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The Old Clothes You Lost Are Becoming New Traffic Entries For Ma Yun.

2019/6/21 10:57:00 100

Used ClothesOld ClothesMa Yun

Some people's "breaking away from home" is becoming another business.

The old clothes do not seem to be such a good resource for the waste recycling industry that "rubbish is just the wrong location".

Recently, Xia Yu, who lives in Beijing, intends to join the tide of "escaping from the north to the Canton" and to live in another city. But she meets a problem that all the long distance moving people will encounter -- how to deal with objects that can not be taken away.

Through the second-hand trading platform such as idle fish and turn around, Xia Yu sold some valuable items, but how to deal with the rest of the old books and big bags of old clothes became a difficult problem.

Under no circumstances, Xia Yu intends to sell old books and clothes to waste recycling companies. Just as she was in distress, how to send the pile of things to the waste acquisition point, she found that there were many companies that could pick up the waste products on the market. The users could make an appointment in advance to hand in the trash, so that they would not run.

So Xia Yu made a reservation through the WeChat applet of a recycling company. But when they arrived at the door, they told Xia Yu that cartons, old books, plastic and electrical appliances were recycled, but they did not accept old clothes or shoes, or only 0 yuan.

Puzzled Xia Yu in the Jingdong pat, fish, flying ants and other second-hand platform after a circle, found that 0 yuan recycling of waste clothing is a common phenomenon. So she had to take a lot of clothes to the second-hand recycling points at the entrance of the plot, and disposed of them at the price of 5 cents / Jin.

Xia Yu's experience is not an isolated case. Because sorting and recycling industry is not active in the recycling of old clothes, many old clothes are discarded, and the proportion of genuine recycling is very few.

Statistics show that, according to the average life expectancy of a piece of clothing 3~4 years, if China every year on the basis of the purchase of 5~10 new clothes per person per year, each person abandons 3~5 old clothes each year, the domestic will produce more than 50 million tons of old clothes each year, while the domestic comprehensive utilization of the old clothes is only about 2000000 tons / year, and the comprehensive utilization rate is less than 10%. In terms of stock, the annual output of old clothes in China will reach 3 billion 900 million ~65 billion. Spin The total volume of products exceeds 1 billion tons.

For the Chinese clothing market with an annual output value of up to 1 trillion and 300 billion, the old clothes recycling is a far away development of the rich ore. It is estimated that the old clothes worth about 200 billion yuan will be eliminated, but mining the rich ore is not easy.

Old clothes recycling industry chain

"The public may have some misunderstanding about the recycling of old clothes". Fang Xiaodong, the founder of white whale, said that in fact, there are always channels to pay for the old clothes recycling, but the price is relatively low. "A kilogram of clothes and clothes is about 1 yuan."

It is understood that the recycling of old clothes has always had a clear industrial chain, from recycling to sorting processing to reuse, and the formation of the industry.

Take the front end recycling as an example, at present, recycling is divided into the traditional offline mode and online mode. The offline mode includes government supported recycling, public welfare organization recovery, waste collection business or personal recycling, etc. They mainly operate in the neighborhood, schools and other places to set up waste clothes recycling bins, waste items recycling points, mobile door-to-door recycling mode. The online mode refers to the Internet company's online booking mode.

According to the insiders, compared to the current situation, the recovery of waste clothing is still dominated by offline.

Take "flying ant" as an example. Its founder, Ma Yun, said that the platform is currently the largest online recycling platform for waste clothes. In 2016, the recycled clothing reached 1000 tons, and increased to 8 kiloton in 2017. In 2018, the recovery volume soared to 40 thousand tons, and he expected to reach 100 thousand tons in 2019. Another Fang Xiaodong, the founder of white whale, which is known as the top three online recycling platform, said that the platform's recycled clothing reached 10 thousand tons in 2018.

But the amount of recycling online is still negligible compared to the annual total of millions of tons of recycled clothing.

