Xinhua All Media+| "Trendy Play" Password: Cultural Unlocking of a New Track in Manufacturing Industry
In recent years, the trend toy market has risen. Trendy toys are endowed with artistic, social, and collectible attributes, which are not only widely loved by young people, but also bring new business opportunities to the traditional labor-intensive industry of toy manufacturing.
Pinku, the ChaoPlay brand, comes from Dongguan, the "China ChaoPlay Capital". With Chinese traditional culture as its design feature, it has launched a series of Chinese style 3D metal assembly products, such as the ten mile red makeup series to restore the ancient marriage customs, and the Datang Street series to show the style of the prosperous Tang Dynasty. Nowadays, Pincool products are translated into 7 languages and sold in over 100 countries and regions. The Fengguan product alone sells 220000 units per month, with annual sales exceeding 100 million yuan.
Pincool sachet trendy toy products. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Pan Yujie
The symposium on promoting the high-quality development of the trendy toy industry was held in Dongguan on the 19th. The reporter learned that the global trendy toy market is in a high-speed development stage, with the market size increasing from 8.7 billion US dollars in 2015 to 34 billion US dollars in 2022. At present, Dongguan has over 4000 toy production enterprises and nearly 1500 upstream and downstream supporting enterprises. Nearly a quarter of global anime derivatives are manufactured in Dongguan; Nearly 85% of domestic trendy toys are produced in Dongguan. As of 2022, there are a total of 87 large-scale enterprises involved in the production of trendy toys in Dongguan, with a total industrial output value of 16.657 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 29.8%. Dongguan is about to become China's Chaozhou City of Play, Chaozhou Center, to further promote the development of the industry cluster.
"In the early days, domestic trendy toy production enterprises mainly engaged in overseas OEM, and many of the products in the market were foreign IP or character products. Now, domestic brands are on the rise, and many traditional Chinese elements have been added to their designs. Currently, the market preference is more for trendy toys with Chinese elements." said Wu Yifu, Deputy General Manager of the trendy toy family, an online platform that focuses on trendy toy trading.
The trendy toys produced by Dongguan Shunlin Model Gift Co., Ltd. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Deng Ruixuan
"Chinese traditional culture has provided us with inspiration and a source of imagination for our creations. We use trendy ways to promote images from traditional Chinese stories such as" The Classic of Mountains and Seas "and" The Romance of the Three Kingdoms "to the world," said Wang Dongdong, founder of Dongguan Dongxiu Culture Co., Ltd.
According to the 2023 White Paper on the Development of China's Toy and Infant Products Industry, the export value of toys from China in 2022 was 48.36 billion US dollars, an increase of 5.6% compared to the previous year.
Gao Xiaojun, Deputy Researcher of Shenzhen Cultural, Radio, Television, Tourism and Sports Research Center, believes that trendy toys are a very good category in foreign cultural trade. In the process of Chinese culture going abroad, they are expected to become a popular image carrier.
Bubble Mart, the leading enterprise of China ChaoPlay, recently released the 2023 semi annual report. Data shows that in the first half of this year, it achieved a revenue of 2.814 billion yuan, a year-on-year increase of 19.3%; Overseas business continues to grow rapidly, with revenue increasing by nearly 140% year-on-year in the first half of the year.
In the first half of this year, Pop Mart opened offline stores in France and Malaysia, and promoted the globalization of the brand and trendy toy culture by participating in large-scale overseas exhibitions, artist signing events, and other means.
The trendy toy image Laura produced by Dongguan Chengshi Toy Co., Ltd. Respondents provide pictures
Chen Xiaoyun, Vice President of Pop Mart International Group, introduced that currently, Pop Mart has opened over 55 offline stores in over 25 countries worldwide, with over 100 robot stores and a cross-border e-commerce network covering over 80 countries.
"The development of trendy toys has injected new cultural added value into the toy industry, bringing more possibilities and imaginative space to the overall development of the industry. It has gone beyond the functional use of traditional toys, with more emotional value and artistic attributes," said Chen Xiaoyun.
Original trendy toy designed by Dongguan Yongjie Plastic Products Co., Ltd. Photo by Xinhua News Agency reporter Deng Ruixuan
"This is a product that satisfies everyone's inner expectations, based on an unknown surprise." According to Lv Min, Sales Director of Dongguan Yongjie Plastic Products Co., Ltd., the company produces 100 million "eggs" a year, including Qiqu Eggs, Twisted Eggs, and Surprise Eggs, bringing more emotional value to consumers.
Luo Xiaoxing, the general manager of Guangzhou Roaming Cabin Network Technology Co., Ltd., a startup company, is very confident in the future development. He believes that by empowering the traditional toy manufacturing industry with culture, there will be more opportunities and a larger global market in this new track of trendy play.
