ISPO china

[sk8norcal]

ASR

Need to establish or update your China strategy?
This is the event for you.

ispo china 2009
The International Tradeshow for Sports, Fashion and Lifestyle Brands in Asia.

February 19-21, 2009 - New earlier dates by popular response from the rapidly accelerating retail buyer sophistication in China.
China International Exhibition Center in Beijing

Nielsen Business Media, ASR's parent company, has partnered with ispo china to help North American brands develop or enhance their China strategies. Work with your ASR team here in California to learn about doing business in the booming China retail market and how you can easily implement a turn-key exhibit at the premier tradeshow for sports, fashion and lifestyle brands in the region for as little as US$15,000 in total cost.

* Benefit immediately from the booming market for your product category in Asia, and specifically in China
* Establish your brand strategically in the World’s fastest growing consumer market
* Meet all the important players at ispo china and establish the necessary personal connections
* Present your products to thousands of retail buyers starved for Western brands (These early buyers have an enormous impact on other emerging retailers in the field)
* It’s easier, more cost effective and convenient than you think to get all these benefits through exhibiting at ispo china


more........

[krayola]

Yes the China growth myth and there 1% middle class that will over night sprout like mushrooms. This rumor has been perpetuated since the late 80's and the rush by big corps to exploit this market is akin to insanity. China has no goal other then mass control of it's people, it's market and it's corporate run triad banks. There stock market is controlled by it's appointed government controllers.

China has wanted one thing, to have direct markets into America not the other way around. Though never spoken about there is a big push in the skate industry not only to manufacture but to as well have Chinese bases here to put American wood shops, distribution and retailers out of business. There goal is to build import bases, and there is a few currently in Oakland and a few in Orange County taking orders for boards, wheels and shoes. Not only will they make them abroad, have the subsidized Chinese government air freight those goods no matter the costs but they will remove the friendly Made in China sticker as well so your customers will never know where the came from.

That's a strategy I'm staying away from.

I'll pass.

[msk]

Yes the China growth myth and there 1% middle class that will over night sprout like mushrooms. This rumor has been perpetuated since the late 80's

What myth? China currently has one of the fastest growing middle class populations in the world, and right now, their middle class is about the same size as the *entire* US population (and still growing).

Though never spoken about there is a big push in the skate industry not only to manufacture but to as well have Chinese bases here to put American wood shops, distribution and retailers out of business. There goal is to build import bases, and there is a few currently in Oakland and a few in Orange County taking orders for boards, wheels and shoes. Not only will they make them abroad, have the subsidized Chinese government air freight those goods no matter the costs but they will remove the friendly Made in China sticker as well so your customers will never know where the came from.

The problem here isn't with China, its with the skate industry...

[breamo]

Want even higher gas prices? Keep buying stuff from China.

The fact that the US now imports more than it exports is the cause of our week dollar and high gas prices. (it's our export deficit)

Explanation here:
The Shocking Reality of High Gas Prices - Seeking Alpha

We're losing jobs, we're losing value in our dollar, and we're losing skilled labor.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not hating, just trying to help inform people of the real reason gas is on the rise. (Ever wonder why it's only skyrocketing in the US? European gas hasn't doubled in the last year. It's funny when someone complains about gas prices, and yet they still buy merchandise made in China. (Especially skate equipment, which is still made in the US) Do something!

[krayola]

I love both of you for having a good attitude about China.

There is no hate on China. That country is das kaput.

Americans in general love to complain but still love cheap sneakers and crappy dollar store junk.

I've written 2 letters to my congressman as well as my representatives as to the fact that all skateboard distribution and importers of Chinese goods are removing the point of origin stickers on trucks, wheels and decks.

Thing have become so strange in American. In 8 years bush dropped over 8,500 items of the strategic resources list. Which means he made it possible for certain technologies to be exported that actual help defend our country both militarily and economically.

Last time I checked China executes it's 180 political prisoners and recycled there body parts for the organ market. Last time I checked they are just polluters and considered the major cause for global warming.

And some shop put some supposed ABEC 7 shop grade barring in my wheels, they broke while skating. The inside shields had chinese bench marks.

Pass.

[BigDaddy@TactisSkates]

Want even higher gas prices? Keep buying stuff from China.

