With a potential for 400 million customers, the young fashion scene is a huge market that is attracting several players, including trade show organizers. Coupled with the tremendous economic growth of the country, the government's one-family/one-child policy has created a new generation of youngsters with reasonable purchasing power and a desire to imitate Western street and fashion lifestyles.
Catering to this vast new segment of the overall fashion and sports market, the organizers of Chic (China International Clothing and Accessories Fair) are proposing holding a new salon in Beijing that could replicate the success of the Bread & Butter show. Called Chic Young Blood, it would take place in Beijing on Sept. 27-29, showcasing around a hundred international brands as well as up-and-coming Chinese designers and brands. The fair would have four sections - Sport & Street, Denim Force, Tasty and Must-Haves. Ideally, it would like to have on board brands such as Adidas, Nike and Lacoste L!ve.
Chic would continue as a more mainstream fashion fair, held annually in Beijing in the spring. The 19th session of this exhibition, held on March 28-31, claimed more than 110,000 daily visits over its four-day duration, including 50,000 on the first day. It hosted nearly 1,000 different brands, 320 of which were grouped into national pavilions, on more than 100,000 m².
Very positive reports have appeared in European fashion trade journals about Novo Mania, a new young fashion fair in Shanghai organized by Novo Concept, a Chinese wholesale and retail group, and a company in Hong Kong called More Solutions. With more than 600 stores in China, Novo has launched 15 different action sports and casual fashion brands in the country, and it currently works with some 50 different brands in the sector including Adidas, Nike, Evisu, G-Star, Replay and the fashion brands of Italy's Sixty Group.
Described as a Chinese version of the Bread & Butter exhibition, the Novo Mania Asia fair grouped some 120 brands in its second session on March 9-11 including Billabong, Circa, Eastpak, Lacoste L!ve, Puma, Vans and Wesc. In 2012, the organizers want to turn Novo Mania into a twice-annual event for about 300 brands, moving it from the Shanghai Mart to a 25,000-m² space in the modern Shanghai Expo fairgrounds in the Pudong section of Shanghai that hosted the first Ispo China fair.
Animated by lively music, fashion shows and skateboard contests, the latest Novo Mania counted 11,158 visitors. They were mostly young consumers, but there were reportedly also several Chinese retailers, many of whom showed interest in starting up new single-brand stores and shop-in-shops for these and other action sports and casual brands, especially in new shopping malls.
Some 300 new large and small shopping malls are scheduled to emerge in China over the next three years, the reports indicate. The bigger projects include Mega Mills in Shanghai (90,000 m²) and First Mall in Nanjing (520,000 m²), which are due to open later this year, followed by Galaxy Mall in Beijing (360,000 m²), as well as Hopson Fortune Plaza (300,000 m²) and The Mixcs (400,000 m²) in Shanghai.
Run by a 34-year-old entrepreneur born in Hong Kong and educated in London and Chicago, Alan Fang, Novo Concept is an 8-year-old group with an annual turnover equivalent to €230 million. It manages 650 stores and shop-in-shops in some 50 cities across China, mostly as franchised and joint venture mono-brand operations. Hosting many different young fashion brands in leased spaces, including Quiksilver, Roxy and Vans, its Novo department stores are located in seven shopping malls and measure between 3,000 and 30,000 m². Some have an Apple Store or an integrated movie theater. Two others, each measuring more than 30,000 m², are due to open soon in Beijing and Chongqing.