However, in recent years, with the recycling of waste products becoming the hot spot of entrepreneurship, there are also some start-ups focusing on the recycling of waste clothes, such as "gull swallow", "old clothes to convey love", "green bag environmental protection" and other platforms have been set up. Even Alibaba, Jingdong and other electronic business platforms have begun to participate in the recycling of waste clothes in various forms.

After recycling the clothes on the front end recycling platform, these old clothes will be sent to the sorting plant for sorting. According to the insiders, these sorting factories purchase "goods" (quality, specification and grade old clothes) at the price of 1700 yuan to 1800 yuan per ton, and then according to season and clothing. Material Science Classification of new and old degrees.

"By comparison, the sorting factories prefer old clothes from north to Guangzhou and other coastal developed areas such as Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Shanghai, and the Pearl River Delta, because many of the clothes in these areas are quite new and of good quality." Wang Yu, the head of a recycling platform for waste clothes, told all-weather technology.

Wang Yu said that the most popular color is 80% of the new summer wear, which is the main export to foreign countries, the rest of the clothes will be further processed, such as the zipper , Button The metal accessories and so on are taken down for recycling. Take copper zippers as an example, some people on the market are recycling at the price of 20 thousand yuan / ton.

After processing, these old clothes will basically have three final destinations: donated to poor mountain areas, exported to Africa or Southeast Asia, or to regeneration.

In fact, the number of old clothes entering the "donation" channel is relatively small. At present, only about 10% of the old clothes will be used to donate. Wang Yu believes that the reason for the small number of donations is, on the one hand, that there is less and less need for large numbers of donations. Simple clothes can no longer solve the poverty problem in the mountainous areas.

On the other hand, the policy also has strict requirements for donation. "It is not enough to donate." According to the regulations issued by the Ministry of social affairs of the Ministry of civil affairs in April 19th, only public organizations registered or recognized as charitable organizations and eligible for public donations can conduct public fundraising activities. Other organizations or individuals may not conduct public fundraising activities. This makes many old clothes recycling enterprises hard to donate.

Besides donation, recycling is the main destination of waste clothes. "At present, about 75% of the old clothes recovered by flying ants are used for recycling," Ma said. The so-called regenerative treatment refers to picking out parts that can be recycled from old clothes, sorting, cleaning, disinfecting, and then breaking and reprocessing.

Generally speaking, if the waste textiles are made of natural fibers such as cotton, wool and hemp, after recycling, they can be made into composite materials, thermal insulation materials and filling materials. chemical fiber After reprocessing, clothing can be used as regenerated fiber to make industrial textiles, such as made of greenhouse, automobile noise insulation cotton and so on.

Some of the more new summer clothing will be exported to Africa or Southeast Asian countries, and will start to play a role in other hemispheres.

Export business

In the recycling chain of old clothes, no one denies the importance of exports. A lot of waste clothing recycling industry mentioned that in the old clothing recycling industry, exports are the only part that can generate greater profits.

Fang Xiaodong disclosed that at present, they are losing money in addition to exports, and the platform is using export earnings to cover losses, thereby realizing balance of payments.

It is understood that according to different categories, the price of old clothes exported to abroad is very large, and the price is usually between 6000 yuan and 10000 yuan per ton. Among them, summer wear is the most popular, and the export price per ton is about 5000 yuan to 6000 yuan. "The export price of these two days is between 9100 and 9500 yuan," Wang Yu said.

The export of China's waste clothes can be traced back to two or thirty years ago. Some of the earliest businesses in Guangdong were doing related businesses. However, over the past 10 years, the scale of old clothing exports has increased significantly. According to the statistics of the United Nations Trade Statistics database, the export volume of Chinese second-hand clothing has been rising rapidly in the global second-hand clothing trade since 2009.

From the destination, the export of China's waste clothes is mainly imported into Africa and Southeast Asia. According to the United Nations Trade Statistics database, more than 60% of China's secondhand garments exported to foreign countries eventually exported to Africa. The actual proportion may be even more alarming. Fang Xiaodong said that Africa is the number one destination of white whale's exports, and 85% of its old clothing is exported to Africa, and exports to Philippines and other Southeast Asian countries account for about 15%.