The fact that the US now imports more than it exports is the cause of our week dollar and high gas prices. (it's our export deficit)

Explanation here:
The Shocking Reality of High Gas Prices - Seeking Alpha

We're losing jobs, we're losing value in our dollar, and we're losing skilled labor.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not hating, just trying to help inform people of the real reason gas is on the rise. (Ever wonder why it's only skyrocketing in the US? European gas hasn't doubled in the last year. It's funny when someone complains about gas prices, and yet they still buy merchandise made in China. (Especially skate equipment, which is still made in the US) Do something!

I'm With you Breamo! I am actively stocking my site with Made in USA by responsible green practices manufacturers... My biggest problem has been Safety gear! I cant find USA made Knee and elbow pads

Also... food for thought.... ALL the bamboo sheet is manufactured by processes that would never pass the air quality act in the USA, except... as far as I have found... Gravity's

You won't catch me do'in 50+ on a C-stamped product!

Keep the stoke Breamo!

"Big Daddy"

[msk]

Last time I checked they are just polluters and considered the major cause for global warming.

Uh, so are we. China finally overtook the US in pollution in 2007. Until last year, *WE* were the leader.

Keep in mind that China also has a population over 4 times greater than the US. If the level of pollution they create is just slightly above ours, then per capita, we're still creating 4 times as much as they do.

Another factor is that part of the reason we've cleaned up a bit is because we now have less manufacturing over here, while they have more. Its not so much that we've actually reduced pollution, its that we've simply moved the problem somewhere else. And by farming out our manufacturing over there, we're still (at least indirectly) responsible for that pollution...

And some shop put some supposed ABEC 7 shop grade barring in my wheels, they broke while skating. The inside shields had chinese bench marks.

First of all, if you bought "ABEC7" bearings, you got suckered. Real ABEC7s are not cheap, and furthermore, that rating has absolutely nothing to do with strength, longevity, or performance. A real ABEC7 that came from Switzerland or Germany could also fail just as quickly, if the design wasn't appropriate for skating.

Once again, the problem is with the skateboard industry, not China. Some company HERE requested a cheap bearing from over there with ABEC7 stamped on it. That same company could've sourced their bearings from somewhere else, and/or asked for higher quality. But they didn't. They figured they could get away with selling a low quality product for a higher margin. That's not the fault of the Chinese manufacturer, that's the fault of the skate company who put their name on the bearing...


But getting back to the original post, China now has a significant percentage of its population with some disposable income. Rather than being purely an exporter of low cost goods, China is now also an importer of higher end goods. A perfect opportunity for skate companies to expand their market, while simultaneously helping to reduce our trade deficit...

[BigDaddy@TactisSkates]

MSK I respectfully disagree with you on two fundamental points. The USA per capita consumes nothing compared to the China Government... Remember that two thirds of the population lives in huts with no power at all... Wake up bro! the majority of resources are spent assimilating other technologies by gov. funded buis. COMUNIST... The average worker makes $3 a week... wether it is skateboards or disk drives... I have been there for the last five years and seen the crap...

Number 2 They have no regard for air Land or water polution standards USA or international...
They are killing their people and the environmont And do not care if you live or die from it Harsh but true

Dano

[krayola]

As to bearings I digress. The point is I have some low rated ABEC bearings made in the US, cheap junk but they work but as a company that supports a team of 12 that blow through boards and bearings I know how much quality Chinese goods have and will last.

As well there is nothing good about Chinese skateboards and soft goods.

They are importing Canadian and American hard rock maple and constructing there inner plys from domestic Russian and or Chinese maple which is pure utter crap. The wood needs to be often enough resin impregnated. You might have to go to a skate shop and ask to see a Krooked board and or Enjoi...The quality is fair but how can you judge a skateboard decks quality when it's designed to break?

I've done extensive R&D into off shore manufacturing and have taken apart layer by layer some 40 boards over 2 years and have found everything from worm holes, to cleverly matched plys that are made from bits like a puzzle, akin to particle board as well as expanded wood cell structure naked to the eye. That is because of the environment the tree is from. American wood is denser do to the longer winter and more agreeable growth cycle.

Anyhow China is not the answer.

