“It’s not as good as God’s calculations.” This clothing factory wanted to close down after the Spring Festival, but unexpectedly, things turned out. The overseas epidemic was raging, and people in Europe and the United States could only choose to shop online. The factory recently received a large number of overseas clothing as mentioned above. With the orders, the workers earn a lot of money, and college students have come to work as workers on the garment assembly line!
Above picture: “It’s a good time to recruit workers that is rare in ten years. I started working for 3 hours and all workers were recruited. Yes.” On June 13, in a garment factory in Guangzhou, the proprietress Li Qing was somewhat surprised.
Li Qing had too many orders and merged with a new factory. “Not long after our recruitment news was sent out, nearby workers rushed over.” Li Qing said, “Even if I told them that the machine hadn’t been set up yet, they refused to leave, fearing that others would take their jobs away (picture below) ).”
It’s June, and some garment factories are still short of orders, but the lights here are brightly lit day and night: every day, more than 10,000 pieces of clothing are sent out from the factory, a small number of them are sold domestically, and most of them are shipped by sea. Ships to the United States.
Time comes! Small and medium-sized garment enterprises,
survived the first half of the year and are now starting to make money
01
The garment industry struggled to survive the epidemic
“The factory I worked at before had no orders, so I came here to find a job.” In Li Qing’s factory, Liu Dongmei was skillfully hemming the cuffs and collars of her clothes.
Liu Dongmei was born in 1983. She has been in the garment industry for nearly 20 years. She is skilled in craftsmanship and is the type of worker favored by garment factory owners.
The average salary of Guangzhou garment factory workers is not low. According to Li Qing, if it involves technical processes such as flat turning and edge cutting, it is normal for workers to earn over 10,000 yuan a month during the peak season. Even for packaging and other positions with low technical content, five to six thousand can be booked a month. “There are also some factories that will provide food or housing. If not, there will usually be a subsidy of 600-800 yuan.”
The edge processing in Liu Dongmei’s hands costs 1.6-1.9 yuan a piece. Skilled workers can make about three hundred pieces a day. “She just came here, and she is still in the running-in period. She can get more than 6,000 in a month. After she gets used to it, there are more orders, and getting more than 10,000 is not a problem.” Li Qing inspected the factory and expressed satisfaction with Liu Dongmei’s craftsmanship.
“In the past, we didn’t dare to be picky about workers. If someone is willing to do it, it’s good.” Fang Hao said, “This year is different. We can choose those with good skills.”
Above: A corner of a garment factory in Baiyun District, Guangzhou
Just two months ago, Li Qing was still at the bottom: Domestic start-up costs The prices are soaring, the overseas market is unclear, garment orders have dropped sharply, and news of competitors closing their doors has never stopped. Li Qing decided to take it hard.
“Boss Boss, do you want me to come back?” In March, Xiaoxia, who was still in her hometown in Yichang, Hubei Province, sent Li Qing a WeChat message. “Of course! I’m still here!” Li Qing replied without hesitation.
Li Qing withstood the pressure and let Xiaoxia come back. She stocked up on a batch of 5-yuan masks in advance and got the factory going. In fact, it was not cost-effective to start construction at that time. “The price is low and the cost is high. Every order I take is a loss. But I still beg my grandfather and grandma to find various orders.”
Li Qing said that she knows her workers well. For many years. She knew that once production stopped, the whole family would lose the income they depended on for survival. On the other hand, “I think the epidemic will eventually end! Then it will be very troublesome to recruit people again.”
In early March, Li Qing’s garment factory resumed work.
02
The clothing factory is turning a corner
Li Qing was born in 1992 and was once a migrant girl. She came to Panyu, Guangzhou from Maoxian County, Sichuan Province at the age of 16, worked in an electronics factory, met her future husband, and then opened a garment factory with her friends.
“In the beginning, we were just like other factories. We didn’t have high requirements for quality or employees.” Li Qing recalled that one night two years ago, she “didn’t know what happened. Stimulating”, I suddenly realized that I couldn’t go on like this for long.
Li Qing didn’t sleep all night. When I got up the next day, I began to carry out drastic reforms in the garment factory: machines were replaced one after another, quality inspectors were recruited, and acceptance standards were raised. At the same time, she began to look for her own suppliers and customers, and explored opening overseas online stores.
In the beginning, Li Qing paid a lot of tuition.