As Africa, which focuses on the poorest inhabitants of the world, second-hand clothing was once a best seller in Africa. Data show that as early as 2004, 81% of clothing purchased in Uganda was secondhand clothing, and secondhand clothing accounted for half of the clothing imports of sub Saharan Africa in 2005. A 2018 article in the people's Daily quoted data from the United Nations that 80% of Africans were wearing second-hand clothing, and in 2017, the East African community imported 151 million dollars of second-hand clothing and shoes.

At present, the second-hand clothing export from China to Africa or Southeast Asia has formed a mature chain. Fang Xiaodong mentioned that the complete link of the export of old clothes is: foreign buyers first came to China to negotiate purchase agreements and contracts, and then domestic factories began to produce according to the procurement contract, and spanported the goods to the other countries' ports through the third party shipping company or freight company. The bill of lading was issued at home, and after the buyer made the payment, the bill of lading would be sent to the buyer, and the other party could pick up the goods at the port.

Some buyers are local businessmen, some of them are overseas Chinese who live in the region. A person familiar with the import and export chain said buyers also play wholesalers in the locales. After picking up the goods, they will sell the garments to the smaller wholesalers in the form of packages, each containing about one hundred kilograms of clothing.

Finally, these clothes will appear in the local "Mitumba (second-hand)" market, and sell at the price of several yuan per piece, "better sell to more than ten yuan."

What is the size of the old clothes exported to Africa and Southeast Asia every year? The data shared by Fang Xiaodong is that at present, there are about 300 to 350 companies that have the ability to export second-hand clothes in China, and the average monthly export volume of each enterprise is 15 containers, and each container is 28.5 tons. However, the export of these enterprises has also been affected recently because of the big environmental factors, and the average monthly export volume of each factory can only reach 11 to 12 containers.

It is worth noting that although the export of Chinese clothing to Africa is not small, but in terms of the size of the overall second-hand clothing market in Africa, the market share (from China's second-hand clothing) is not more than 20%, Fang Xiaodong said.

Those who are familiar with the second-hand clothing market in Africa say that besides China, Britain, Germany, Holland, Korea, Japan and other countries are also exporting to Africa in a large scale.

"Africans have a larger body size than those in the European and American countries, and the clothing in Europe and the United States is more extensive," he said. He believes that a very important reason for the large number of Chinese second-hand clothing exported to Africa is that the price is very cheap.

Low price is also an important competitive force in the second hand clothing market in Africa, which is the key factor for the sale of secondhand clothing in Africa. Data show that the average market price of second-hand clothing imported from Africa is only 35% to 40% of new clothes.

However, due to the impact of cheap imported second-hand clothes on the local textile industry, some African countries have begun to consciously increase the restrictions on imported second-hand clothing.

In July 2016, East African countries such as Rwanda, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda raised tariffs on imports of old clothes; South Africa's post Guardian reported that the East African community planned to stop importing second-hand clothing and shoes from western countries by 2019 and revitalize its own manufacturing industry.

However, Chinese exporters of old clothes are not worried about this. "Most African countries will also need to import second-hand clothing from abroad." Wang Yu believes that there is still demand in at least 20 years.

The pain of profit

Compared with the trillion garment industry output in China, the market space of the old clothes recycling industry is almost negligible.

According to statistics, the scale of China's scrap steel market is as high as 300 billion yuan a year, and the annual market scale of the waste paper industry is as high as 100 billion.

The pain of profit runs through the front end, middle end and back end of the waste clothing recycling industry.

At the front end, the waste recycling staff's enthusiasm for the recycling of old clothes has not been high. "Recycling workers are more willing to recycle household appliances, metals, cartons and so on," Fang Xiaodong said. For a recycling worker who rides a tricycle, the recycling machine can earn tens or even hundreds of thousands of dollars for a washing machine, air conditioner and fridge. But if the old clothes are used, only one or two cents per kilogram can be earned. "Even if the tricycle is full, he will not make money from a refrigerator."

