills the room quickly, and Liu Min hangs a box of red, green, and green Christmas ornaments on the tree. When Liu Min’an was on the “star of Bethlehem” on the top of the Christmas tree, it meant that her Christmas season came. With the power on, the Christmas tree’s lanterns warm the whole rental house.
In mid-November, Liu Min has begun booking Christmas trees at a flower shop called Rosa Gallica in Wukang Road, Shanghai. The flower shop not only has a storefront but also a warehouse on Wukang Road. After entering November, the flower shop put the numerous Christmas trees along the street-they were telling the city that Christmas was coming.
But Chen Guangda acted earlier.
Baishan City, Jilin Province, a few thousand kilometers away from Shanghai, just enters November every year, and the temperature reaches below zero. He will walk into the snow-capped mountains and start looking for Norwegian spruce that can sell for a good price.
Spruce in Baishan City. Image source: Chen Guangda
In Baishan City, many families raise pines for generations, otherwise they can only farm. Earlier here, spruce was planted on the hill, and in the past 10 years, everyone slowly moved to the nursery. More spruce is sold for landscaping purposes, and the Christmas tree business is not a big list. There may be only one planter for 100 households.
Chen Guangda knows that the sale is not too profitable, but it happens that after November of each year, the people who raise the pines enter a long period of farm leisure and the mountains are covered by snow. Chen Guangda watched that the Christmas tree market in big cities was profitable, so he started to go up the mountain in November every year to find trees. Then he drove by bus to Shanghai and waited for the last month to sell the trees and return.
The same is true this year. Chen Guangda dragged his companion and drove south together. Two thousand kilometers along the way, the two drove for three days and three nights. The two men took turns driving for 12 hours a day. A steering wheel held a whole Huangshan cigarette and a can of old godmother.
In Shanghai, on weekdays, Chen Guangda guarded the narrow nursery in the suburb of Pudong, waiting for the Shanghai flower shop to pick up trees. It was so cold that they got into the bus, and the other pine trees in stock were stored in a warehouse behind the nursery.
Chen Guangda (right) and his friends. Image source: Zhang Qin
In Chen Guangda’s opinion, the Christmas tree industry in China is still a fairly decentralized industry, and the industry chain is not mature, but it is just a “cutaway” for the nursery stock business. And Shanghai has become the demand of the whole ChinaThe most dense market.
Rosa Gallica’s Christmas tree business has peaked since 2017.
Florists doing Christmas tree business in 2012 are scarce. In the first year, large and small Christmas trees, including imported and domestic ones, were sold for a total of 100 trees. Since then, the business has become better every year. In the heyday of 2016 and 2017, five or six hundred trees were sold.
A small Christmas tree in Rosa Gallica. Image source: Zhang Qin
The first Christmas tree consumer in Shanghai was a foreign family. “The family came to the Wukang Road warehouse with great interest to choose a tree, and the whole family only fancy it.” Li Ke, the owner of the Rosa Gallica flower shop, told Interface News, “When I bought my favorite Christmas tree, the family took a group photo around the Christmas tree. It looked very warm.”
Foreign families like to decorate the traditional Christmas tree with a height of 1.8 meters to 2.4 meters. Chinese families prefer small and newly decorated Christmas trees, ranging from 30 cm to 80 cm, and the price is cheap-30 cm decorated Christmas tree is probably At 399 yuan.
Chinese families started to buy Christmas trees, and they were also people with overseas education or living background. Later, more ritualistic people also began to yearn for their own Christmas trees.
“It ’s really a day to study in the U.S. in Christmas. The shops and restaurants are closed early at Christmas. Friends take this opportunity to party and exchange gifts. Think of Christmas, winter is not so cold and difficult. “Break it.” Zhang Yuan, 28, went to the United States to study in Shanghai and returned to Shanghai. After starting advertising, she insisted on spending Christmas every year. Decorating the Christmas tree and drinking mulled wine with her friends made her feel not alone.
She spent 350 this yearYuan bought a small 80 cm Christmas tree, and after getting the parcel, he quickly sent a circle of friends, “I am also a tree person”.
Large Christmas tree in Rosa Gallica store. Image source: Rosa Gallica
These requirements have allowed the Shanghai Christmas tree market to expand.
When I first came to Shanghai, Chen Guangda only cooperated with 3 flower shops. Currently, there are 100 flower shops in Shanghai, and Chen Guangda cooperates with 70 or 80. Chen Guangda’s biggest list this year is the Shanghai Disney Resort. He shipped a total of 1400-1500 large and small spruces to Disney. Among them, the 5-meter-sized Christmas tree Disney will have 6 trees this year-which will take more than 20 years to grow. .
Shanghai Disney Christmas Tree. Image source: Shanghai Disney Official Public Number
The reason why his tree will be favored is because the spruce is cold and drought resistant, and the environment of Changbai Mountain is suitable for spruce growth. In addition, the northeast is black land, so Let them grow rapidly in the slightly acidic forest land with good drainage. Such a tree is humid and warmThe survival rate in the south will become lower. Some places in Jiangsu do produce spruce, but the quality is not as good as that produced by Baishan.
