Breaking through the 600 billion yuan mark, "World Supermarket" Yiwu becomes popular!

As the New Year approaches, more and more good news comes.

In 2024, the eastern region of my country performed outstandingly, with imports and exports accounting for 79.7% of the country, nearly 80%. In particular, Guangdong, Zhejiang, Jiangsu and other places performed strongly in foreign trade and continued to play the role of "ballast stone".

Last year, Yiwu City's data performance in all aspects was remarkable, delivering a satisfactory answer to the foreign trade throughout the year.

Yiwu's overseas expansion is strong

Zhejiang's cross-border e-commerce is rising rapidly at an astonishing rate, giving birth to batches of cross-border giants, and its influence in the national cross-border e-commerce field is increasing.

Judging from the historical data of cross-border e-commerce in Zhejiang Province, its scale has always occupied a relatively high proportion in the country. In recent years, Zhejiang Province has invested heavily in the field of cross-border e-commerce, and has built a total of 839 overseas warehouses with a total area of ​​12.1 million square meters.

In addition, at the end of October 2024, Zhejiang Province's cross-border e-commerce comprehensive service platform will be launched and put into operation, providing support for more local cross-border e-commerce companies to go overseas.

Yiwu, known as the "World Supermarket", occupies a leading position in Zhejiang's cross-border e-commerce sector. The number of e-commerce entities in Yiwu market is nearly 700,000, accounting for nearly 30% of the total in Zhejiang Province.

The rise of its foreign trade can be traced back to the 1980s . Now, Yiwu Small Commodity Market radiates to more than 230 countries and regions around the world, and merchants from all over the world gather here. At the same time, it also links more than 20 industrial clusters and 2.1 million small and medium-sized enterprises across the country, creating employment opportunities for 32 million people. On average, 30 million express deliveries are sent out from Yiwu every day.

In 2024, Yiwu small commodity market has attracted much attention and frequently appeared on hot searches. Whether it is the sports economy brought by the Paris Olympics or the support peripherals brought by the fiercely competitive US election, you can always see or hear about the hot sales of Yiwu products.

Netizens' jokes about "pressure being put on Yiwu" reflect the popularity and spread of Yiwu's products. Yiwu is always able to keenly smell business opportunities and seize this "overwhelming wealth".

Yiwu's cross-border e-commerce has gradually developed into the main driving force of Yiwu's foreign trade with its deep market foundation, strong innovation capabilities and market adaptability.

In 2024, Yiwu's data performance was impressive. Specifically, in 2024, Yiwu's total import and export value hit a new high. In the first 11 months alone , Yiwu's total import and export value reached 613.99 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 17.6%, 10.7 percentage points higher than the provincial average, and successfully broke through the 600 billion yuan mark , reflecting the booming foreign trade market in Yiwu.

However, with the intensification of global market competition, relying solely on product quantity and price advantages may encounter development bottlenecks in the future. Therefore, in order not to be eliminated in the global market, Yiwu City has also begun to build brands and promote them internationally. Only by creating its own brand can it be more confident in the fierce market competition and win the favor of more consumers.

Yiwu brands are going global at an accelerated pace

In order to continue to prosper the market and promote industrial upgrading, Yiwu market is vigorously promoting the brand overseas expansion plan.

The "Yiwu China Commodity City" brand overseas expansion plan began in September 2023. With "Yiwu China Commodity City" as the parent brand carrier, relying on the five major models of overseas sub-markets, overseas warehouses, overseas exhibition halls, overseas exhibitions and Chinagoods national station, it helps Yiwu merchants and products connect with the world and accelerate overseas expansion.

Currently, the business has spread to many countries, providing support for nearly 5,000 merchants to expand overseas markets, enabling Yiwu brands to quickly move towards larger international markets and achieve the transformation from "selling products" to "selling brands."

From Yiwu's export data, we can see that in recent years, the UAE has been among the top ten export countries of Yiwu. Dubai, as an important hub city in the UAE and the entire Middle East, is also the first overseas branch market of Yiwu Small Commodity Market in the world, and the largest trade distribution center of Yiwu manufacturing in the Middle East.

Yiwu Small Commodities City has an extensive global layout, with overseas warehouses in more than 100 cities in 50 countries around the world, including Russia, Spain, Nigeria, etc. , which has greatly improved logistics efficiency and reduced risk costs.

In addition, Yiwu has further promoted the implementation of its brand overseas strategy by setting up Yiwu Selection brand overseas collection stores, etc. These collection stores not only showcase Yiwu's high-quality brands and products, but also provide foreign merchants with more convenient and efficient procurement channels, promoting the smooth connection between Yiwu's small commodity market and overseas markets.

Yiwu Selection brand overseas collection store innovates the overseas model, adopts the way of going overseas in groups, complements each other's advantages and forms a brand effect. There are a wide variety of high-quality goods here, covering a full range of categories. 139 industry leaders are involved, such as home furnishings, kitchen and bathroom, digital, beauty, accessories, stationery and other 23 major categories are included, forming a brand synergy and making the brand deeply rooted in the hearts of the people.

On January 13, Yiwu Selection brand overseas collection store opened in the second area of ​​the International Trade City, attracting a large number of buyers and market operators. In just one week, it received more than 1,200 international merchants. It is worth mentioning that 120 million orders were completed in just 5 hours on the opening day.

On January 18, the second global franchise store of Yiwu Selection brand overseas collection store was officially licensed and landed in Kenya. As one of the important economic centers in Africa, Kenya has huge market potential and convenient transportation. Opening a store here will provide great convenience for Yiwu brands to further expand into the African market.

Of course, the rapid development of cross-border e-commerce in Yiwu is inseparable from the strong support of the Yiwu Municipal Government. In order to promote the prosperity of cross-border e-commerce, Yiwu has also built a cross-border e-commerce industrial park with a total construction area of ​​about 1.62 million square meters and an estimated total investment of 10 billion yuan to provide support for the development of cross-border e-commerce.

In terms of export markets, the United States is Yiwu's largest export destination, followed by India, which accounts for about 6%. Currently, about 70% of Yiwu's exports to the United States are through cross-border e-commerce channels. In the future, Yiwu brands are expected to be exported to more countries and regions.

Yiwu Manufacturing, as one of China's core brands, will play a more important role in global trade with the rise of global cross-border e-commerce and the continued growth of Yiwu's cross-border e-commerce industry .

But at the same time, facing fierce market competition and the "uncertainty" of the market environment, Yiwu's international trade will also be accompanied by various difficulties and challenges. For example, price fluctuations caused by exchange rate changes, rising transportation costs, and changes in national policies in the target market will all have a certain impact on the interests of sellers.

Yiwu

Brand Overseas