The emergence of brands represented by Xiaomi Mobile Phone,Three Squirrels,and Handu Group has provided a referential development path for the manufacturing industry.In the Internet economic era,e-commerce is highly likely to create new opportunities for new breakthroughs of Ouhai Glasses proprietary brands.

“Industrial development relies on transformation and upgrade.The future glasses industries relies on channels and brands as well as manufacturing,”said Mario Pietribias,the CEO of the world’s second largest glasses company Safilo,as he pointed out the key to industrial transformation of Ouhai Glasses on an international glasses forum.

Lin Sudan,Chairman of the Wenzhou Municipal Glasses E-commerce Industrial Association and Operating Director of the China(Ouhai)Glasses Cross-border E-commerce Park,held that to reach hundreds of millions of end users and corporate clients through the e-commerce is an effective way for proprietary brands to make new breakthroughs.

On the path of creating the“Capital of Chinese Glasses”,Ouhai has product and supply chain advantages to develop its glasses e-commerce.A growing number of local enterprises have realized the importance of e-commerce platforms,and more and more enterprises from other places have based themselves in the China(Ouhai)Glasses E-commerce Park.

Taking advantage of the sound development momentum of cross-border e-commerce,Ouhai Glasses proprietary brands are vigorously seeking a greater share from the international markets.

Increasingly significant scale effect of clustered overseas business

The arrival of the e-commerce era has changed the growth path of traditional brands,and also forced current enterprises to change their outdated sales models.In the past,the exorbitant brand advertising discouraged many enterprises,which were not financially powerful to create their proprietary brands.Now,things have been changed.Via the platform of the Cross-border E-commerce Platform,enterprises can better advertise themselves at a lower cost.

In 2016,the Ouhai District Government planned the construction of the China(Ouhai)Glasses Cross-border E-commerce Park.Located in the Louqiao Industrial Park of the Ouhai Economic Development Zone,the E-commerce Park covers a planned area of 50,000 square meters,of which 21,000 square meters has been built in Phase I.As the first cross-border e-commerce park committed to serving the glasses industry in China,it has provided great convenience for clustered e-commerce of Ouhai Glasses enterprises.In the same year, “Ouhai Glasses Industrial Cluster Cross-border E-commerce”was successfully listed in the first batch of Zhejiang provincial industrial cluster cross-border e-commerce development pilot projects.

“The Park started business attraction in late February 2018.Quite soon,almost all office areas were sold out.”In describing the business attraction of the Park,Lin Sudan used the phrase“panic buying”.Currently,there have been more than 40 enterprises based themselves in the Park,including TH SUNGLASS CORP.from the United States,Contour Optik INC.and Yangsi Glasses from Taiwan(China)the Taiwan company,Wenzhou Silu Glasses Co.,Ltd.,Wenzhou Zhejiang-Jiangxi Import and Export Co.,Ltd.,etc.Among them,there are two foreign-invested enterprises and one foreign investment company.

In the opinion of Lin Sudan,the Cross-border E-commerce Park holds special“charm”.Apart from ensuring a complete glasses supply chain for Wenzhou’s glasses industry,the Park can also provide enterprises with customs clearance,logistics,reimbursement,and Internet services,as well as spot goods supply for clients.All these services have greatly cut enterprises’operating cost. “In the Park,if an enterprise has 1,000 orders a day,and it could work with other enterprises from the Park and the surroundings to deliver all together,the enterprise can bring down its logistics cost by 1,500 yuan a day,and 540,000 yuan a year.”

In today’s Cross-border E-commerce Park,there is a spacious office,large and warm makerspace,young and fashionable e-commerce talents…Since put into operation in 2018,the Cross-border E-commerce Park has been filled with vigor,creative ideas,and innovation,and is heading towards a promising future.

The Ouhai District Government also holds a high expectation of China(Ouhai)Glasses Cross-border E-commerce Park,that is, “building it into the largest specialized glasses foreign trade and e-commerce base in China with an annual sales volume of more than 2 billion yuan in five years”.

Improvement of service quality to boost brand development

“Years of foreign trade practices has led to familiarity of Ouhai Glasses enterprises with glasses demands of users in different parts of the world.For example,Europeans and North Americans have a high nose,and their requirement of glasses stipules is different from that of Asians.We have been dealing with Europeans and North Americans for a long time,so we are very familiar with their facial features and can effectively design glasses in line with their demands,”said Chen Guoguang,President of Wenzhou Ouhai Glasses Co.,Ltd.and Deputy Director of the Ouhai District Industrial and Commercial Association.In fact,many professionals in the glasses industry share Chen Guoguang’s view that Ouhai Glasses enterprises have unparalleled advantages in the business of glasses cross-border e-commerce.

“Nevertheless,we are currently faced with how to transform products into commodities,and sell them to overseas markets.We are exploring how to address this issue,”confessed the head of an Ouhai Glasses e-commerce company at a business attraction conference of the E-commerce Park.