Here is why. If (hypothetically) Loaded tries to sell boards there, there will 30 companies making a board like Loaded in ten minutes after there boards hit the shelves. No us company besides a technology leader can crack into Chinese Triad distribution or services. They must first sell an unfair of domestic distrobution, retail rights as well as they must partner with a Chinese bank for $22-30%. This is why no major US company is over there. Chinese banks want to own use interest outside of China hence the bail out of the stock market and todays dow spike. Sorry that is a reality and it will fall apart but a complete other rant all together.

Unless you want to be leaned on so hard that there is no profit. The only way a skate company can survive in a land where there is no contracts only handshakes is you must meet there quota of sales or production. Otherwise you got to ship your product out to developed markets. China is not a developed market. Try in 14 years if they don't get into a shooting war with India or Russia which if you read Janes Monthly and The Economist looks like China is going to war in the near future....why? They are a country of no real renuable resources, zero conservation and a ruined interior since the 1890's when it's populace just about ate it all up. Besides a few tree farms, for making cheap import wood goods China buys a majority, some 87% of it's wood from Russia, Canada, India and other Asian countries.

A Chinese middle class family is more interested in sending there child abroad for a western education then buying them a skateboard.

In the last 3 years the Chinese goverment has built skate parks, they go unused. As well the Chinese lobby real hard with Canadian companies, hence a contributing factor to the Canadian stock market on the rise and there strong dollar which took everyone by surprise.

Right now China looks good, however it is a myth and the dragon is loosing it's steam.

Why else would they need the business when the cost of doing business there is worse then dealing with the Jersey mob?

[tomahawk]

i always find it funny how people bitch about a communist country beating them at capitalism.

PWNED is all i have to say.

all this complaining about human rights, sweat shops, etc etc is also funny. how else do you think we industrialized? how do you think the entire western world managed to reach the modern age?

1)on the backs of the rest of the world
2)by exploiting workers, polluting massively, etc etc.

read your history book, the industrial revolution was not a pretty thing.

and many years later when the rest of the world is catching up, theyre going through the same growing pains and problems (some would say less pains and problems) the western world did about a century ago. and we have the arrogance to bitch at them??

[tomahawk]

A Chinese middle class family is more interested in sending there child abroad for a western education then buying them a skateboard.

i just want to comment on this point because i have the most experience here.

1) china/india are producing more engineering and science degrees than the US

2) I am working with a post-doctoral researcher here at UC Berkeley who got her Ph.D from UC Davis, and went to a university in Beijing (dunno the name). I've discussed her undergraduate education, and they learned more, and more practical skills as well, than i did at UCLA, which isn't the best, but isnt a shoddy school either. When i asked her why she's doing a post-doc at UC Berkeley, she answered that a USA Ph.D isn't good enough anymore to get a good job in China.

3) My friend has essentially grown up in America, but his parents moved from china to the US when he was young. we were discussing stuff, and he mentioned that if his parents had a choice of moving to the US now as opposed to during the 90's, they probably would have stayed in china. for reference both his parents are engineers.

the rest of the world is catching up

[msk]

MSK I respectfully disagree with you on two fundamental points. The USA per capita consumes nothing compared to the China Government... Remember that two thirds of the population lives in huts with no power at all... Wake up bro! the majority of resources are spent assimilating other technologies by gov. funded buis. COMUNIST...

The various estimates I've seen put the Chinese population without electricity between 10 and 20%, not 66%. But just for the sake of argument, let's go with that 66% figure. That still doesn't change the fact that there are still more people producing only about the same level of pollution that we do. Even if we completely eliminate the "two thirds of the population [that] lives in huts with no power at all", that still leaves us with a lot more people than there are living in the US. The fact is, we're still the #2 polluter in the world, and only by a slim margin, and doing it with a lot less people..

The average worker makes $3 a week... wether it is skateboards or disk drives... I have been there for the last five years and seen the crap...

The average salary of a factory worker there is actually quite a bit higher ($75-$80 per week). And keep in mind that the poverty line in the US is around $11,000 a year, while in China its less than $500. Someone earning what in the US would be considered "slave wages" can afford a place to live, a car, and still have disposable income.

Number 2 They have no regard for air Land or water polution standards USA or international...
They are killing their people and the environmont And do not care if you live or die from it Harsh but true

China has been passing a lot of stringent pollution laws in the last few years. Admittedly, enforcement will be a problem, and it'll probably take a while before there is significant compliance. But this isn't really any different than what the US went through a few decades ago. I can still remember, as a kid, living in the foothills and still not being able to see the mountains most of the year, and having the schools shut down several weeks out of the year because it wasn't safe for anyone to be outside. China is currently where we were in the mid-20th century.

