Yiwu Meetings

So I'm in Shanghai now and finally have found a proxy that works and allows me to update this blog. So this post will be dedicated to my experiences in Yiwu.

To begin, let me describe the city of Yiwu, known as "the small commodities market city." There is a reason that is the nickname of Yiwu, because the market in Yiwu is amazing. It is the largest wholesale market in the world. It is over 1km long, has 4 stories, and contains over 70,000 shops and over 500,000 different types of goods you can buy wholesale from Chinese factories. Almost every factory in China has a booth in Yiwu, making this an international business hot spot.

The largest populations of foreigners in Yiwu were Korean and Middle Eastern, which was readily apparent by the massive amounts of Middle Eastern restaurants and hookah in Yiwu. In the market you could see people from Europe, Africa, South America, North America, and Asia all buying goods wholesale so they could sell to their home markets, or maybe even redistribute them again to businesses.

I began my trip through Yiwu going to the market and interviewing the shop owners there. I will give a general overview of what I've learned they do and who they work with. Basically, the shops are filled with samples of products from the factories, and all the customers that want to buy goods will walk around the market looking for goods that they are interested in buying. All the foreigners will come with a trade agent, who has a knowledge of the market and knows where to take them. Also, the agent will help the customer bargain with the shops, work with the government to export the goods, and also just allows foreigners who do not speak Chinese to communicate with the shops.

The shop owners will negotiate with the customers and take down their order. Once the order has been made, the shop will send the order to the factory for production. Once the goods are produced, the factory will send all of these goods to the trading agent's company, who in turn will ship these products overseas to their customers destination, who then will pick up the goods at customs, and the deal is done.

This is the basic way that companies are able to buy cheap goods in China, and in subsequent posts I will discuss how the Chinese have difficulties dealing with other countries and the risks involved for each party.