For the Internet platform to collect recycled clothing, it is far more profitable. They are still exploring how to cover costs. Logistics cost is the biggest cost of the Internet platform. It is understood that at present, various Internet platforms mainly cooperate with courier companies to send couriers to their homes.

But there are two problems in the way of Internet second-hand recycling platform. Ma Yun believes that the first is the high cost of logistics, the cost of sending clothes to the door is almost the same as the cost of sending users express. There is a platform that accounts for the fact that a user donating 10 kilograms of old clothes at a time is probably the profit point of door-to-door service, but many times it can not reach that amount. In addition, the delivery of old clothes by express people is essentially a reverse logistics, which has many problems in matching with the current express mode.

In order to reduce costs, flying ants have invested in a courier company specializing in reverse logistics. In addition, they also began to prepare for walking down the line and laying old clothes recycling bins. In order to reduce the logistics cost and consider the convenience of residents, Ma Yun believes that the future of the line is still the main battlefield for the recycling of old clothes.

Because of the small scale of the market and the difficulty of making profits, the old clothing recycling industry is rarely valued by capital. For example, flying ants have not received financing since its establishment. Ma Yuncheng, they do not want to finance, but the capital can not see the industry, and feel that the profit space is small; in his view, capital is more willing to invest in more profitable mobile phone recycling, household appliances recycling, waste paper recycling and other fields.

The survival of the old clothes sorting plant is also not optimistic. It is understood that, apart from a few large enterprises, most of the sorting factories are small workshops. In essence, they are still labor-intensive industries.

"Hard earned one year makes two, three hundred thousand, and most of them are still losing money," another industry source said. The profit of the sorting plant is very thin. Only one ton of old clothes can earn 200 to 300 yuan. And with the increase of manpower cost and the strictness of environmental protection requirements, the survival of the sorting factory is becoming more and more difficult and the quantity is also decreasing.

It is not easy for the old clothes recycling industry to go through the back end. For them, exports are still the pillars of profits, but the intensity of competition is also intensifying, and their bargaining power is also gradually decreasing.

In addition to exports, almost all other ways of handling old clothes are losing money. Take regeneration treatment as an example, Fang Xiaodong said that the price of a ton of recycled materials is only about 200 to 300 yuan, such as the regenerated automobile noise insulation cotton, which is a very cheap material in the automobile industry. "If it's too expensive, the automobile manufacturer will not have the power to spend money to buy it." Therefore, the cost of regeneration is more expensive than the new material, but the income is very low, and it is not cost-effective in terms of economic cost.

Fang Xiaodong revealed that sometimes the waste of clothing not only did not benefit, but to pour money. For example, for some useless textiles, their final destination may be power plants, which are spanported to power plants for combustion and power generation, but power plants will not spend money on them, or even they need subsidies.

Compared with developed countries, there is still a way to generate profits in China's old clothes recycling, that is, to circulate in the market again.

According to an official article released by the strategic alliance of industrial technology innovation of waste textiles comprehensive utilization (hereinafter referred to as the "waste textiles alliance"), in July 2017, the circular economy Association of China took the lead. The four associations of China Textile Industry Federation, China Chemical Fiber Industry Association and China Renewable Resource Recycling Association jointly reported to the Ministry of commerce circulation department leaders about the current situation of recycling and utilization of waste textiles in China, and explored the work idea of establishing second-hand clothing market.

Yin Hong, deputy director of the circulation department of the Ministry of Commerce, made clear that the state's policy on secondhand clothing was prohibited.

However, from the perspective of policy development, we are also exploring the mechanism of establishing second-hand clothing market in China. Sun Huaibin, vice president of China Textile Industry Federation, suggested introducing market mechanism to build the market from old clothes to second-hand clothes.