Right now, the government is waking up to the fact that wealth and power don't matter when it comes to pollution. The ones in power still have to breathe the same air...

As to bearings I digress. The point is I have some low rated ABEC bearings made in the US, cheap junk but they work but as a company that supports a team of 12 that blow through boards and bearings I know how much quality Chinese goods have and will last.

There are Chinese factories producing stuff that is on par, and sometimes even better, than what is made here. You generally don't see that because the main reason most companies source from China, maximum profit for minimal expenditure, is lost when when importing higher end goods (especially when dealing with goods that have a higher materials to labor cost)...

A Chinese middle class family is more interested in sending there child abroad for a western education then buying them a skateboard.

Maybe you didn't catch what the first post in this thread was about? There is a huge, and still growing, market over there for higher end sporting goods. Sure, they would like to send their kids abroad for an education. But they can also afford to buy them a skateboard or a bike as well...

[sk8norcal]

I My biggest problem has been Safety gear! I cant find USA made Knee and elbow pads

prodesigned and pain cheater

[sk8norcal]

Global Manufacturing – The China Challenge

http://www.jimpinto.com/writings/chinapricing.html

[BigDaddy@TactisSkates]

The various estimates I've seen put the Chinese population without electricity between 10 and 20%, not 66%. But just for the sake of argument, let's go with that 66% figure. That still doesn't change the fact that there are still more people producing only about the same level of pollution that we do. Even if we completely eliminate the "two thirds of the population [that] lives in huts with no power at all", that still leaves us with a lot more people than there are living in the US. The fact is, we're still the #2 polluter in the world, and only by a slim margin, and doing it with a lot less people..



The average salary of a factory worker there is actually quite a bit higher ($75-$80 per week). And keep in mind that the poverty line in the US is around $11,000 a year, while in China its less than $500. Someone earning what in the US would be considered "slave wages" can afford a place to live, a car, and still have disposable income.



China has been passing a lot of stringent pollution laws in the last few years. Admittedly, enforcement will be a problem, and it'll probably take a while before there is significant compliance. But this isn't really any different than what the US went through a few decades ago. I can still remember, as a kid, living in the foothills and still not being able to see the mountains most of the year, and having the schools shut down several weeks out of the year because it wasn't safe for anyone to be outside. China is currently where we were in the mid-20th century.

Right now, the government is waking up to the fact that wealth and power don't matter when it comes to pollution. The ones in power still have to breathe the same air...



There are Chinese factories producing stuff that is on par, and sometimes even better, than what is made here. You generally don't see that because the main reason most companies source from China, maximum profit for minimal expenditure, is lost when when importing higher end goods (especially when dealing with goods that have a higher materials to labor cost)...



Maybe you didn't catch what the first post in this thread was about? There is a huge, and still growing, market over there for higher end sporting goods. Sure, they would like to send their kids abroad for an education. But they can also afford to buy them a skateboard or a bike as well...

First of all... The smog you are talking about is in isolated climate zones such as LA and other vally locations.... the rest of the country enjoys high air quality and is lacking the truly deadly toxins you will encounter in the water, air, food and products in China. They also have terrible quality and manufacturing controls and suffer the highest recall and quarantine rates of any nation. Don't let your kids lick a Hotwheel....

The wages you defined only work if the employed has steady work.. Hitachi global storage media for example offers their engineers and labor workers ONLY one term of two years employment and then they are laid off for a new lower wage earner... I have been there many times and have been shipping them equipment for over 5 years to most of the major china based US and Japan owned co. as in most comunist countries you will only hear what they want you to hear.

I will agree with you on the growng market for an emerging class of people in the inner cities that can afford luxury items... But I would hardly call it a luxury lifestyle for the average person in china.

I am enjoying the chance to share some of my experience in doing buisness there with you and I am not trying to change the topic of the thread. I am Just a little more than anoyed with companies that buy or manufacture in china and then market themselves as green

Dano

[sk8norcal]

saw on Frontline this tuesday,

'young and restless in china'
FRONTLINE: young & restless in china | PBS

you can watch it online.....