“There are many companies in Guangzhou that are ‘cutting leeks’ and defraud money under the guise. They claim to help garment factories find overseas customers, open stores, etc., but in fact they only recommend some fake customers to you, or It is obviously an online store that is free to register, but it insists on charging you a large fee.” After spending money to learn a lesson, Li Qing finally opened an American Amazon online store in 2018 by relying on her own exploration.
Today, the operating expenses invested by this outlet add up to more than 400,000 yuan, and there is a fixed traffic diversion fee of 3,000 yuan every day.
“We have been running a factory for so many years, and we have always opened a small car with a price of more than 100,000 yuan.The factory makes the whole piece, looking for speed, and often makes it at night, and it appears at the stall the next day. “Fang Hao introduced.
Fang Hao is not optimistic about young people in garment factories. “You see, those who play with mobile phones at the workstation are usually born after 1995. They have no intention of doing it, and it is difficult for them to do it for a long time. They may not come at any time the next day. Fang Hao said that he had never encountered such young people. “When they owe a large amount of money on their credit cards, they will come back to work for a month or two.” “
During recruitment, Fang Hao tends to hire people born in the 1980s, “They are more stable and have better skills.” Fang Hao joked that he dare not recruit college students born in the 1990s casually. “Although college students are The wages required are generally lower than those of workers, but they cannot bear the hardship. We have a joke: Three thousand dollars can only recruit college students. Are you looking for a skilled worker? It can’t be done without a monthly salary of 10,000 yuan. “
04
The Prospects of the Clothing Industry
Li Qing would like to recruit some college students who can understand English.
“I want college students to Help me operate my overseas social media accounts. “However, at this stage, she is busy delivering goods and expanding production capacity, and has not yet taken care of hiring people.
Regarding the details of various logistics and warehouses, Li Qingmenqing: After the epidemic, the price of sea freight will basically remain the same. It has not changed, still 8-10 yuan/kg, but the price of air freight has increased a lot, about 83.5 yuan/kg. In order to ensure spot supply, Li Qing usually chooses air freight. “Even if you lose money, things must reach consumers on time. “On hand”.
Li Qing said that this logistics information is public and almost every garment factory owner knows it, but not everyone dares to ship goods to the United States at this time. Many garment factory owners, They would rather close the factory than take orders. Liang Feng even mentioned that many bosses explained to their employees that foreign trade exports were restricted. “Actually, this is just a white lie.”
In Baiyun District There are two empty buildings in Luo Chongwei, which used to be the employee dormitories and warehouses of the Guangzhou clothing brand “Lady’s Square”. “The buildings used to be full of people, but now no one lives in them, and the warehouses are rented to others. “The owner of a snack bar next door said.
“Brands like Ayilian and Ladyfang are actually in decline. Where can young people buy them now? “Perhaps because he has been hearing about it for many years, the snack bar owner turned out to be very clear in his comments.
Although it is midsummer, the clothing industry is going through a cold winter.
In mid-May, the former “domestic No. 1 women’s clothing brand” launched Charbel issued a warning announcement that the company’s stock may be subject to delisting risk warning; at the end of May, Esprit, known as the “King of Fashion”, completely terminated its business in mainland China and closed all 56 retail stores in Asia outside mainland China; Immediately afterwards, I.T, known as the “originator of trendy brands” in history, showed in its 2019 financial report that the company’s revenue was HK$7.719 billion, a year-on-year decrease of 12.6%, and its net profit suffered an annual loss for the first time.
The latest protagonist is ZARA: After handing in a quarterly report with a loss of 409 million euros (approximately 3.2 billion yuan), Zara parent company Inditex reported that it plans to permanently close 1,000 to 1,200 of its stores.
“There are still many manufacturing Clothing factories, in pursuit of quick money during the epidemic, switched to making masks and protective clothing, but now they are stuck because most of them cannot meet export standards. “Li Qing said that the factory she started constructing for free this time was also a factory that was unwilling to spend money to improve product quality: “If we set our own standards higher, it would not go bankrupt so quickly. ”
In Li Qing’s factory, domestic sales orders that had been received at a loss are still piling up. Customers do not want to pick up the goods for the time being because there is no sales. But Li Qing said that she doesn’t care anymore, these orders help her They have gone through the most difficult time with their employees. Now, they just want to run at full capacity and produce batch after batch of clothes that will appear in American shopping malls.
Li Qing’s first job in Guangzhou, The salary is less than 2,000 yuan. Now, she and her husband run two garment factories, managing hundreds of employees, and the business scale has doubled compared with before the epidemic. Li Qing only has a junior high school education. She said that every time she sees the workers If your children go to college, you will be happy.</p