To the end,the sponsor of the Ouhai Glasses Cross-border E-commerce Park has organized one business attraction conference almost every week to provide enterprises with inspirations of overseas business.Activities,such as LightInTheBox Suppliers Conference themed on“A New Shortcut to Overseas Market Expansion of Made in China”and Global Scanner Business Attraction Fair,have attracted at lease 100 glasses e-commerce dealers every time.Sometimes,the number of participants can fully occupy the large conference room providing 220 seats.

“How to expand overseas markets has been a huge challenge facing Wenzhou glasses enterprises,”said Pan Hongxia,Deputy President of LightInTheBox,when analyzing perplexments facing the development of Ouhai Glasses enterprises,and sharing her overseas business development experience.

In addition to experience sharing,various cross-border e-commerce platforms have provided sales platforms and channels to boost e-commerce business development of Ouhai Glasses.

“In the past,we had to undergo a complex set of approval procedures to set up our stores on famous e-commerce platforms.When we had any problems to consult the customer service staff,we needed to wait for a long time.Things have been changed.Ouhai Glasses Cross-border E-commerce Platform has provided not only door-to-door promotion,but also offered many preferential policies and conveniences to us.”Enterprises based in the Park are satisfied with the online business services.

Moreover,the E-commerce Park has attracted photography,design,glasses assembly and logistics service providers.This has contributed to completeness of the local facilities.The infinite business opportunities behind“Ouhai Glasses+Cross-border E-commerce”have attracted more and more enterprises from the glasses industry.Currently,a large number of glasses professions,when formulating personalized marketing plans,are willing to make the bold step of“brand overseas expansion”.Some e-commerce enterprises in the E-commerce Park have already developed their e-commerce brand.Among them“LianSan”is a paragon.Besides,many Ouhai Glasses manufacturing enterprises,including Tongda Optics Co.,Ltd.and Ouhai Glasses Co.,Ltd.have registered their own proprietary brands,and started their cross-border e-commerce.

With the constant upgrade of various e-commerce brand marketing strategies and the rapid establishment of the logistics system within the Park,Ouhai glasses industry has witnessed the rapid growth of its e-commerce forces.Data showed that the online sales volume of the China(Ouhai)Glasses Cross-border E-commerce Park had already exceeded 200 million yuan.

To sum up,cross-border e-commerce will not only become a short-cut for Ouhai Glasses proprietary brands to seek a higher market share internationally,but,more importantly,become a new economic growth point of the Ouhai glasses industry.

O2O integration

As known to all,the glasses industry is a high-added-value industry.If Ouhai Glasses can develop abroad in the form of“proprietary brands+ cross-border e-commerce”,then Ouhai glasses enterprises will grasp the right to set the selling price.

Relying on the complete industrial chain and mature production technology of Ouhai,Ouhai Glasses can win clients with its high cost performance ratio,and create more profits for clients.Meanwhile,Ouhai Glasses can make itself known to more overseas clients,deepening their understanding of“Made in China”and Chinese brands.

However,this does not mean that e-commerce has to be fully separated from brands and physical stores. “Under the background of new retail,O2O integration is the mainstream,”said Zuo Jiajun,Vice-President of Aikucun.com,on the Aikucun Wenzhou Station City-oriented Business Attraction Fair.

Lin Jiaqian,Chairman of the Wenzhou Municipal Glasses Commerce Chamber,also thought that it is necessary to resort to big data analysis to seek O2O integrated development.He pointed out that an Indian company has been very successful in global e-commerce.According to the company’s model,they first sell products online.When users of certain region reach certain number,offline stores will be set up in that region to attract online buyers to offline sales.This can maximize transaction efficiency,and the measure is referential to Wenzhou’s glasses industry.

O2O integration has become a consensus of Ouhai Glasses enterprises.Local glasses manufacturers have set up O2O experience stores along the brand image street.These experience stores,featuring integration of online platforms and offline stores,enable users to experience all kinds of online products,thus reducing the wrong online purchase rate,enhancing the user engagement,and strengthening users’brand loyalty.

Under the current market-oriented market,the supply-front response generally lags behind the demand-front changes.In many fields,the demand-front changes have been very obvious,but the supply-front,due to back of an efficient feedback channel and flexible mechanism,responds slowly to these changes.This is also a major challenge facing brand transformation of China’s manufacturing industry.Currently,proprietary brands of the Ouhai glasses industry have been on the track of accelerated development,and the time will tell.

So far,offline sales channels expanded by Ouhai glasses industry via the OEM model have reachedmore than 100 countriesand regions.All the year around,about 1,000 foreign trade elites of Ouhai glasses industry are bustling around in different parts of the world.A global trade network incorporating not only trade and retail giants(such as LUXOTTICA,SAFILO,FGX,MRCOLIN and SPECAVERS)but also dozens of chain stores has been set up,which can immediately grasp demand-front changes,and provide flexible countermeasures for the supply front.All this will speed up the emergence of Ouhai Glasses proprietary glasses.

“As long as we do a good job in branding and channel development,the glory of Ouhai glasses industry will sustain in the coming one decade or two decades.We will strive to pass down the glory of Ouhai glasses industry to the next generation,”said Lin Jiaqian full of confidence.