According to the above articles of the waste textiles alliance, Yin Hong mentioned at that time that the adjustment of policy needs to fully demonstrate the necessity of policy adjustment, and avoid the risk of policy adjustment. At the same time, we need to consult the relevant departments (such as the Ministry of environmental protection, the General Administration of industry and commerce, quality supervision, Health Planning Commission, etc.), and we need to consider whether there are enough consumer groups in the Internet economy.

Flow inlet

On the one hand, old clothes recycling is not profitable, but on the other hand, Internet Co has joined the field of old clothes recycling, and even Jingdong, Alibaba and some fast. fashion brand H&M has also set foot in this market.

Take Jingdong as an example, Jingdong has also patted a second-hand platform to participate in the free home recycling of old clothes business. Users can use Jingdong public service "love and love linked" platform or download the pat second-hand APP button to call Jingdong express courier free to collect idle clothes. Jingdong patted the second hand companies, including Tetra Pak, P & G, Mengniu and other enterprises launched the "all things new life plan", and combined with some recycling partners in the garbage classification field, and entered the front end recycling link.

And Ali's Tmall and leisure fish have access to several old clothes recycling platforms, such as flying ants, and cooperate with fast fashion brand H&M to try online recycling of old clothes. Users can make an appointment for home recycling service through these platforms, and get the reward of ant forest capacity, shopping coupons and so on.

Since there is no money, why are there other players pouring into this field?

Wang Yu thought that although all families did not plan to make money from the recycling of old clothes, they had different thoughts. Jingdong and H&M valued the promotion of brands and the sales increase brought by discount tickets.

"Recycling of waste products is a strong demand for users. We first wanted to bring users and traffic through this way." Ma Yun frankly said that the goal of flying ants is to aim at the traffic volume, hoping to turn the traffic into the electricity supplier business and other waste recycling areas, in order to achieve profitability.

It is reported that the current revenue of flying ants is not on the recycling of old clothes, but in the business of e-commerce. Ma Yun disclosed that in 2018, the revenue of flying ants in the recycling of waste and clothing items was about several million yuan, but the electricity and advertising revenue was as high as 30 million yuan. Take the electricity supplier as an example, with the help of millions of fans accumulated on its public account, its electricity business turnover reached 50 million yuan in 2018.

It is understood that at present, the flying ants have access to all the platforms of Ali department, but also access to Jingdong, 58 second-hand trading platform "turn around", but the order from Ali is the largest, and "big is not a little bit".

Ma Yun said that the recycling order obtained by flying ants on the Ali platform has been from hundreds of orders per day to tens of thousands per day. "Ali did not find the user's needs at first, and the flying ants raised the business," he said. Although Ali has also set foot in the whole recovery section of mobile phone recycling and home appliance recycling, the order volume of the old clothes recycling is the largest from the order quantity.

In addition to the strong demand of residents for handling old clothes, Ali is another important attraction for users from ants forest. It is understood that after the recycling of second-hand clothes on Ali platform, Ali will reward 790 grams of ant forest energy, far more than most of the energy available for consumption, thus attracting many users, "some users are to obtain the energy of ants forest to place second-hand clothes."

Compared with other platforms, "Ali has done this thing more successfully", according to an industry insider, Ali discovered the value of this entry, and has begun to promote second-hand clothing recycling as a strong service entrance.

With strong demand business as an entry to attract traffic, the mode of realization through e-commerce has been tested repeatedly in all walks of life. But in the final analysis, the foundation of this model is based on the basic business of old clothes recycling. Only when the basic business is stable can stable traffic flow be generated.

Ma Yun believes that the competition of old clothes recycling platform is reflected in cost and service. He said that flying ants have entered more than 300 cities in the past few years and screened the industry. The more than 60 factories that are currently working together are larger and more standardized factories in the industry.

In Ma Yun's view, "only one link in the future will never get better." Previously, flying ants have invested in logistics companies, export companies and reprocessing companies, and many cooperative sorting factories rely on flying ants, so they also have strong control over sorting plants. They hope to integrate all links in the future to form a scale advantage.

In any case, the old clothing recycling industry has entered a new era. Under the support of the Internet thinking, what kind of change is expected for this industry?

 

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