Improving epidemic prevention and resuming work as soon as possible is a top priority.
Editor’s note: This article is from WeChat public account “New Retail Business Review” (ID: xinlingshou1001) , author : Tang Suzheng.
“The country has been in a state of shutdown for more than 20 days, and the delivery period has choked the throat of textile and apparel companies.”
Before the Spring Festival, a fabric trader in Shaoxing, Zhejiang received news from a Thai customer, demanding that orders for 10,000 meters of fabric be reduced to 5 kilometers.
Another customer, Chilean retail group Cencosud, has orders in April. The resumption of work was delayed by 20 days. In order to deliver on time, the end of February and March became the critical period for the fabric manufacturer.
“In addition to the difficult delivery time, some customers have made adjustments to the order volume, some reduced by 50%, and some reduced by 20% to 30%.” Mr. Liu, the principal of Shaoxing fabric trade Tell the retailer, “Many unexpected expenses and reduced income have led to a rapid decline in corporate profits. Orders with a profit of 30% before may now be only 10%, and some orders can only protect the capital.”
Large deadlines and high pressure for delivery
The country has been in a state of shutdown for more than 20 days, and the delivery period has choked the throats of textile and apparel companies.
Aokun Textile, located in Shaoxing, Zhejiang, took a fabric purchase order from a large American luxury clothing brand a few years ago, and now delivery has become a problem.
Although the production raw materials were prepared a year ago, after the resumption of work, it was found that the raw materials such as yarn and fabric were still seriously insufficient.
After resuming work, you can only lean on the original stock while waiting for the upstream supplier’s production line to resume work. New yarns and fabrics can be in place.
Li Fang, head of quality control of Aokun Textile, told the retailer that the part that was not handed over was too late to start even now. After negotiation, the company had to choose the air transport method to ship the clothes out as soon as possible.
According to the original contract, these clothes are planned to be shipped to the United States by sea, and the freight will be borne by the customer. Compared with sea freight, air freight is faster, but too expensive. Generally speaking, from China to the destination port of the United States,It takes about one month, and air freight takes only one week, but in terms of price, air freight is 8-9 times higher than sea freight.
“If it’s air transport fabric, it’s equivalent to doing this list; if air transport garments, basically all the losses.” Li Fang said helplessly, “Everyone is unwilling to choose air transport, but now is a special situation, there is really no Way. “
In addition, because the actual quantity that can be delivered is different from the contracted quantity, the company has to bear a more or less clause.
“This is the first time we have encountered such a short installation fee.” Li Fang said that if 3,000 pieces of ready-made clothing were originally agreed with the customer, only 2500 pieces would be delivered, and the company would need to install 500 fewer pieces according to the contract price. Pay the buyer.
The brand side saves itself, where is the way out
It is undeniable that the epidemic has brought a huge impact on the clothing retail industry. The Spring Festival is the key point for the digestion of winter clothing inventory, and the year after is a new important moment for spring clothing.
Peacebird has 4,500 stores across the country, including women’s clothing such as Peacebird, Men’s, Rakucho, MiniPeace and MATERIAL GIRL.
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More than half of the stores are temporarily closed after the first day of the year, and offline traffic is almost zero. Since the second day, Peacebird Women’s Clothing has set up a marketing team and entered online marketing, and the follow-up business department of Peacebird has begun to follow up.
Pan Pan, the manager of Peacebird Ningbo Tianyi Center, recalls that since the first voice of Academician Zhong Nanshan, the number of customers patronizing the store is getting less and less … The team felt that this would not work.
Many shopping guides originally had consumer WeChat services due to membership services. At the beginning of the holiday, everyone began to communicate with consumers online based on their intuition. At the same time, the headquarters and regional managers also started to formulate sales response strategies.
“The store opening hours have been adjusted. If my performance is said to have no impact, it is impossible, but fortunately, it can also be sold online.” Pan Pan, who is still in his hometown in Guizhou, told the retailer, “I can complete it every day. About 8 orders, after the resumption of work, it is mainly online remote work. It will be 9 to 6 every day, and will communicate with customers at night to try to win personal performance. “
Pan Pan, who has been engaged in offline clothing sales for a long time, said that due to the epidemic, single online sales could not communicate with partners and customers as close as in the store. In contrast, Pan Pan prefers to understand the product characteristics in kind in the store, and it is better to recommend products to customers on the spot.
But from the beginning of 2019, Pan Pan has joined the peacebird’s offline store live broadcast army. In addition to live broadcast execution, this up-selling sales experience also allowed her to acquire a lot of new skills, including online product inventory, circle of friends marketing, remote management and incentives for partners, and so on.
Through online member specials, social marketing fission, small program distribution, and alternate live broadcasts in different regions, Peacebird has opened a second sales front online, which partially recovered the loss of offline stores.
Peacebird’s data shows that half of the suspended stores still have sales, and the average daily total retail sales after the holiday is 10 million yuan. In some provinces, such as Anhui and Henan, the daily conversion rate of new WeChat fans can reach more than 10%, and the daily retail new customer ratio is about 10% to 20%.
It is understood that as of February 19, the remaining 20% of the stores were not yet open, but more than 80% of the stores opened through new retail.
“The recovery in the offline world depends more on the trend of the epidemic situation. Some of the shops that have been suspended for business have been prepared for business in an orderly manner according to the guidance of the local government and shopping malls.”
The peacebird told the retailer that commercial real estate companies such as Wanda, China Resources, Longhu, and Printronix have provided assistance to brands in a timely manner, such as rent reduction and exemption. Ali and Tencent also provided brands with annual platform fee reduction and smart retail support Wait.
Chinese companies are doing everything they can to overcome the difficulties together.
However, the small brands in this epidemic are even harder. The Hanfu shop “簪花 阁” has resumed work, but a batch of fabrics has been delayed due to the epidemic.
Last year was the warm winter. The winter styles of Huanhuage didn’t sell well. Hangzhou Xiaohuage, shopkeeper and designer, Xiao Qiao, figured it out, and went to the spring. After all, his store is best at spring. Hanfu, who knows that it is affected by the epidemic, can only make summer goods directly now, and lost a whole season.
“Not only production, but the spring designs that have been prepared are made in white, and the fabrics have also been stocked, because they may become obsolete by next year. In addition, the warehouse cost is also a large expenditure.” Xiao Qiao said.