Although he has the best spruce forest in China, Chen Guangda’s Christmas tree business is not a huge profit at all.
From Baishan to Shanghai, the fuel cost is 1,500 yuan and the toll is 1,000 yuan. The 2,000 pine trees are transported by three trucks, and the transportation cost is 15,000 yuan. Chen Guangda’s nursery rent in Pudong is 15,000 per month, and the warehouse is 5,000 per year. The price of Chen Guangda’s trees is not high. The wholesale price of 1.5 meters of pine is 100 yuan, and 200 yuan for two meters. From the experience of selling trees in these years, the most popular range is 1.8 meters to 2.4 meters.
But the 2000 trees of Chen Guangda obviously cannot satisfy the city.
A lot of flower shops and consumers tend to buy imported Christmas trees with richer color, lush foliage and stronger scent.
The popular imported Christmas tree is Lobeson from Denmark. According to data from the Danish Agriculture Agency, in 2018, Denmark exported about 9 million Christmas trees and contributed about 1.56 billion yuan in revenue, about half of which were sold to Germany, and only 6% of Christmas trees were sold to countries outside Europe and the US. One practitioner revealed to Interface News that the price of Lobesson, which is 1.5 meters high this year, can rise to about 2,000 yuan, because the strictness of customs has made Lobesson even more popular.
Christmas wreath by Shanghai Qingyi Studio. Image source: Shanghai Qingyi
As a senior grower, Chen Guangda knows the difference between domestic Christmas trees and imported Christmas trees. “The domestically produced Christmas tree still sells better because of its high cost performance. For most Chinese consumers, as long as the Christmas tree looks like it’s OK, foreign consumers will be more discerning and tend to buy imported ones.” He told Interface News Say.
But most Chinese people haven’t regarded Christmas trees as just needed. Therefore, the Christmas trees you see in life are more from Yiwu-plastic Christmas trees are a cheaper option.
Not only China, in fact, 80% of the world ’s Christmas trees and decorations come from Yiwu. Between September 2016 and August 2017, more than 600 factories and workshops around Yiwu produced Christmas-related products worth US $ 3 billion.
Cai Qinliang, Secretary-General of the Yiwu Christmas Articles Industry Association, told the interface news that Yiwu ’s Christmas tree foreign trade business started very early because it took a long time to export by sea. End.
General plastic Christmas trees are divided into two materials, PVC and PE. Most of the two materials are mixed and sold. PE with better gel feel is placed on the outer layer and the inner is made of PVC. On the e-commerce platform, a 1.5-meter plastic Christmas tree using mixed materials costs about 200 yuan, which is half the price of domestic real trees. The fake Christmas tree is a box of plastic at hand and needs to be spliced together, but it is easy to store and sort garbage, and it is also convenient to recycle.
Domestic Christmas tree. Image source: Shanghai Qinqing Bird and Flower Market
In fact, “real tree or fake tree” has become a hot topic in the media and the public in European and American countries. This involves how the “post-Christmas season” deals with Christmas trees .
During Christmas, 75% of American families will place a Christmas tree at home. Only 20% of them are real trees, and the rest are fake trees made of plastic or other materials. The “fake tree” school believes that the use of fake trees will reduce the negative impact on the environment after 5 years. In addition, the price of fake trees is constantly decreasing but the quality is better. The tree itself has a greater environmental impact.
Millennials ’concept of all-naturalLove, in 2018, the US natural Christmas tree went from unsaleable to in short supply. The total retail sales exceeded US $ 2 billion for the first time in ten years, and many local growers made profits for the first time in 10 years.
But in China, people don’t seem to be that particular.
In fact, this foreign festival has always been controversial. From the beginning of the Republic of China, some people opposed Christmas, but it did not hinder the popularity of Christmas among the young people. Liang Wendao mentioned in the article “Misunderstood Christmas” that “any traditional festival will be transformed on the road of circulation and become a container for participants to put their own set of interpretation and meaning”.
“In China, Christmas without Christianity is more a romantic holiday than a fake religious holiday.” Patty Waldmaier, a reporter for the Financial Times in China, commented on China’s Christmas, “Chinese people choose Christmas more to fill spiritual emptiness. To a certain extent, this is no different from Westerners placing Christmas trees.”
Although Christmas is not a public holiday, Chinese people, especially young people, spend it in a casual way. There is no Westerner’s remorse, anxiety or family friction during the Christmas holiday. It is an opportunity for people in urban life to leave work and daily commutes and gather with friends and family-a “pause” and “silence” button for life.
“As soon as the Christmas song is played, the small colored lights on the Christmas tree light up, and there is a festive atmosphere in winter. The winter itself has a short sunshine time, and people are easily frustrated because of the coldness. Liu Min regards Christmas as the most wonderful time in winter, and she is willing to spend hundreds or even thousands of yuan each year to buy a Christmas tree, even if the tree has only a short life.
(In response to the interviewee’s request, “Chen Guangda” and “Li Ke” are pseudonyms)
This article is from WeChat public Public number: Interface newsan) , author by Liu Yujing, reporter: Zhang Qin Edit: Ya Hanxiang,